View from Two Weeks

Two ideas have been resonating around in my brain for the last two weeks. First , the trip has given me a sense of possibility. Two years ago we set a goal of going to Europe on two tandems and we made it happen. It was a huge task organizing our life around these four weeks, planning the route, learning about accommodations, arranging logistics and communicating the to all the people involved. It was not just our family either, family and friends pitched in to help as well. At the same time, it has been incredibly easy to snap back into the daily life of work, soccer practice, cleaning, maintaining cars, … While all these things need to be done, without the two year goal you will not carve out the hour to start planning or talk about how to approach the goal. All this makes me impatient to start the next big task although I have no idea what this should be. Another big vacation, a financial goal, extension on the house, starting a small business? The goal doesn't matter, I want to get started. The Europe trip has given me every confidence that our family can achieve whatever we decide to do.

Second, I have been struck by the history that exists in Europe. Not the history that exists in museums or dedicated historical sites but the history that exists around people as they live and work. There were many examples of cafes and stores working in the old cities right beside or in buildings that were hundreds of years old. People didn't visit history they live it every day.

Also, some of the cathedrals we saw took hundreds of years to build. I can't even imaging the commitment required to keep a project of that magnitude running from generation to generation. When you sit and stare at a building that took three hundred years to build, maybe you think that the deadline at the end of the day is not very important or maybe you think that you should try to achieve something as grand and lasting as that building. Either way it can't help but impact your view on the world.

August 23rd The Return Trip

Although the alarm went off at 4 AM to start our return trip, there were few complaints from the kids. We were ready to go home. Our driver was an interesting lady who, with her husband, ran a company that provided support to different types of productions. Essentially it sounded like they were roadies but not for rock bands. Since they were experienced in shipping and moving large productions, they also provided logistical support to missions. We had a very interesting conversation about her work and aid work in general. Time flew and soon we were at Schipol Airport arriving in the pre-dawn darkness. We wheeled our large baggage into the airport and once again met no resistance during check-in.

The trip to Dublin was short and soon we were back in a familiar airport. The kids mentioned how nice it was to be able to understand the language around them. We had a good lunch and boarded our plane to Washington Dulles.

The almost eight hour trip has afforded me some time to reflect on our trip and think about if I had accomplished what I had hoped for when I envisioned the trip.

The first thought is that the trip was difficult. Each day presented new problems, new challenges and a long day of riding. Some problems were similar day to day such as finding a place to stay and getting drinking water. Other problems were different each day such as bike problems, train scheduling, heat, rain, navigation and terrain. Each problem we faced and overcame and everything eventually worked out. Some days the problems were easy to overcome and sometimes they involved stress and arguments. While I had expected difficulties I expected it to get easier after a week or maybe two. It did not. While I was willing and even excited with the daily challenges and long bike rides other we not.

The trip was clearly a trip into uncharted waters. The more we tried to set a schedule and plan ahead, the more difficult it became to maintain the schedule. When we went 'off-schedule' it became more difficult in some ways but overall less stressful. I believe the trip is an analogy for many large, new endeavors in life that require a large amount of planning and paradoxically the abandoning of the plan on the first day of execution. Not performing any planning would result in not enough knowledge to react to changing situations and insurmountable problems. Even with all the planning we did, still so much is unknown that we faced daily challenges.

All this sounds very negative but my emotions are the exact opposite. The trip was surely not a vacation but an adventure. We learned and experienced so much that I don't even think we have begun to processed it all. I think it will take me a month or more to process it all. People were asking the kids what they liked best about Europe and they can not begin to answer the question. I think it will take the kids months maybe even years to sort out everything they have experienced.

I'm already feeling nostalgic and want to plan the next cycling trip. I'm more convinced than ever of the value of bicycle travel. While traveling by bike we experienced the culture, landscape and people of Europe. The rest or non-bike days were certainly more comfortable but we experienced far less. I will do more cycle touring in the future. The appetite for this type of adventure among the rest of the family is may well be zero or may higher with some changes in the trip format. The next trips on the horizon will be skiing and a return trip to the grandparent's cottages.

The trip was also much more that experiencing Europe. The time I have spent with my family and my kids has been so wonderful it is hard to describe. I have learned more about my kids than I have in the last several years. I will forever look back upon the hours of conversations with my daughter while riding through the Rhine valley as among the best experiences of my life. In bad and good times, I learned about the members of my family and love them more for it.

In a few weeks, I will laugh about the hills in Switzerland, the rain in Duisburg, the smells of farming and the Youth Hostels at the tops of hills. I'm already fondly remembering Xanten, Stein am Rhein, dinners in Konstanz and breakfasts in Emmerich. Who knows how the kids will view the trip in five years or what lessons they have learned.

August 22nd Packing Day

Today was quiet with most of the day being spent preparing for our return trip. Packing the bikes took about 4 hours and packing everything else took about the same amount of time. Making the transition from bike to plane travel requires repacking everything. Imagine dumping everything you have on the floor and then deciding where it should be packed. This was pretty close to what we had to do. For most of the day our room was a mess with piles of stuff all over the place. We also had to discard many items that were useful on the bike part of the trip but not as useful going forward. In the end we had what we started with two bike boxes and four suit cases. In addition to this we had a pile of trash.

We went to bed early to prepare for the 4:00 AM alarm.

August 21st Trip to Amsterdam

We were able to borrow a car from some relatives and make our way (GPS assisted) to a local train station and on to Amsterdam. Amsterdam is a beautiful city but we didn't have such a great experience. We went on the standard boat tour of the canals. The buildings in Amsterdam look all the same at first glance but as the boat tour progressed, they started point out some of the architectural features and suddenly they all looked different.

