On leaving the campsite outside Maurik I was soon back up on the dikes, following the river towards Rotterdam. The riverbanks are quite pretty along this stretch, although it is very, very flat. Having cycled along the dikes for a few hours, I kind of understand the whole windmill thing now. Being totally flat, the […]
Cologne to Xanten and on to Maurik
Day 12 began pleasantly, cycling along the river bank through Cologne. The weather was warm, even early in the day, but the riding was pretty easy so not much of an issue so far. The river bank passes behind the famous cathedral which was hit 14 times by bombs during the second world war. It’s […]
Koblenz to Cologne
Well I hadn’t had a puncture for a few days……until very first thing this morning, before I’d even left the campsite. I had locked my bike in a secure cage on the site over night, but by the time I got it back to my pitch to load up, the front was flat. So off […]
Bacharach to Koblenz
Having woken at 5am, the first thing on my mind was a bath. So I leapt out of bed and almost fell over. Somehow in the night my legs had decided that they had had enough. Staggering to the bathroom I managed to run a bath and soaked for a good hour. It was bliss […]
Karlsruhe to Speyer and on to Bacharach
As I am way behind on blogging and these two days were fairly uneventful I have combined them into one. The plan for day 8 was to have a fairly easy ride to Speyer, dump the tent and bike at a campsite about a mile outside town and walk back into town for something to […]
Strasbourg to Karlsruhe
Another pretty uneventful day’s riding. The ground was pretty flat, chugging along by the river for the most part. The scenery again was pretty, without being remarkable; I have felt a distinct shift though in the river. Apart from being a lot wider here, from Basel on down to the sea, it is navigable and […]
Basel to Strasbourg
Awaking on the campsite to sunshine was quite a novelty after three days of dour weather. I had a good chat with another English cyclist who was heading in the opposite direction to me, swapping advice about what was ahead. He was riding a reclining bike so fearful of the hills to come. I set […]
Schaffhausen to Basel
Having fled from the worlds weirdest hostel quite early I hit the road. My plan for the day was to visit the Rheinfall (The largest waterfall in Europe) and then head directly for Basel. The weather was grey and overcast, slight spits of rain in the morning, but nothing too bad. Even from half a […]
Konstanz to Schaffhausen
Having made use of the bathtub, yet again, I headed out looking for a bike shop for my poorly bike. She was not in a good state; The new front panniers which I had bought for this trip had snapped on both sides and were only hanging on by the top clips. The new rear […]
Bad Ragaz to Konstanz
I awoke to the sound of rain on my tent at 5am. By 6am it seemed to have cleared away nicely. I swapped onto my last spare tube and I was keen to hit the road, but I had to wait until 9am when the local bike shop opened so that I could grab some […]