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Published: August 17th 2015
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The bike path along the national park
The Danube is to the left, then wetland or forest, vehicle track, bike path and forest again. The access cuts a swath through the forest for many kilometres Raining!!! Yes, finally the temperatures have dropped with the rainfall overnight and we left Vienna in with raincoats on at just after 9am. From our hotel on the north side of the river we were soon out of the city and biking along through very nice suburban houses. That soon disappeared and we continued biking along the Danube on the stopbank for many kilometres until we unbelievably got lost on a straight stretch. We believe it is the same place than Cherie and Dan also lost the turnoff a few years ago. 8 kilometres later we got ourselves back on track and found the turnoff to take us through and OMV and Shell Tank farm before turning onto another stopbank which took us through a long narrow national park. We did get a stop for coffee and tea at one small village along the way when a group of 33 Italian cyclists turned up. We left at that point in still drizzling rain. On and on we biked with a tail wind, flat path and pretty much straight all the way. We were averaging 20km/hr so faster than our normal 18 or 19. And it was COOL. What joy to bike
Some of the reconstructed building of Carnuntum
The reconstruction is superb and gives a real insight into life in a Roman town 1700 years ago in weather that is not hot!
The National Park is basically a long narrow band of wetlands and trees alongside the Danube River to preserve birds, turtles, vegetation and fishlife. There are many access routes in for people wanting to picnic or fish but one dedicated road for biking. It was like having your own highway just for bikes. We hardly saw many cyclists all day apart from the Italian group. You could say it was a fairly long and boring ride but it was enjoyable after all the hot weather we had had.
Eventually we turned off the trail and took a bridge through the National Park wetlands and eventually over the Danube on a 2.5km bridge. We came to a town called Bad Deutsch-Altenburg which is a spa town and also has a Roman Museum. We had lunch here and then couldn’t find our way out to the bike path. After a few wrong turns we went back and asked someone who sent us off on the main road to Petronell. Something didn’t seem right so Neil got out the GPS and it seems we were on the right path. I asked another guy for instructions
and sure enough we were ok. Eventually we arrived at Petronell, a small town not far from the Danube and the Slovenia border. The area we had been biking on since the bridge is well known for it’s Roman archeological sites.
After settling in we headed off for the main archeological site of Carnuntum in Petronell. It is essentially straight across the road from the hotel. What a great place to visit. The remains date back to 308AD and the Austrians have reconstructed parts of it back to it’s supposed original format. During it’s hey day 50,000 people lived here with all the necessities and luxuries of the time. Recontructed were a two houses, shops, kitchens, gardens and bathhouse. They had been beautifully done and you could imagine actually living there – not what we normally see which is just the remains tidied up a bit. These were newly constructed with all the flooring, painted walls, frescoes, furniture, etc, as if they were still occupied. The bath house was spectacular and had heated and running water through underfloor heating. Seeing these homes made me realise that we have gone backwards over the years and while our houses might seem
modern they don’t actually serve the occupants as well as these ancient ones did. I could live in one like that now with a few adaptations. We only had a couple of hours to spend there because it closed at 5pm.
Our day finished with the usual drinks and dinner at the hotel which is a small family run hotel with pretty small rooms but comfortable enough.
What was supposed to be a 49km day turned out to be 62kms. So much for an average day but at least it was cooler.
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