We did make a wrong turn while leaving our boat tour and these left us in a decidedly un PG-13 alley with a number of 'coffee' shops. We quickly left the alley and wandered through the streets. We stopped into a souvenir shop only to find it was also R and likely X rated as well. Only later did we find out that we were in the worst part of Amsterdam. Leaving the boat tour, we should have turned right when we turned left. While this may be true, the regular people walking the streets didn't give us the impression that this was a seedy area of town. Also there were very respectable stores in the area.

To us the souvenir shops reflected what tourists thought of Amsterdam. On the same rack you had souvenirs of the red light district, the 'coffee' shops, wind mills and canals. These items were generally weighted towards the first two attractions. Also the average Dutch person didn't seem phased by it at all. It was just the way it was. To me it seemed sad that a city with beautiful canals, fascinating architecture and fantastic museums is known more for the Red Light district and coffee shops. I guess the Dutch believe these are two parts of the same whole.

Links to Pictures

I've had many requests for pictures. Here are a few albums I have not published.

2009-08-06 Koln to Remagen

2009-08-18 Loerrach

August 20th Utrecht to Amerongen

Our overnight train was direct from Basil to Utrecht and arrived at 8:30 AM. We didn't have a map of the area and had to make a decision if we wanted to ride from Utrecht to Amerongen or take another short train to Amersfoort. Taking another train would require transferring the tandems from one platform to another. Looking at a map of Europe it didn't seem like there was a significant difference in the distance from Utrecht or Amersfoort to Amerongen. We decided to avoid the hassle of transferring the bikes and ride from Utrecht.

When we arrived in Utrecht we were able to purchase a map and it was only then that we realized the trip from Utrecht was significantly longer due to the location of the train stations in the cities. In Utrecht the train stain was on the distant side of the city while in Amersfoort it was on the near side of the city. We decided to start our ride and found that exiting the train station would require traversing a set of stairs or a set of escalators. We have navigated a set of stairs with scary results so we opted for the escalators. They turned out to be virtually drama free. With a creative use of the front and rear brakes as you are entering and exiting you could control the tandems quite well.

The Netherlands have great bike paths in general but those leading from the train station in Utrecht were poorly signed. Construction in the area was the primary problem but it caused us to ride in circles for a while. After some assistance from the locals (some of which was incorrect) we found our way onto a bike path that lead out of the city. As with our past city experiences, we made our share of mistakes guessing in poorly signed areas or missing a sign indicating a turn. Overall it took us over an hour to make less than five kilometer of progress. Once on the open road we slowed by the fatigue caused by a night on the train. At about 3 PM we arrived in Amerongen and finally found our destination around 4 PM. We were not expecting a serious ride today but this trip has been full of surprises and today was no different.

We were glad to be back in the quiet calm surroundings of Amerongen. We were even provided the exact same rules as we had at the beginning of the trip. We ate a hearty dinner in the guest dinning room and went to bed early.

August 19th Second Rest Day in Lörrach

In the morning we made arrangements to store our bikes and baggage at the Youth Hostel for the day. We also decided to have dinner at the Youth Hostel and after dinner begin our trip to Amerongen.

We spent a second day in Lörrach shopping for most of the day. In the morning, we went shopping in Lörrach and purchased a few items. In the afternoon we planned to go to a castle in Lörrach but by noon, the temperature was already ready 37 C. Simply walking through the city was draining and the kids were getting cranky. Walking through a castle in the mid-day heat would have been unbearable.

We searched for places to take refuge from the heat. We were hoping for a film that had English subtitles but they were all dubbed into German. We spent some time in air conditioned stores but eventually headed back to the Youth Hostel. Most of the Youth Hostel was quite warm except for the table tennis room in the basement. We spent the afternoon, playing table tennis waiting for dinner and our 8:00 PM departure time. At 7:30 PM we retrieved our baggage, packed our bikes and left the youth hostel for the train station in Lörrach. The downhill trip to the train station in Lörrach combined with the quick arrival of the train meant that we were at the Basel train station at 8:00 PM. This train station proved to have the best facilities for our tandems with long ramps on each of the platforms. As luck would have it, we arrived on and were leaving from the same platform. Our schedule didn't require us to change platforms in the train station with the best facilities for our tandems. As I look back on our past train schedules, the train station with the worst facilities was the one with the 7 minute transfer time. Clearly the German rail system was working against us.

I enjoyed a bit of ribbing since I was the one pushing us to make sure we arrived on time. We arrived two hours early, a bit more than 'on-time'. Both the people and the bikes had reserved locations on the train. We were in one car, the bikes were in the next. The bikes needed to be properly outfitted with their tickets but I could not exactly which parts of our tickets to attach. A quick trip to the information stall allow us to clarify which out of the 6 tickets needed to be attached to the bikes. We purchased some food for the trip at a grocery store located in the train station and soon the train was about to arrive.

We loaded our bikes onto the train and found our cabin. The accommodations for both bikes and people were quite comfortable. Sleeping was interrupted when the train stopped at stations and I had some difficulties sleeping due to the heat. Overall it was a reasonable night sleep but was not great.

August 18th Rest Day in Lörrach

The day started with a simple list of things to do and once these were done, a few vague ideas on things to see and do. We needed to find a bank to get some cash and also book our train trip back to Amerongen. We also wanted to do some shopping, maybe see a castle in Lörrach and the kids wanted to play in the climbing forest.

