August 21, 2022
Day 12: To Hemmoor
Throughout the trip so far we had been trying to plan a couple of days ahead to make sure we knew we would have places to stay, but today we woke up without knowing how much we would be cycling or where we would be staying, due to our route change yesterday. There were no hosts within range and we didn’t want to cycle a long way after yesterday’s 40 kilometres, so we avoided thinking about it, took things easy and spent the morning in the nice garden.
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When we did leave at midday it was in the direction of Hemmoor where we knew there was a campsite. Now it was either going to be a short day to there, or a bit longer and a wild camp. The ride there was a bit of a slog into a headwind with tired legs and our pace was certainly not as fast as yesterday!
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2 years ago
There was a really nice place to take a break in Hemmoor but before we got there Kevin began to cry. That made up our minds to take the short day and just go to the campsite, but first we took our two hour break. It was at a lake in the town that had a beach and a beach volleyball court. We couldn’t really make use of either because of our little boy, but there was also some nice shaded grass and we took it in turns to go for a swim, promising to come back here one day when Kevin was old enough to play. “It’s ages until he’ll be able to play volleyball well enough not to just be annoying though,” I sighed.
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It was a few kilometres to the campsite and it was almost a disaster when the place I thought we could cross a railway line turned out to be a stepped bridge impossible with our trailer, but luckily it just meant we got to cycle on a very nice quiet road beside the railway line before crossing it further north.
We found the campsite and got ourselves a good spot in the shade quite far from any other campers. Our hosts from the previous night had told us that it was an unusual campsite because it was next to an artificial lake with very clear water, which was popular with divers, and it did seem that most of the people were here for that reason. There were people in wetsuits everywhere and oxygen tanks and things hanging on poles. It was because this area used to be an industrial region making cement and the lake was a big quarry that had been turned into a lake. Apparently the dive sites were to old machines and things left underwater.
We walked over to the lake and I had intentions of going for another swim, but we were surprised to find a sign saying that swimming was forbidden due to “lebensgefahr”, a lovely German word meaning “life danger”. Somebody should really tell all the divers!
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We had a nice afternoon and evening at the campsite. It was actually quite nice to not be reliant on anyone’s hospitality and to just be able to relax completely. I even found another secret lake round the back that nobody else seemed to know about. There weren’t any signs forbidding swimming here and I considered going in for a dip, until I saw a giant crab on the bottom and reconsidered.
“Lebensgefahr!” Dea remarked.
Today's ride: 16 km (10 miles)
Total: 487 km (302 miles)
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Thirty-seven years ago, my wife and I took our one-month-old son on a 1,000 mile camping trip for a few days. As far as I could tell, he loved it. That trip was via automobile though. I did not know about bike touring back then.
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