Day 43 - Melting in Melk

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Today we are riding to the town of Melk. It's a short 46kms from Grein along the Danube. The next 3 days are all relatively short as we make our way to Vienna.
The ride out of Grien is under blue skies with the promise of hot weather ahead for the next couple of days. With such a short distance today we are really taking it easy cruising gently along enjoying the view.
It's Sunday, and as we pass through little towns it's as if they are ghost towns with other cyclists the only other people we see. We are also down to base rations as the supermarkets were closed last night and we didn't have breakfast at the Pension this morning.
Our morming break is in a quiet little town were we luckily find one industrious cafe owner open for business. She is doing a healthy trade with mainly cyclists as cliental. By 9:50am the temperature is already 29C and getting hotter.
We continue our ride along the river and wind through some farmland. We are definitely in rural areas now with less activity between the towns. The heat is getting stronger by the minute, the only relief we feel is by the air movement we generate from cycling.
As we approach Melk the massive Abbey dominates the place sitting on the hill above the village. We arrive at Melk at 12:30pm, well before official check-in time of 2pm but thankfully we are allowed into our rooms. After we shower and change we go out exploring seaparately. I keep to the shadows out of the direct sunlight walking slowly because it is so oppressively hot. Despite the heat, the main attraction here is the Abbey which must be seen to be believed and that means climbing up the hill. I do so ever so slowly.
The Abbey itself is amazing and has been recently restored. It has a rich and intricate history intricately woven with the Market town below it. We are staying at the rooms of the Madar Cafe Restaurant situated in the shadows directly beneath the Abbey.
It has not been lost on us that we have been complaining about the rain and cold and once we finally get some hot days we're wondering which we'd really prefer. We're very glad the next few days are short so we can have them finished before the worst of the heat of the day.
Tomorrow we ride 42kms to Krems.

Distance travelled today: 46kms
Distance travelled so far: 2,356kms

The blog site I use, Travelblog, still hasn't fixed the issues with photos. It's receiving plenty of flak from the bloggers that use the site. I'm hoping it will be fixed soon. Til then, I'll keep posting the photos to face book with the link to the blog.

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Photos

That's our hotel behind the fountain
The one on the left