The return train trip was going to be a bit complicated since we could not make the trip easily in one day. We would need to ride our bikes a few kilometers to the train station, take a series of trains to Amersfoort and finally ride the last 20 kilometers to Amerongen. The only connections available had us arriving in Amersfoort at 10:00 PM. Navigating from Amersfoort to Amerongen was going to be challenging during the day and impossible at night.

We had resolved to make the return trip in two days with an overnight in Düsseldorf. We first traveled from Lörrach to the main German train station in Basel. When we were leaving we forgot to pack the phone which would turn out to be a significant problem. We arrived at the Basel train station in about thirty minutes and were able to confirm with the Deutsches Bundesbahn (DB) that the two day trip would work. We now needed an Internet connection to make hotel reservations in Düsseldorf using my Priority Club points. Since we were in Switzerland we could not easily find a T-Mobile Hotspot and other Internet connections required a mobile phone confirmation. We returned to Lörrach and eventually found a T-Mobile Hotspot. There we were able to make the reservations and complete all our chores except actually buying the train tickets.

I returned to Basel to buy the tickets and the rest of the family returned to the Youth Hostel to experience the Climbing Forest. Both of our experiences were exciting for different reasons. We I returned to the train station, I went to the ticket counter to book the tickets. Everything was going smoothly until the transaction was almost complete. The two previous times I booked train travel, the distinction that our bikes were tandems was not important. I was going on this assumption but I though I should confirm my assumption. It was an important distinction on the IC trains but as I found out not on the RG trains. Tandems required special reservations on a IC train.

The agent was quietly furious with me for mentioning this at the last moment. She was relatively calm but her anger could be seen in the shaking of her hands. She first tried to make the reservations for the tandems but the tandem spots were full. She backed out the entire transaction, which required an extreme amount of stapling and stamping, and pushed my papers back at me.

“It is not possible” the agent stated.

“Can we try another route?” I asked

“I guess we can try” she reluctantly replied.

After some searching we found a night train from Basel to Utrecht and then a short train to Amersfoort. This was a change in plans but it had its benefits. The trip would require a total of two trains, the previous trip required four. The overall travel time was 10 hours overnight not spread out over two days. This meant we had an additional day before and after our train trip. The most important benefit was that the train had space for us and our tandems. I had the choice of a seats at no extra charge, a six person sleeping car for 20 euros per person, a four person sleeping car for 30 euros per person or a 2 person sleeping car for 60 euros per person. Not having any idea what sleeping accommodations were like on German trains, I choose the four person sleeping car hoping it would be reasonable.

“Do you want the upper or lower bunks” the ticketing agent asked.

“We are in a four person sleeping car?” I asked in a puzzled tone. Why would we need to choose bunks in a four person sleeping car?

“Yes you are in a four person sleeping car and there will be two other people in the car with you” Replied the agent.

“I'm booking for four people” I said as a pointed to my papers saying that I needed tickets for two adults, two kids and two tandems.

“I did not see this. We will now have to see if there is room for the two extra people and the extra tandem”

This further rattled the ticketing agent and she started muttering “this is not easy for me”, “you should have let me know earlier about the tandems” and “it is complicated to return train tickets.” Luckily there was room for all of us and our stuff on the train. After about 45 minutes I was booked on a overnight train with the two tandems. I instinctively ducked as I left the ticketing area, expecting a stapler to be thrown my way.

I returned to the Lörrach Youth Hostel to find the kids in the Climbing Forest. The climbing forest is a series of obstacles strung up between trees about 10 to 20 feet in the air. There were many different types of obstacles and a number of zip wires. The kids wore harnesses with two carabiners and traveler for the zip lines. The kids were to always to have two carabiners attached to the safety lines except when they were transferring lines. When they were transferring they would transfer a carabiner at a time. If they followed the rules the climbing forest was actually quite safe. The amazing part was that after a short instruction period, the kids were allowed to enter the forest without supervision. We of course made sure the kids followed all the rules. The kids had a great time climbing through the obstacles and especially zooming along the zip wires. I thought this was a really fun facility and really only required a sloped forest. I'm guessing facilities like this don't exist in North America because of different liability rules. After a few hours of climbing, the kids were exhausted and their hands and forearms were almost useless. The day ended with a good meal at the Youth Hostel, some soccer and a little bit of table tennis.

August 17th Bad Sackingen to Lorrach

We had talked about our plans for the rest of the vacation and today was going to be our last day of riding. Since there was no train station in Amerongen, we will need to ride the last 14 km from Amersfoort to Amerongen. All of the train schedules from Basel put us into Amersfoort after dark making a single day trip impossible. We resolved to travel first to Düsseldorf, stay overnight and then travel on to Amersfoort the next day. We also planned a rest day in Amerongen,, a day to tour Amsterdam and a day for packing. This filled up the rest of our vacation. Hard to believe that four weeks was over so quickly.

The day was going to be hot again and we wanted to get an early start before the heat of the afternoon. We rolled into Bad Sackingen determined to find a internet connection and locate accommodations for the night. We found an internet cafe and I started to work on accommodations. Alex sat down to watch a soccer game that was playing on a large screen TV and was promptly given a betting sheet. Most internet cafes in Europe are not nice places to sip coffee but rather associated with the darker side of the internet such as gambling. In about 20 minutes I had found a Youth Hostel in Lorrach about ten or fifteen kilometers outside of Basel.

Our bike map is occasionally annoying when the proposed cycling route goes through a pedestrian zone. Riding in pedestrian zones is not allowed but is not uncommon. We preferred to avoid the wrath of the Germans and usually walked. The tandems were unwieldy when they were being walked. They are easy to push but if they load is not properly balanced, the weight can quickly pull the bike down. If you try to recover by lifting up on the handlebars, the front wheel will lift off the ground and the rear panniers will pull the rear of the bike over. In order to recover, you needed to press down on the front wheel and push or pull the bike back to center.

