May 5, 2022
Day 22: Hann. Munden to Warburg
Mountain Bikers
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Just like kids, who supposedly can be cured of begging for ice cream by giving them unlimited access to it , our eis bechers (mega gelato treats) spared us wanting to eat anything else last night, and almost this morning too. We may also be cured of eis, at least until maybe Austria, or maybe when it gets warm, like ok, next week?
We did have a pretty big incentive about eating breakfast this morning. That's because the hotel had made an arrangement to serve its breakfast in the church across the courtyard. Say what? Yes, the church of St. Aegideon, which was first established at that site in 1379 and which had been renovated as late as 1964, fell into disuse and was deconsecrated in 2006. However in 2011 it was reborn as a cafe, a little like Alice's Restaurant, I guess. Interestingly, in 2019 it launched a new concept - Church plus Cafe. Their new slogan is along the lines of God is great, but we really love Espresso!
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We said goodbye to our interesting hotel around the corner from the eis cafe and across the courtyard from the Church of the Ten Jammer. It's only defects had been highly flaky internet and a lamp that would not light.
We hung a right past the eis cafe and headed once again into the altstadt, in search of a bakery to find lunch stuff for on the road. In the Rathaus square there was now a small market. Veggies looked really good, and fruits too, but of course it is still too early for local field grown things like strawberries. We did also get a closer look at the rathaus facade, which is very colourful.
We dawdled around in town so long that Joshi's Electronics Store, on the high street, hit its opening time. It was a small store jammed with stuff, and I had hopes Joshi would have my camera battery. But no. Well anyway I have ordered two (they're cheap!) from amazon.de and sent them to our friend Manni in Austria. We'll be at Manni's in not too long. Surprisingly free delivery did not extend to Austria. In postal terms, the EU is still all separate countries.
Yesterday when I wrote that the Weser splits at Hann. Munden, I did not understand the situation. In fact two rivers - the Fulda and the Werra -meet at Hann. Munden and become the Weser. So by reaching Hann. Munden we really and truly had cycled the Weser from the sea to the source.
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As we had scoped out routes for this trip back home, we saw that we could come South up the Weser, but we did not see how to continue and ultimately reach the Rhine. With a bit of checking (way too little, it turns out) we saw the "Hessian Route - R6", which heads down to Mainz. Only thing, the R6 begins about 70 km east. So I simply whipped up an algorithm (never say "algorithm" to Dodie!) and made a route over to there. Simple.
We (and the algorithm) began by passing a series of what looked like mansions on the bank of the Fulda on the west side of town.
That was fun, but then the algorithm swung up into the forest. By up, I mean UP! You can see it on the track at the top of this page. There was some debate within our team, such as when I would begin a sage observation with "When we made this track", and Dodie would retort "Whaddyya mean we!". But in fact Dodie very gamely proceeded up the mountain. She observed that the forlorn forest looked like good fairy tale territory, and she took care not to go flying on the extensive loose gravel.
For my part, I looked on in horror as the charge bars of my battery toppled like bowling pins. Our heavy and heavily loaded, minimally geared, underpowered (on purpose) and with small batteries (on purpose) bikes were really not designed for prolonged ascents. And although we did have the gpx track to keep us company, we truly were in the middle of nowhere.
Then at one point Dodie missed a turn and we descended some gravel track for a km and a half before it got caught. Dodie just did not have the will to climb back up, so she scanned ahead for a way to rejoin our track without doing that.
We were bumbling forward on that general mission when a sign appeared by the side of the road. Google Lens told me it was recounting the story of Sleeping Beauty, and recommending that we go see her castle at Sababurg. Why did this sign pop up when we thought we were just generally lost in the forest? It turns out we had stumbled onto the "Fairy Tale Route", and soon we encountered signs with its characteristic crown logo.
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Following the signs, we before long bust out of the forest, and had a view of Niedermeiser in the distance.
Niedermeiser was a nice town, in fact every town we have seen in this region is stuffed with beautiful half timber houses. But, our dilemma was still to find an effective way back onto our track. We developed some ideas, involving jumping on some innocent looking (on our map) yellow roads.
