Cruising down the Rhine at 13 knots, pacing the cruise ship: St. Goar through Boppard and Koblenz to Kobern-Gondorf - Poking Around Europe on our Bikes Germany and France - CycleBlaze
Cruising down the Rhine at 13 knots, pacing the cruise ship: St. Goar through Boppard and Koblenz to Kobern-Gondorf
We had a fabulous day today. The infrastructure for bikes here in Germany is truly amazing. There are bike paths everywhere and most of the time they are completely separated from traffic if not in a completely different place. It is such an economic driver in this part of Germany as well. The accommodations are called bett and bike and are all set up for cyclists. Our hotel in St. Goar even had a bike pump...unfortunately a schrader valve when we have presta, or vice versa, I am not sure. That is the chief navigator's department. At any rate, it was a nice touch, even if we had to wait until Boppard to pump up the tires. The weather today was overcast (what my Mom calls cloudy bright) and perfect for riding.
We were in Boppard less than an hour after leaving St. Goar, and finally resolved the German SIM card issue, so Keith is happy to have data again and we can phone within Germany, so we may find that helpful. We wandered around the town centre, checked out the church and enjoyed another bakery. I think it is safe to say we won't lose any weight on this cycle tour.
Then it was on to Koblenz. The bike path is so well marked that we only made one misstep when the chief navigator's faithful companion (moi) missed a sign because she was rubber necking at the awesome homes. We stopped at Deutsches Eck and admired Kaiser Wilhelm I and then carried on down the radweg (bike path). Once we crossed the Mosel we were into vineyards and views. I will let the pictures do the talking.
We stopped for the night in Kobern-Gondorf and after dinner went for a walk and discovered a wee alley up to a turret. Keith thought I had disappeared down a hobbit hole for a minute. Then he thought I was trespassing. I had to point out the sign before he would follow. Our B and B is charming and we even have a spare room for stuff. We are not missing the tent at all!
The only disappointment is no wifi, so the blog is a day late. I am posting this from a perch in front of the tourist info center, so pictures will follow from a more comfortable spot.
Keith pumping up the tires with a real pump instead of a toy one.
These vineyards we estimate to be about 40 degrees. According to the guidebook the steepest is 68 degrees. It must be really interesting to harvest the grapes. Maybe next year we will come back to pick grapes.