Once out of town the riding was easy. We arrived within 17 km of Basel around lunch time and ate leftover pizza for lunch. As we approached our lunch spot, I noticed a bike sign for Lorrach which was also 17 km away. I didn't know for sure but I though Lorrach was about 10 km outside of Basel. We had to make a choice between the 27 km route to Lorrach through Basel or the 17 km route directly to Basel. The map indicated that more direct route would be travel next to a river most of the way and transitioning from one river to another. There was clearly a hill there but we could not tell how large it was.

We decided to go directly to Lorrach and deal with the hills. I purchased a new map so we could navigate our route. We followed the bike path signs only to arrive at a spot where Lorrach was no longer on the destination signs. Without the bike routs signs, we had to follow the roads. We started along a highway that had a nice bike path and gradually rose. The bike path turned into a gravel path, then a single track and finally stopped. We were about 5 km away from our destination but the road was a two lane road with 70 km/h traffic. Traffic was steady but not heavy. The road also pointed upwards and rose well above the river that ran beside it. It was also about 2:00 PM and the temperature was in the low 30s. We had to make a decision. Turn around and travel about 35 km to Lorrach or push forward on a highway over a hill of unknown size.

We pushed forward. At the beginning, we believed the hill would soon end and we pushed hard to minimize the speed difference between us and the cars. We looked up the road and thought the hill must end soon. We rounded the first corner, no crest, we rounded the second corner, no crest. Soon we were in our granny gear struggling to keep moving and the hill continued upwards.

Turn after turn the hill continued and soon we were sweating profusely. I stopped to let the other tandem catch up but there was almost no shade to cool us down. The other tandem had given up on riding and started pushing the tandem up the hill. As I found out later, the only thing that kept the captain going was the visions of new shoes she would have when this was all over. Our tandem continued riding and I made some interesting discoveries. First, when I furrowed my brow, I could squeeze a 10 to 20 drops of sweat out of the padding on the inside front of my helmet onto the road.

Second, no matter how many times I lifted my glasses to wipe my brow I could not keep the sweat from rolling into my eyes and causing them to burn.. After about 20 minutes of good work, my stoker was done for the day and I had to pull both of us and our luggage up the hill.

As the say, all good things must come to an end and eventually we reached the top of the hill and waited for the other tandem to arrive. The other side of the mountain was just as steep and we blazed down the other side. Not sure how fast we were going but the cars who had a speed limit of 70 km/h didn't really find a pressing need to pass us. One or two did pass and pulled slowly away from us. Amazingly we were close to dry by the time we reached the bottom of the hill. I guess descending on a hot day is much like standing in front of a blow dryer.

At the bottom, of a hill we saw the telltale sign of a youth hostel and turn off the main road only to be faced with yet another hill. Finally we arrived at the Youth Hostel. Our last day of cycling ended with our largest challenge. On a bike ride that seemed to present challenges each day, the last day was no different from other days.

We reserved two days at the Youth Hostel. It would not be possible to take the train to Amersfoort the next day since we needed to make advance reservations for the bikes on the trains. The kids were elated to find a soccer and table tennis available at the Youth Hostel and a climbing forest (more on this later) right next door. We unpacked and had showers.

After dinner Alex played soccer and table tennis with Sarah. The parents rested on the balcony that overlooked the outdoor table tennis facilities and soccer fields as the kids played.

August 16th Eglisau to Bad Sackingen

The ride from Eglisau to Bad Sackigen was only about 40 kms and the map indicated that there were no significant hills. After a hard day, even small hills seem large. It is Sunday and we had resigned ourselves to eating lunch at a restaurant because most of the grocery stores would be closed. We arrived in the town where we planned to have lunch. According to the map it was supposed to have at least one restaurant. We found the town and the restaurant to be closed on Sundays.

We moved onto the next town about four kilometers away. We were riding close to the Rhine with very few hills. As we approached the town, there was major construction on the banks of the Rhine and a detour. This detour lead us up the banks away from the Rhine to a major highway with a bike path. Along the detour we stopped for lunch at a small restaurant. We had a little difficulty conversing with the waitress who I believe spoke Italian and a bit of German. Regardless of the difficulties we ended up with another amazing meal. Our meals came with either french fries or salad. The kids selected the fries and the adults selected the salad. The side salad was more like a selection of five or six salads. My pork chop was perfectly cooked and the salads were amazing. I'm not a huge fan of salad but this was different. I'm not sure if it was our hunger, the fresh ingredients or the recipes but each of the salads were different and delicious. We also drank three liters of water with the meal which meant we didn't have to find an open store to get more water.

After our wonderful lunch, we finish our hilly detour and rolled towards our destination. After staying on the Swiss side of the Rhine a couple of nights, we decided to move back over to the German and hopefully save some money. I was able to find four separate rooms with single beds in a house for a very reasonable price.

The rooms were reasonable but not spotless. The owner was pleasant and took a great interested in our trip. The owners daughter was elusive and we barely caught a glimpse of her but knew she was their based on the typical teenager sounds (ring tones, talking and music) coming from her room. We went down to the Rhine for a swim and then had pizza for dinner in our rooms. A welcome budget day after our expensive Swiss excursion.

