May 30, 2014
Day 31: Rothenburg to Dinkelsbuhl
With the warning about the large tour group that we received from the hotel staff yesterday, we reported to the breakfast buffet five minutes before the start, at 7:00 a.m. We did in fact beat the rush, which took about twenty minutes to really hit. The buffet, though, while good was disappointing - lacking soft cheeses, fruits and vegetables, and offering only white buns. I developed the idea that the quality had been downgraded to match some package price that the hotel had given the group. This turned out to be accurate, because after we had hung around for a bit - going to the post office to mail home our latest treasures and sorting yesterday's photos - the tour group left and the real breakfast stuff came out. No problem, by then we were hungry enough to have another shot at it!
From our table we could again look out at the Tauber valley, and we could see the stone bridge that had figured in the story of the surrender of the city in 1945.
We left town by a south gate, remarking that (as Rick Steves has dubiously claimed for Nurnberg) when you are inside the walls, the city and the world outside might as well not exist. Actually, despite a shell station right outside, the modern town was quite pleasant as well, and it evolved out to rolling green countryside.
The Romantische Strasse, naturally is not just an advertising concept, but also a signed route, one for bicycles and one for cars. So we made the acquaintance of our new sign, that we would be looking for on the signposts. As usual, there are lots of bikeways, going every which way and often sharing a route with others for a while. Our first sign had not only the standard green on white direction indicator to the next large town - Feuchtwangen - but also the indicators for seven or eight other routes aside from our own.
Although there was no rain - only a lot of cloud - the temperature was strangely brisk at about 10 degrees. We have long ago mailed home our long finger gloves, and begun to forget about our heavy hoodies. Now these golden oldies were back on our minds.
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Aside from the chill, we merely rolled easily from town to town. Some days ago, Dodie's bike computer sputtered and died, the victim of too much yanking on the wire entering its connector base. So in Feuchtwagen, when we tripped over a family bike shop/sporting goods store, we popped in to see if there might be a new base, somewhere in a drawer. They did have the expected drawer of orphan parts, but no base. so we bought the cheapest new computer, only to cannibalize its base. 18.50 euros is quite a high price for a base computer, but this was just a little neighbourhood store.
Outside the store we ran in to five (at least) guys, who were touring with 16" Bromptons. They were French and German, and had met each other and organized the tour through a Brompton users' forum. We really wanted to get to Dinkelsbuhl, and so did not take the time to analyse which models they were using, or to give them the usual grilling all about their tour. We did learn that they had started near the Bodensee and were heading for Wurzburg.
Out of Feuchtwangen, the radweg does some doodling around, criss crossing the direct car roads. Dodie poo pooed that and used her maps and GPS to find a way directly to the camping, using very quiet back roads. This saved about 15-20 km, and got us here in no time! Yeah!
The camping is the standard luxury affair - by a lake, with a restaurant. The tent place is a large lawn by the lake, with picnic tables. However, we have gone one step further and stuck our tent in our favourite spot - the table filled giant beer tent. No morning dew for us.
We still have sandwiches left over from breakfast, but will cook some tortellini instead, and use the sandwiches for breakfast tomorrow. The campground will have fresh bread at 8, but we hope to be gone long before that. We have a tour of the town brochure for Dinkelsbuhl, and hey, they even have their own night watchman tour. Nono, we need to get back to actual cycling for a bit!
Today's ride: 47 km (29 miles)
Total: 1,719 km (1,067 miles)
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