Bedburg - Porz: across the Rhine again - A Flanders Fling 2017

June 16, 2017

Bedburg - Porz: across the Rhine again

Our hotel used to be the site of a mill on the Erft River. It might have been nice to follow the river for a while, but the route charted by the bikemap website was more direct. And we thought why not.

Our hotel, Bedburg Mühle, displaying an old millstone from the building's past when flowing water was used for energy.

We had never cycled in this area and were looking forward to what kind of countryside our route would take us through today. I found it fascinating every day to discover what the reality would be of the route that I had planned on an abstract map, like opening a package wrapped in brown paper and not knowing what was going to be inside. Today we were in for a surprise and it was indeed fascinating - but perhaps if I had known where our route was going to take us, I would have planned it differently.

We were feeling great and were soon on a fantastic bike path. But whoa, what was that ahead? And we kept getting closer and closer. This was beginning to feel threatening.

We rode directly up to and circled around the power plant at Niederaussem. The closer we got, the more menacing it felt. From a distance it looked relatively inocuous but the emotional impact came when we got up close.

Here are a few facts that I picked up in the Internet:

The Niederaussem power station was built between 1963 and 2003 and is operated with brown coal. With a total output of 3,396 MW net, it is the second most powerful power plant in Germany. With CO2 emissions of 27.3 million tonnes, the power station caused the third-highest greenhouse gas emissions of all European power plants in 2015. The power station has the second highest cooling tower in the world with a height of 200 meters.

And I had never before heard of Niederaussem, nor did I notice the power plant on the map when planning our route for the day.

The giant billowing clouds are not just steam. According to information from the Environment Agency, the Niederaussem power plant in 2012 caused the following emissions: 50 kg of arsenic, 280 kg of zinc, 500 kg of mercury, 11 t of fluorine and 140 t of chlorine compounds, 480 t of fine dust, each 6,000 t of sulfur and carbon monoxide, 18,000 t of nitrogen oxide and 28 million tonnes of carbon dioxide.

The second highest cooling tower in the world is part of the power plant.

We were relieved when we could leave Niederaussem behind us. I wondered how it felt to live in one of those nice little houses we saw in the village Niederaussem. For me a distressing thought.

Directly next to the power plant is the village Niederaussem.

Our path was good and we were approaching Cologne through its suburbs. When we reached the city we noticed we had to watch out. We had a clearly marked bike lane all the way, but cyclists, pedestrians and traffic had become more hectic, less considerate. We cycled straight to the Rhine, glibly riding past the Cologne cathedral, and only stopped to take some pictures when we were on the bridge.

We stop on the bridge over the Rhine for a shot of the cathedral - which we had visited on earlier stays in Cologne.

Hello, old friend Rhine, we're back again.

At the beginning of our trip in Düsseldorf we cycled across the Rhine, today we cross it again.

On the other bank of the Rhine we can follow the Rhine Bike Path.

There was a better choice of moderately priced hotels outside of Cologne and we found something in Porz which was on the Rhine Bike Path. It wasn't exactly a classy neighborhood but the hotel was excellent.

Today's ride: 45 km (28 miles)
Total: 912 km (566 miles)

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