August 15th Stein am Rhein to Eglisau

In order to reach Basil in fur days we needed to complete about 44 km per day. Yesterday we completed about 30 kms. We left Stein am Rhein hoping to complete the mileage for the day and yesterday. We also wanted to see the Rhine Falls at Schaffhausen. They were described to us as the 'little Niagara Falls'. We got an early start and knocked some significant distance before lunch. Since we were moving well I thought it would be nice to have lunch at the falls. We purchased lunch supplies and rolled on with visions of having a scenic lunch watching the water falls.

The first problem we encountered was that the fall are not actually in Schaffhausen but a few miles past the city. Not much of a problem except when you have been promising a hungry hoard that lunch would be in Schaffhausen. We arrived at the falls only to be greeted by a 20% incline which required us to walk our bikes to the top. We arrived at the top of the hill only to find the whole falls area was a pedestrian zone. We parked the bikes, grabbed our lunch and wandered down to the falls.

The falls have a viewing area at the bottom and a railway bridge with two walkways at the top. The path to the viewing area leads across the bridge, along the bank on the far side to the viewing area. We walked out onto the bride and viewed the falls for the first time. While there was quite a bit of water volume flowing over the falls, but they were simply not that tall. Most of the white water was created by the water diverting around the railway bridge footing. Anybody who has seen Niagara Falls would not be impressed. Anybody who has seen the falls in the Ottawa or Potomac rivers would be slightly impressed. Since we all have seen all three we were not really impressed. We searched for a place to eat lunch and could only see one at the viewing area about a 20 minute walk away. This combined with the thousands of people visiting the attraction caused us to immediately give up and return to our bikes. We ate lunch in the shade of some trees and pushed on to our destination.

After lunch the heat of the day became apparent. It was approaching Washington in July (not quite Washington in August). In addition to the heat, the afternoon brought more hills. 32 or 33 degrees Celsius was not too bad on the flats when you are moving and generating a breeze. Climbing reduces your speed and increases your effort multiplying the heat. After a couple of uphill sessions, the two captains were sweating heavily. While we were hot we were not overheating and we were keeping ourselves well hydrated. To stay hydrated, we needed to drink quite a bit and we quickly ran out of water. Generally this would not seem like a problem on a Saturday afternoon but in Europe stores start shutting down Saturday after lunch for the weekend. We also travel smaller roads which means we don't encounter many gas stations/convenience stores. At 1:45 PM we found a small food store that was open until 2:00 PM and purchased five 1.5 liters bottles of water. We refilled our water bottles, drank some water, and packed two bottles as spare water.

After one of the larger sets of hills, we immediately descended back to river level. On our way down, we passed a restaurant that was playing music. It was rather strange until we reached the river where a party was in full swing. People were eating, drinking and playing games on the banks of the river. There were a number of inflatable rafts that held relaxed people who were lazily drifting down river. The contrast could not have been more stark. You could be spending a lazy afternoon on the river with a beer or sweating it out lugging your 100 lb tandem over hills. To add insult to injury, we were faced with yet another steep hill just as we rolled past a stall selling beer and barbecued brats.

We arrived at our destination city around 3:00 PM and started looking for a place to stay. We were told we would have not problems finding accommodations along the way. This was true. Accommodations are available but not necessarily easy to find. We found a map of the city and rolled to the information center. The towns information office was either closed or non-existent. We found the information sign but is was portable and didn't really seem to be related to any building or store.

Alex and I set out to find a some options. We walked into one hotel/restaurant and I immediately thought to myself that we not even bother to ask since it was so nice. I thought it may be a bit expensive but 490 Swiss Francs (1 Swiss Franc is about .95 US dollars) was way more than I was expecting. After seeing the shock on my face she said that she could let the room go for 400 but not less. We'll be sleeping in the forest before paying 400.

After a few inquiries we did find a nice, reasonably priced (for swiss standards) guest house. We had thoughts of trying to find a cheaper place but were too tired to move on. We found our rooms on the ground floor at the back of the restaurant and slowly unpacked. Soon all the empty rooms were filled and we were glad to have taken the rooms when we did. The amazing part was that they even had wireless internet and I was able to upload a number of blog entires. All in all it was our most difficult day on the bike... so far.

August 14th Konstanz to Stein am Rhine

We rolled out of Konstanz without knowing our exact plans. We wanted to reach Basel but we could do it in either 4 or 5 days depending on how much time we wanted to spend on the bike. There is quite a bit to see in this area. The Bodensee is a large lake where the Rhine starts. There is actually a large tributary that feeds the Bodensee called the Vorrhein (before rhine). There are a number of old cities, there are falls on the Rhine. We decided to simply follow the Rhine bike path and see what we would find.

We quickly found the bike trail and started towards Basel. We cycled along the Bodensee which was quite pretty but not spectacular. The Bodensee was extremely clear and clean. The bottom of the lake could easily be seen in 10 feet of water. As we left the Bodensee and started along the Rhine the Rhine was much smaller and cleaner than we had seen in other places.

We rolled through a number of small towns that were not very special until we reached Stein am Rhine. There was a city square that was surrounded by beautiful buildings each of which was several hundred years old. The buildings were architecturally interesting and were also painted. It made for an impressive surrounding. At the same time this city square was not a museum either. There were a number of small restaurants with outdoor patios and number of stores that were doing a brisk business. People went about their daily activities while we gawked at the buildings.

We stayed in the square for an hour using the time to buy a Swiss Army Knife for Alex and some post cards. We then rolled on and lunch on the banks of the Rhine just outside the city. We found some accommodations just outside of Stein am Rhein which was also a canoe rental center.

