What an unexpected day we had today. Lots of climbing, historical sights, a big miscue on the route and we are cosy tonight in a completely different place than we expected to be. It was epic!
We had fog this morning - the weather gods are throwing everything our way - so we lingered over coffee until the sun was out and the riding was good. As we left the hotel Keith warned me that he was trying a new GPS track on his trusty Galileo app. That explains what was to come. He did say it was going to be an interesting day.
We started climbing right away. The views were amazing.
We started climbing right away. After peaking with the wind turbines we dropped down into a village where we enjoyed three different unexpected sights of the day. At this point in the morning things seemed to be going quite smoothly. We were taking Elizabeth's advice and following the secondary highways for the most part. There was almost no traffic. We knew where we were.
First unexpected sight...the fire department, complete with trucks, hoses and equipment. This was a small village...they have a lot of firefighters!
And finally, in the unexpected department, we had triathletes going in the other direction on the road. The race had originated in Bosen and the swim portion was in the Bostalsee.
We arrived at the Keltischer Ringwall without any drama. Lots of climbing to get there though. We decided to ride the bikes up to the wall, and what a sight it was. It is one of the biggest fortifications the Celts ever constructed. It was astonishing to think that they were building it in the 5th and 4th century BC with substantial work done in the 2nd and 1st century BC.
This gives you an idea. It was huge! Thanks Elizabeth for the suggestion to go see it. It was awesome.
It was after this that the route planning went a bit crazy. Here is the Chief Navigator's version: "The CN did not have quite enough time last nite to properly plan a route to Trier. He also recently discovered a new feature in the App he uses where the App can generate a route with turn by turn directions. So why not try that today. So into the woods we go eventually getting great first hand views of the bases of the wind turbines. Typically these things are planted and grow on ridges or hill tops which some people like to avoid with fully loaded bikes. So we bailed from our Trier goal and are now at a beautiful spot called Kell am See. We are staying at a Hotel situated on a bike route that will result in steady downhill ride into Trier tomorrow."
The GTW (that's me, the Go This Way device he brings along) followed him gamely. It was quite an adventure and when we finally ended up on a paved bike trail I thought I had died and gone to heaven. Unfortunately, shortly after that the CN said to turn right and the next thing we knew we were climbing back up and into the forest...at one point the nicest German man stopped to let us know we were going nowhere, but we forged on. He was right by the way. Finally, we decided to bail to the highway and to Kell Am See which was only about nine km away. I did point out to Keith that it had only been five km away when we were on the bike path.
We sat down to have a beer the moment we arrived on the hotel terrace overlooking the Radweg. We are in the heart of German mountain biking territory here and the hotel caters to cyclists. They have a free map of the Ruwer-Hochwald Radweg, and we discovered that had we just stayed on it we would have easily been in Trier tonight. We really laughed. Especially when the people Keith had chatted with on the path sailed by on their bikes and waved at us.
So we have done over 2000 metres of climbing in the last two days, we have been wined and dined and the wifi is slow. The pictures are taking forever to load. I can't keep my eyes open, so once more they will have to wait until the morning.
Shortly after that the GPS took us on the mountain goat detour. We aren't sure even now exactly what this bike path sign meant, but we saw it throughout and it wasn't encouraging.
I ran up to this one to give it a sense of scale. Riding through the forest with these moaning all around you, and the shadows flicking around was a bit weird.
Wee then went down and down to this bridge. This is much steeper than it looks. Keith was amazed I was able to push my bike up the short steep piece on the other side. We both feared we would immediately start climbing up the other side of the valley, but nope, this time it wound around the forest. The whole ride was beautiful, just unexpected.
We have just had a great breakfast at the Hotel Zur Post, where the proprietor told us immediately to make lunch for the road and showed us where the lunch bags are to put it in. The hotel caters to cyclists and has the Radweg running immediately adjacent. Then he gave us a huge bottle of mineral water and two new water bottles. We feel pampered. We also received a bike route map and learned from him that the sign we were confused about means mountain bike route. That explains a great deal about yesterday. We are having such a good time! https://www.relive.cc/view/1166554817
Today's ride: 49 km (30 miles) Total: 263 km (163 miles)