We were heading for one of these roads when a "road angel" appeared out of nowhere and asked where we were headed. At first Dodie was reluctant to talk, because once you have your head in the GPS and think you know where your are going, you just want to get on with. But the man was enthusiastic and persistent, and so we met, no kidding, Peter Grimm. We told him we were a little lost, like Hansel and Gretel. Peter thought about our dilemma, suggested a route, and offered to guide us part way.
We are always reluctant about a guide on a bike, because they always jump ahead and we spend the time desperately trying to keep up. But Peter understood this, and promised to stick with us.
I am not sure if this was stricly the most direct way, but Peter first led us to his house, where he showed us off to his wife, who hung out of an upper window and joined in the discussion about the best route. We then proceeded with Peter this way and that, until he pointed us on our way.
Peter denied any lineage from the Brothers Grimm, but he had another special quality. He was about our age, with grey hair and of course, a German accent. An enthusiastic man of about that age with grey hair and a German accent is exactly how we most remember Dodie's dad, Walter. We loved Walter so much that anyone who is even vaguely like him takes us back. Walter passed away in 2005, and it seems like yesterday. It's not quite fair to Peter, who had his own stellar qualities, but his appearance and turning our thoughts to Walter gave Meaning to our Lives today.
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But we were not "out of the woods" yet, as our route continued to climb ridges and to pass through forests. Speaking of forests, the stacks of cut logs look like very nice hardwood. I am guessing their species as elm. Experts, what do you think? Here below are the trees and the leaves.
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http://www.tree-guide.com/european-beech
2 years ago
Out in the woods, it was still not a cake walk. A fork in the road like this should be easy to deal with, except that the GPS track is not always snapped to the trail, meaning it takes a little time to see if you have chosen the correct way.
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The only thing, even after a whole day of ups and downs, the hills were not about to let us go. As I looked at the range estimate by my bike dip lower and lower, I pedalled in lower and lower gears, quickly settling on "1", and with the lowest possible assist. Up hills, I found this often had to be "Tour", which is the level above "Eco". Spinning away madly like this, I patiently ground my way up too many long slopes. Dodie, with a slightly more powerful motor and battery had an easier time. Part of this was that she refused to look at or worry about the range. No case of the famous "range anxiety" for her.
Warburg, our destination, was built on a hill, of course. We entered the town in the lower portion where I think the Aldstadt was. Dodie was for going to find it. I was for going to find the hotel. We went for the hotel, which was up, yes, a long hill.
The hotel Zeit Geist turned out to be a modern one, with an actual real elevator. Today, I appreciated that a lot. We have turned down their overpriced breakfast, particularly because there is a bakery across the street and a Penny grocery next door.
The internet here is good, and we quickly began to look for where we would stop tomorrow. It was clear that only a little over 50 km was the limit of my range, if it was going to be in hills like today. So we began to ask ourselves what the terrain was really going to be. We found a description of the Hessian R6 online, and it was full of praise for the challenging forests and hills to come.
Dodie responded by beginning to look for shortcut routes, and we actually found the first one, and locked it into the GPS. Then we proceeded to look further down the route. That's when I said "You know, this is stupid". "Why would we want to spend six or more days fighting heavy bikes up and down a bunch of gravel hills in an unknown countryside". Dodie said she had rather enjoyed the challenge today. I said, it's only 2 1/2 km to the bahnhof, even if it is up a damn hill.
So it looks like tomorrow we will take a short circuit, and hop the train to the end of the Hessian Route - which is Mainz.
We might use the days saved to make a dash for Venice, later in the trip. Or we might "squander" them on shorter days. Although we did meet our first two self imposed deadlines (for Cuxhaven and for Hann. Munden) it did feel like a bit of a race.
Today's ride: 51 km (32 miles)
Total: 1,286 km (799 miles)
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Dodie was very polite about my casual route choices.
One really despicable thing is when a gpx track is not snapped to the roads but only vagues points the direction. Dodie does really hate that one.
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