We spent the afternoon paddling down the Rhine in a 4 person canoe. The trip down the Rhine was pretty exhausting requiring about 5 hours in total. There was about 3 hours of paddling and an hour hour break to go swimming. At our canoe drop-off point, there was a 20 minute walk to the train station and about a 30 minute trip back to Stein am Rhein.

2009-08-14 Stein am Rhine

August 13th Heidelberg to Konstanz

The train ride from Heidelberg to Konstanz was relatively simple. The first train to Karlsruhe was quite full and we had to stand with our bikes. Luckily this was only about a 40 minute ride. We were struck by how unhelpful people were in general. There were a number of backls in the bike area. Which meant that our tandems were a tight squeeze. A couple of the seats along the side of the car were being used by regular passengers. They could have easily moved to other seats in the car but decided not to do this. They watched us struggle with the tandem as the train started and stopped and did nothing.

We had 30 minutes to complete the connection in Karlsruhe so there was no drama. The second train was full but didn't have as many bicyclist as the first. We were able to secure the tandem and after a few stops find four seats together. I wrote a number of blog entries and rest of the family read. Three hours went by quickly and soon we were exiting the train in Konstanz.

The Konstanz train station was under construction and there were no elevators. We lifted the tandems up the stairs and were suddenly in the middle of the city. Konstanz was quite a bit different than other cities in Germany. First there was a significant amount of Italian being spoken and it definitely had more of a Southern European feel.

McDonald's has be undertaking a smart strategy in Europe. Each of their stores has a cafe in it, which really reminded us of Starbucks, and all have intenet access of some sort (free internet access or T-Moblie hotspot). Since we are often in need of internet access we find ourselves at McDonald's frequently. While we are completing our internet tasks, we often have a coffee or eat a bit of food. All the McDonald's that we have visited have been absolutely packed. In Heidelberg, I expected it to be all tourists but this was not the case. The Konstanz McDonald's was also filled with locals.

We eventually found a place to stay and started on our short journey to our room. We rolled across the border from Germany to Switzerland without stopping. There was a border crossing but like all the other cyclists we just rolled on through.

It is very common in Europe to have a few rooms above a restaurant. The restaurant was in a small city close to Konstanz. It was a nice clean room. The restaurant was also very nice but was expensive. Switzerland is living up to its reputation. Since there was really no other place to eat, we had a fantastic and expensive meal at the restaurant.

August 12th – Heidelberg

I have been to Heidelberg another times in the past (three as I will find out later) and each time I have enjoyed the city. The first job of the day was to get our train tickets to Konstanz. The tickets were surprisingly cheap. 39 euros included four people and two bikes. We also had a transfer but this time with a reasonable 30 minute transfer time.

The primary attraction in Heidelberg is the Castle which was founded in the 1300 and expanded over the next 400-500 years. During a number of wars in the 1800s the castle was badly damaged. A fire shortly after this destroyed all the wooden parts of the castle. What is left is an interesting puzzle of walls, turrets, gardens and moats. There was even one section that was incorrectly restored in the early 1900s. Our guided tour was very interesting putting the puzzle together and explaining the sources of the different architectural styles that were used over the 400 years.

We ate our packed lunch sitting in the ruins of part of the castle and then wandered down to enjoy the old city. Heidelberg has many tourists and also many tourist shops. We purchased some small items and went on a boat ride.

In the evening we visited with relatives. It was interesting since they had a guest book that they wanted everybody to complete. In this book, I found the last two times I had been in Heidelberg. The second of these two entries said that this was the third time I in Heidelberg. We struggled to remember the first time I was there. Eventually we determine I had been there with my sister in 1982. I was struck by how a simple book could help us remember things in the past. The blog has been a struggle to keep up to date because it requires an hour or more a day to update. Add pictures to this and you likely have another hour. After realizing how quickly we forget some experiences I have renewed energy for the blog.

We returned to the Youth Hostel late in the evening and went straight to bed. Tomorrow should be a relatively easy day as we travel by train to Konstanz on the Swiss boarder.

2009-08-12 Heidelberg

August 11th – Mainz to Heidelberg

Today we needed to buy some phone cards to recharge our prepaid phone, look for a boat to take us to Heidelberg or Mannheim (about 20 kms away) and if the boat didn't work, get some train tickets to Heidelberg.

We had asked for the past few days for phone cards for our Ortel mobile phone. Other phone cards were everywhere but we could not find Ortel cards. We found a few locations on the Ortel website and started our search. We found one location that was not in the best area of town. Cards were procured and our mobile phone was once again operational after the Soccer ticket saga. In the mean time, the other tandem team was searching for a boat to Heidelberg. They found the information center and the friendly staff scoffed at the idea of a boat traveling to Heidelberg.

The two teams reunited and rolled on to the train station. After a very unsuccessful attempt to buy tickets using an automated machine, we found the Deutsches Bundes Bahn (German railway company) travel center and asked for assistance. Within 10 seconds, DB employee had selected my request on the automated machine and I was ready to pay. The attendant absolutely flew through the menus. So fast in fact that I could not see how to select the options I needed. Job preservation I guess.

While I did not learn the automated ticketing machine, I did learn the following bikes were not allowed on the fastest trains (IC), they are allowed on the second fastest trains (EC) but only with advance reservations and bikes were always allowed on the slowest trains (RG). Since we were booking on the day of travel it was not possible to travel on a non-stop IC train. We selected a route that required two RG trains with a connection in Darmstadt.

Getting to the track was easy since we able to put the tandems in the elevator. We were an over an hour early which was fortunate. We were able to watch our train arrive, load up and leave. It was especially useful to watch the cyclists get on an off. There are specific cars on trains that are allocated for bicycles and are marked with a picture of a bicycle on the outside. About half the rail car has fold up chairs along the wall with seat belts for the bikes.

