Day 68: Lenggries to Munich

June 19, 2022

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The underground garage of our hotel in Lenggries was huge, covering the entire footprint of the building. Just leaving was a challenge for us, as the automatic door wanted to close before we could push up and out!

The Isar radweg started for us in a way that was very typical of the whole day - gravel in a forest, with not a lot to see. The Isar did put in a bit of an appearance. It was fast moving and clear, as befits a stream not too far from its origin, which is 50 km away in Tyrol.

The scene was slightly enlivened by a herd of goats

We arrived at Bad Tolz and looked at it from across the river. We had already been up and down the main street when we crossed here on the way to Salzburg, so we didn't have another try at going up and down (it's on a hill).

Beyond Bad Tolz, for a little bit at least, we travelled on paved path with a clear river view. This was the most pleasant part of the ride. But soon the route took us on an excursion away from the river and out to the west. This was pleasant too, since it brought us back to the Allgau style country of the Bodensee-Konigsee. That is, there were short steep hills leading to giant scenic farm houses.

We came to a point where the track intersected a straight, smooth, and quiet road. This road, said Dodie, was going our way, and did seem very quiet. But I am very leery of shoulderless roads, and this time we stuck with the official bike route. That route was immediately more of the gravel in the forest, and now it threw in some noticeable ups and downs. By "noticeable" down, I mean Dodie had to walk them for safety!

We popped out at the bottom of a steep gravel descent, and found a young couple with push bikes, thinking about making the ascent. They asked us what the path ahead for them entailed. It seems they were from Munich and had just hopped an S-Bahn out here, looking for a place to swim. While we stood there talking I noticed strange bat-bat-bet sound coming from behind some trees. I went to look and discovered many courts of people playing "paddle tennis" - something new to me. They were actually quite forceful about it, with lots of smashes.

Trail signage was very hit and miss, and at one point a "miss" brought us directly into someone's messy front yard.

So it was back to this, for km after km!

The track seemed to go out f its way to not bring us near any place that might have refreshments or any other retail service. In the heat, we were thinking about eis, but no luck. We did come to one spot that seemed to have some sort of refreshments, but the humans had piled onto it in a very unseemly way!

We continued up and down, on gravel often, or on road. Here below is Dodie holding up a car driver on a hill. She is loathe to pull over and stop, because then she has difficulty starting again. The driver here was in fact very polite. I had taken the photo for use in court, in case there was any sort of unfortunate "scene".

The route then decided to run us through sort of sterile suburbs. At least it was paved and flat!

An amazing 15 km from Munich we began to see people out along the Isar, swimming and sunbathing. The amazing part of the 15 km was that people lined the river for that whole distance. It was intriguing to watch them. We saw that essentially everyone had come by bike! What we did not see was the expected support for all the people in the form of biergartens, or other forms of radler treff. We even did not see a whole lot of porta potties. The people were just "out" there!

On one bridge across the river, in a spot with lots of bathers, Dodie came across a lady who was injured. She had gashed her leg with the bike pedal, somehow, an had tried to tie a face cloth or something over it. But our expedition carries a nurse and first aid supplies, so Dodie quickly had her properly fixed up, leaving her also with advice on what to do when she got home. This was Dodie's second nursing foray of the day. A little earlier she spotted a little boy in a child carrier on the back of a bike, looking extremely wilted. Dodie got out a microfibre cloth and water, to help the mother cool the boy down. Then she supplied some sustaining grapes, before we said goodbye to the little family.

The route continued with little tricks, like this 17% gravel descent! It's just routine for the Isar radweg.

There were more and more bathers, for kms and kms!

River fun continued right up to the feet of the city.

In time - a long, hot time - we turned off the river and into the city. Some of my first impressions involve the fact that unlike even Innsbruck, we did not encounter any large, fast, crowded car roads in getting into town. In fact, within the town cars were rather a non-issue. Perhaps it was because of being Sunday, but cars just were not a thing. Cyclists, of course, remained a menace!

We noodled our way into Marien Platz, the central square of the city. Our photos are more to show the crowds of people rather than the monumental buildings. At this point we were so hot we only wanted to find our hotel - no strength for even an eis, or the tempting "milkshakes" on offer at Five Guys!

One thing we did rather notice was the police presence in the town. We spotted at least a half dozen police cars or vans, just hanging around. And one police man appeared from nowhere and harangued us for riding our bikes , contrary to a no riding bikes sign he managed to point out, about half a block away. Ok mister, sure.

Our hotel is a goodly distance from the old town, more near the train station. But we knew that. And being in a big city, it is directly on the sidewalk. We pulled up to the near the front door and put our bikes on their stands. Normally we then send one of us in, to begin the check-in process. But the desk clerk beat us to it, coming out the front door and telling us not to park there. "Yeah, tough luck" was Dodie's reply, after 76 hot and dusty kms. Dodie went in, and the clerk's next gambit was to deny knowing of our reservation. I pulled up our message from Booking, showing that we not only were reserved but paid. Oh. Next about internet, he printed one of those goofy slips, giving a logon and password - for use with only one device. But we have four. It took a little longer for me to win that battle! (But I did).

I decided the clerk was a quirky but nice guy. I think he has some work to do to win back Dodie's approval!

Our old downtown hotel - the Bayernland.

What gave Meaning to Life today? Tee shirts soaked in the Isar, wrung out and put back on. So cooling!

Today's ride: 76 km (47 miles)
Total: 3,844 km (2,387 miles)

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Ben ParkeSounds like the isar Radweg south of München is just like it is going out to the airport: monotonous. It is at least pretty flat heading toward the airport. Stay safe in the heat, and hopefully you’ve got some more exciting cycling to come.
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