Day 11: To just outside Hüll

August 20, 2022

We had planned to take the main road from Itzehoe to Glückstadt but Holger and Sandra advised us to take an alternative route instead. This proved to be good advice as it took us on very quiet roads close to the river Stor and it was excellent cycling. Being off the bumpy bike paths and on a decently paved road also meant we could cycle at a decent pace and we made it a record 17.5 kilometers in just over an hour before our first break.

We took our break on a patch of grass beside the church in the village of Borsfleth. It was memorable for a couple of reasons, the first involving baby poop is one that you probably don’t need to hear more details about, the second a random meeting with a woman from Sheffield, England, who now lived here. I asked what had brought her to Germany and she said she had adopted three German children and then got three more children. She was happy to see Kevin and said she was awaiting her 16th grandchild any day now. Then just like that she was gone off down the road and Dea and I agreed that her story about how she came to move from Sheffield to Borsfleth was one that could have done with a little more explanation.

Our first cycling session had been so good that our second only required pedalling six more kilometres and we were at the ferry in Glückstadt. Actually, we just missed the ferry, the barriers coming down as we rode up, but that was okay because the next one arrived five minutes later. Bikes went on first but just as we started walking on one more car appeared coming off the ferry and we had to reverse slightly. As we did so Dea’s front derailleur inexplicably got completely mangled by the chain. “I’ll just take it off,” she said. Sensible girl.

The ferry took about fifteen minutes to cross the very wide River Elbe. Kevin was awake so we took him out to watch. It was a bit windy and some water splashed over the front of the boat so we retreated a bit to the middle and enjoyed the crossing. As we approached the far bank of the Elbe we realized we had lost something very important due to the wind that left us feeling quite upset. I will now post a photo Dea took of me at the start of the ferry crossing and one she took at the end, and see if you can spot what we lost:

No no, not Kevin! Good lord, no! He was just in the trailer in the second photo. What we had actually lost was the lovely orange flag that Dea had spent quite a bit of time making for this trip. Well it was now floating off down the Elbe towards the North Sea and there wasn’t much we could do about it. I tried making a new one from one of our hi-viz vests, but it wasn’t quite the same.

We took a break on the far side of the ferry until Kevin got tired again. It should have been an easy five kilometre ride from here to the campsite where we had planned to stay on the shore of the Elbe (and miracle of miracle might find an orange flag wash up) but to get there we had to cross a bridge over an inlet of the Elbe. Holger and Sandra had told us that this bridge was often left up for boats and we might have to wait a while before it was lowered for us. We could see from where we were that it was up so I rode over to it to try and find out when it would close again. Unbelievably it wouldn’t go down until five pm, some four hours away. It was only down a couple of hours in the morning and evening, the rest of the time it was impassable by bike, despite being part of a signed bike route. Well, the whole hour we were there we didn’t see any boats sailing through. We did see at least half a dozen cyclists ride up to it, look bemused, and cycle away again though. Stupid Germany.

This misfortune meant our five kilometre ride to the campsite would be a 12 kilometre ride to the campsite via a longer route. But we realized if we had to cycle that extra distance we might as well cycle it in the right direction, and instead of looping back around to the campsite we could just keep going west. There was a “one night tent” garden available 16 kilometers away and we thought we would be better off aiming for that, do all the distance in the right direction, and save ourselves 20 euros into the bargain. There would be no chance of finding our lost flag, but to be honest there had been no chance of that anyway because the campsite was upstream of the ferry crossing.

There was a risk to the plan though which was that we would be cycling another 40 kilometre day, albeit by accident, and a 16 kilometre session in the afternoon. There was the potential for Kevin to have enough of the trailer and get upset. On the other hand, our average speed had been lot higher than normal, and if we could do this last session quickly too we thought he would be fine.

And it did go fine. There were some bumpy bike paths along the way that slowed us down but also some good ones where we could keep the average pace up and Kevin was really quite okay. He was even still sleeping when we got to our hosts just outside Hüll. Which, now I come to think of it, might have been how that woman from Sheffield came to live here. “We’ve found some children for you to adopt, just outside Hüll.” You can imagine the confusion.

Anyway it was a lovely garden, actually right out in the German countryside. There were chickens and fruit trees and a lovely old boat that had been sitting in the garden so long that things were growing out of it. We also spotted a little creature that was scurrying around in the leaves. It looked to us like some kind of small mole, but I really wasn’t sure what it was, so I’ll just post a couple of photos, and I’m sure Bill Shaneyfelt will let us know.

We had a lovely shaded spot nestled in among the trees and a very fine and peaceful evening. Our hosts were very friendly but get many guests and just left us to our own devices. Which, out of range of mobile signal, weren’t that much use to us, so we enjoyed the peace and quiet of the garden instead.

Today's ride: 40 km (25 miles)
Total: 471 km (292 miles)

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