When our train arrived, we were able to roll our bikes from the platform into the train. This was challenging competing with space from other cyclists, people with strollers and people with large bags. Once in, we were able to rest our bikes against the wall and secure them with the seat belts. We used a few of the folding seats on the other side to sit down. The first train to Darmstadt was relatively short and then we had to switch to another train to get to Heidelberg. The connecting train was leaving from another platform so we were going to have to move the bikes from one platform to another.

When we arrived we were able to eventually get our bikes off the train. It always takes two people to move a tandem in tight spaces due to the large turning radius. One person is at the front steering the bike and the other is at the back lifting the back wheel into place when a tight turn is needed. Once off the train in Darmstadt, we were confronted with a swarm of people trying to get on or off the train. We located the elevator and moved toward it. Several other bikes and strollers were in line ahead of us. As we got to the front, we realized that the tandems were too long for the elevator. The only option now was to lift the tandems up a couple of flights of stairs, across the upper floor, and down another set of stairs to the next platform. All this needed to be completed in 7 minutes which was not reduced to 5 minutes with the unsuccessful attempt with the elevator. Needless to say, we didn't make the connecting train. Overall it was not a large problem since the next train was coming in an hour.

We got onto the train to Heidelberg with a German riding a recumbent bicycle. I had a long discussion with him about touring and cycling. It was the first time on the trip that language really was not a problem. I have most of the common words well under control and of course the cycling vocabulary is very good since I use it every day when people come over to gawk at the two tandems. If the discussion wanders into politics, food, cars or another other topic, I have difficulty. It was a good feeling to know that my German was improving.

The odd time I will catch myself talking to myself in German. A sure sign that the German is starting to take hold. I have also found that my brain is, at best, a one language brain. As I start using German, I have difficulties with English words. There are those out there who would say my brain is really a 0.5 language brain since the English is weak in many places. I would not disagree.

We arrived in Heidelberg without any problems and cycled to the Youth Hostel that was relatively close. Some soccer was played, a load of laundry was completed and a beer was consumed (not all by the same person). We also made a family decision to travel to Konstanz by rail and ride from there towards Basel. We went to sleep with dreams of touring the Heidelberg castle and the old city.

August 10th – Oberwesel to Mainz

We once again took it very slow down the hill from the Youth Hostel, stopping a number of times to let the brakes and rims cool. Today we were trying to get tickets to a soccer game in Stuttgart. This turned into quite an adventure. Tickets for the VFB Stuttgart game went on sale the morning of the 10^th. We tried a number of times to get through but had a difficult time. As expected, soccer tickets are in high demand. We tried a number of times. Most times the call would not complete. Every 5^th call, the call would complete and we would be placed on hold. After a few minutes, we would be kicked off hold and we would have to start over again. After about 30 minutes of trying, we finally got through to the ticket line. Everybody did a little dance as we were finally talking to a person. I gave them my American address and they said that they could not send the tickets there. I asked if I could pick up the tickets at the stadium and they said that this would also not work. I was so shocked that they didn't offer ticket pick-up that I didn't know what to do. I hung up deflated. A few seconds later I realized that I could have had them sent to my relatives in Heidelberg. We tried to call back but we could not get through. Eventually we used up all of the money on the prepaid cards. We tried to use a pay phone but could not get through at all. Eventually we gave up but at this point it was after noon.

We ate lunch and started on the remainder of the ride. Usually by lunch time we have 20 or 30 kilometers completed but today we only had five. It was going to be a long afternoon. We started on our ride and had to decide on our path. In this area, the Rhine has bike paths on both sides of the Rhine and you can choose which side to ride on. The paths are not always equal however, sometime one side is asphalt and the other is dirt. Sometimes one side is under construction and the other side isn't. You rely upon maps and word of mouth to determine which side of the Rhine is best. As it turns out we choose the wrong side of the Rhine on this day. There was a long section that was dirt, a section that was under construction with poor detour signs and a very tall bridge with steep on and off ramps. All this added to our ride time. At least Mainz was flat so we would not have too walk up a long hill to reach our accommodations.

We arrived in Mainz and got close the our accommodations. Both tandems had separately rejoiced in the fact that Mainz was flat and that they would not have to climb a hill to get to our accommodations. We found a Youth Hostel sign and this pointed directly up a hill. While the hill was not really bad, both tandems were distraught when we were faced with any hill at all.

In the evening a decision was made to halt riding for a few days and take an alternate mode of transportation to Heidelberg. Rhine boat was the preferred method because of the view and the ease of loading tandems onto the boat. Trains were secondary because we were not sure how our tandems were going fit on the German rail system.

August 9th Bad Ems to Oberwesel

Leaving the Youth Hostel in Bad Ems required navigating the long down hill to the town. Since were riding along the Rhine, a relatively flat route, I didn't think we were going to need drag brakes. A drag brake is a large brake mounted to the rear wheel of a tandem. It is intended to deal with the large amount of heat generated while trying to slow down a heavy tandem going down hill. While the hill was not very long it was steep and we generated a large amount of heat slowing the tandems down. I rode about 1/3 of the way down and stopped. Before I touched the rims I could smell the brakes. The rims were very warm but not hot. If one is not careful, you can generate enough heat in the rims to melt the tires causing catastrophic tire failure, usually on the front tire. The catastrophic failure is derived more from the ensuing fall rather than the tire failure itself. If we go on a trip again, even on flat terrain, I will add drag brakes to the tandems.

