July 7, 2015
Bernkastel to Trier
The day started reasonably cool, though we weren't early. Breakfast at our hotel doesn't start until 8:30 and the bike storage doesn't get unlocked (it did get locked last night) until 9. But eventually we were off. And eventually it got hot.
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At 15 km to go to Trier, we were ready to be there. There was a headwind and for the next 5 or so km, we were riding through ugly industrial outskirts. At one point, I was wondering about a familiar smell,but couldn't place it until we came around a corner and hundreds of huge bundles of empty plastic bottles were visible. The smell was bottle depot.
We finally crossed the bridge into Trier and followed the signs to the city centre. I recognized the Porta Nigra from photos on other CGOAB journals.
We passed through, looking up, and then found a cafe for cold drinks and decisions. Happily the cafe had wifi, with a 30 minute limit. We were having trouble finding reasonably-priced accommodation online, so we tried searching with our Garmins. The trouble with GPS searches is that they only provide the location and name (and not always the name). There's no distinction between 5-star hotels and ratty motels, other than what you can guess from the name. It took us over an hour but we finally ended up at Hotel Aulmann, 95€ including breakfast. Coming from Bernkastel, where every second building if not every building is a hotel, this was a clange.
Although Hotel Aulmann was billed as a 3-star hotel, there was no air conditioning or ceiling fan and the room was quite warm. We escaped to the Hauptbahnhof to see what our options were while the info office was still open. Today is Tuesday, we need to be in Ulm on Friday afternoon, and Trier isn't worth two days to us. Perhaps there was somewhere on the way suitable for a stopover?
The young woman in the DB information office was very helpful. She suggested Heidelberg and it seemed like a good idea to us. Not much of a detour so let's do it. We don't have time left on this trip to cycle anywhere we had specifically wanted to go, ... so why not Heidelberg?
We had dinner at a cafe on the old Marktplatz. We splurged on the 30€ menu: a salad with scampi, grilled "Argentinien Rumpsteak," and a dessert that included "mascarpone parfait" and raspberries soaked in Amaretto. It was very good, but what the Germans call "Rumpsteak" bears no resemblance to the cut sold by that name in Canada. It's more like sirloin.
We washed this all down with a bottle of sparkling water (it's funny paying for water in a restaurant but they treat it like wine, often with a cooler bucket and stemmed glasses) and a half-litre of Dornfelder. I immediately recognized the wine I'd had during the night watchman tour in Dinkelsbühl and I will need to have it again before I leave Germany. Rieslings are all very fine, but I prefer red.
Back to our overly warm hotel room to open all the windows and try to sleep.
Today's ride: 74 km (46 miles)
Total: 928 km (576 miles)
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