May 2, 2022
Day 20: Hameln to Hoexter
Ashenputten!
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Yesterday I was toying with the notion that each of the Grimms' fairy tales, and not just those with a town name in the title, would be linked to a specific place. And if so, there would be an opportunity for a Fairy Tale radweg. Well duh, it exists, of course. Dodie found a wealth of information on it last night, when she should have been sleeping. A fast way to see all about it is in the Wikipedia artcle.There we leaarn that the route was created in 1975, runs from Hanau to Bremen with a couple of branchings, and covers 600 km!
Hameln is of course a stop on the route, and we set off into the altstadt to find a Pied Piper, or maybe some residual rats. The Hameln altstadt is very extensive, and has a wealth of interesting houses and official buildings. It would have been worth it to book our nice apartment for another night and to spend a day walking around. But as it was we took our bikes and just swooped around.
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We did find the Piper, and a few brass rats embedded in the cobbles. It turns ot there are daily performances of the fable at the Hochzeit Haus, with musical accompaniment from a carrilon, but the first of the day is only at 1 p.m.
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1 year ago
1 year ago
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We returned to the Weser and were again immediately struck by the beauty of the river, the town along it, and the surrounding fields. The bright yellow rapeseed (which is called "raps" in German) sets off everything and makes it cheery.
Our track does not specifically match with the Fairytale Route, but there are some towns that are common to both. One, which Tricia Graham had already alerted us to, is Polle, the site of the Cinderella story, and featuring the castle where presumably she attended the ball. Cinderella in German is Ashenputten, a name we rather like.
I was a bit disappointed that the castle is a ruin, but Dodie sagely pointed out that Cinderella was a long long time ago. In fact Cinderella's castle is Everstein Castle. The first mention of the castle is from 1226. It was the home of the Everstein dukes. In 1493 it lost its military use. After that, a portion of stones from its walls was used for the construction of a different castle, and it became a ruin.
We continued along the river and it really was a glorious ride. For some reason we were both feeling rather tired today, but for the first time in the trip we had no periods of freezing. In fact we took off almost all our heavy clothes and really enjoyed being rid of them. Because of this we nominate our Reason for Living today as "Sunshine on Our Shoulder", which will be a familiar theme for any fans of John Denver.
Normally I would pop in a link to John Denver performing the song, but I am writing this with very limited internet, so any readers are spared that, and actually lots of other photos, and topics. The basically non-internet is just one frustration we are having with the "Hotel Corveyer Hof" here in Hoexter. Or small room is amazingly decorated in all black - black walls, black curtains, black bed headboard. Mated with a tiny window, it's kind of a prison cell. We tried showers to cheer up, but there was pathetic pressure and a long wait wait for any hot water. Also not so cheering is our bill here. I see they charged 11 euros for breakfast and an additional 4 1/2 euros for beverages with that, on tp of a hefty room rate that on Booking was more than what they had posted on their door.. Let's counteract any bad vibes with a peek at the sunshine we enjoyed on the trail today.
And for good measure, one of those beautiful (non-native) Egyptian geese.
Today's ride: 73 km (45 miles)
Total: 1,160 km (720 miles)
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