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Published: August 1st 2023
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I woke a few times overnight and heard the air conditioner going, then I remembered we didn't have one, which meant it was raining persistently overnight. And the morning was no different.
We left around 8:30am with the rain still falling. At least it wasn't too cold. The forecast predicted rain for most of the day with a chance of thunder storms. Not ideal.
The day was meant to be all on the river today. We made good time considering the conditions and had ridden 23 of our 60kms by 10am when we rode into a town and spotted a coffee shop. We figured we could use a coffee (and cake as it turned out) and stopped for our morning break - probably for longer than we should have but it was dry inside.
Jeff was using Google Maps to navigate and while I had it open on my phone I was also using my Eurovelo Maps on my GPS. They differed on route selection continuously. We ended up following Google Maps.
By now the rain was steady again, and after about an hour we ended up going down a dirt road. The problem was that it
had been raining all morning and the dirt road was more like a mud road. There were also trucks going back and forth to a quarry which just made things worse. And then to top it off I got a puncture. So there we were in the rain, trying to change a tube with our bikes on the side of the dirt/mud road with trucks going back and forth. No fun at all.
We managed to finish up and push on, but we didn't seem to be where we needed to be. The road became so bad that we couldn't ride the bikes anymore. Each step we took our shoes buried about 4cm. The mud was caking on to our wheels and disk brakes and chains and everything. We could see the path we were meant to be on so we just pushed our bikes over to it thru a paddock. We stopped there and used our water bottles filled from the puddles around us to try and get the mud off our tyres and brakes. After about 30 minutes we managed to get the bikes ridable and we pushed on.
We got to the next town with
only 10kms left to ride and stopped for lunch. It was only 1pm but it felt like we had been going all day.
As we reached the outskirts of Bamberg Jeff noticed a car wash and we thought what a great opportunity to clean the bikes. I had been dreading another episode like we had at Flemmings in Frankfurt.
Someone had to show us how to use the carwash. We were putting our dollar euros in the slot and nothing was happening. We didn't realise we had to buy tokens and put those in the slot. 3 x tokens later and our bikes and bags were cleaner than when we left in the morning. We got to our hotel at a respectable 2:45pm.
First point of order was to buy a new tyre, the ones I had bought new in Melbourne were basically crap and now both had been replaced. I certainly hope that spells the end of my tyre issues.
We walked into the old part of town for dinner. On the way there and back we spent time looking at the magnificent buildings, bridges, squares and statues. It really is a beautiful town. If
I ever get the opportunity it would be good to spend a few more days here.
Distance travelled today: 60kms (plus 5kms riding around Bamberg)
Distance travelled so far: 1,785kms
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Mike1234
Michael Carra
Bamburg, what a town.
So many beautiful towns in this area. Great photos. Are you going to Munich? Neushwanstein castle is a must see if possible. Safe travels