Once at the bottom, we traveled along the Lahr back to the Rhine. Then along the Rhine to Oberwesel. Each day we stop somewhere along the Rhine to each lunch. The kids have taken to skipping rocks on the Rhine. Good skipping stones have been named 'Skipper Dans'. Exactly where this came from I don't know (neither do the kids) but skipping stones will forever been named this.

Navigation is now so simple, you barely require a map. Keep the Rhine within view and you really can't go wrong. Our only problem really has been wandering onto a walking path. We really didn't realize except for the stern corrections that we received from the Germans.

We arrived in Oberwesel only to find our accommodations once again at the top of a hill. Bad Ems was about 200 m high, today was closer to 300 m. I tried to avoid this but our map had the Youth Hostel in the wrong location. Instead of being on road close to the river, it was on a road that clearly had switch backs on it. While we can climb reasonably well with the loaded tandems, long steep climbs are too much and we had to push them up the hill once again.

The Youth Hostel was nice with a pool. Sarah and a very chatty German girl named Lea played in the pool for a hour before dinner. Lea spent most of the time trying to teach Sarah German. It was very funny to watch since Lea really didn't know much English. Lea would first ask me to translate then she would teach the words to Sarah.

“What is the word for nose in English” Lea would ask me in German.

“Nose” I would say in English.

Lea would then say to Sarah in English “The word for nose in German is Nase.”

This went on for about 40 minutes. Sarah found this exchange very confusing. Lea especially like those word that were the same in both languages. 'Bikini', 'OK' and 'Flip-flop' created a shriek of joy as she realized that the word was the same in both languages.

We went to bed early since today was a long day and tomorrow was also going to be a long day.

August 8th – Rest Day in Bad Ems

Our rest day in Bad Ems was relatively quiet. We made some reservations for future accommodations and went down to the city. Bad Ems is named because it has a hot spring in the town. Well I think they were more of warm springs rather than hot springs. 33 C is warm not really hot. The changing rooms were quite confusing. Everybody was went up a set of stairs to a large room with lockers. Our entrance ticket were able to release the keys for small lockers. There were also larger lockers and then there were small changing rooms which could be used as lockers for an additional fee. We found the showers that were divided between men and women but no divided changing rooms. Perplexed as to where we should change, we ended up using the 'change room' lockers and then showered before entering the pool. On the other side of the showers was a large pool much like an indoor swimming pool in North America but with no diving boards. We went in and the water was warm, not hot, and slightly salty. There were signs indicating that no jumping was allowed but they did have flotation devices that looked like large square flutter boards. The kids played with these for a while and then I noticed a sign for an outdoor pool.

The outside pool was a little bit warmer and also had a number of relaxation devices consisting of air was bubbled from the bottom, jets of water spraying from under water and water falling from above the pool. Everybody was relaxing, floating and chatting. I grew tired of this quickly and was ready to leave in about 20 minutes. The rest of the family had a great time for the next 2 hours.

After the pool we went to a café that was named Maxeiner. Maxeiner is quite a common name but Maxseiner is quite rate. We had some ice cream (the Maxeiner special) and cake along with a round of warm drinks. A triathlon was fishing just across the street. Sue was shocked to watch one of the participants change right across the street. The rest of us missed this spectacle. We returned to the Youth Hostel in the evening and used a mountain tram to return.

After dinner Alex played soccer for a while and was joined by three other boys. Soon the parents joined in an there was a challenge match between the kids and the parents. I'm proud to say the old timers routed the kids despite being down a player.

We had a great conversation with kids and the parents after the game and talked about how the kids were able to play despite the language barrier. Once names are exchanged, the game goes on with a few hand gestures. Alex and Dad required an additional shower before going to bed but overall it was a great day.

August 7th – Remagen to Bad Ems

We wanted to go to Koblenz today but we were not able to find accommodations. Bad Ems is a small town with a youth hostel that is about 15 kms away from the Rhine on the Lahr river. Today was going to be a reasonable day but when our accommodations moved from Koblenz to Bad Ems, we added an additional 20 kms to the route. We were planning on having a rest day tomorrow but the Youth Hostel in Bad Ems was booked. I made some inquiries into places to stay including the youth hostel but had not heard back. There was the awful thought that we may have to ride another day to find accommodations.

We headed out as early as we could and made good time. Ride was uneventful and we made good time. We had a beautiful lunch on the Rhine. The kids skipped rocks into the Rhine and wandered a bit into the Rhine.

As we entered Koblenz, we understood why we had difficulties finding accommodations. This weekend was “Fire on the Rhine” which is a fireworks display from boats as the glide down the Rhine. It is also accompanied by concerts and other activities. We were looking forward to seeing the Deutsche Eck again but we were disappointed. The Deutesche Eck (German corner) is where the Rhine and the Mosel meet. There is a large statue there and a nice area where you can walk along both rivers. This area was completely consumed by either construction or festival preparations. After a few minutes we continued on to our accommodations that were a bit further down the Rhine and about 15 km up the Lahr river.

The bike path along the Lahr was like a country road compared to the super highway bike path on the Rhine. Soon we were in Bad Ems and found signs to the youth hostel. The signs pointed up a slight hill. We geared down and climbed this hill. The next sign pointed up a steeper hill. We dropped into our granny gear and rode up this hill also. The next sign was immediately followed by a warning sign saying the rode was a 16% grade. At this point we were all huffing and puffing and out of gas. We pushed the tandems up the 16% grade and finally arrived at the Youth Hostel. Alex was excited since they had a soccer field right at the back of the Youth Hostel. Now that we know how the youth hostels work, they seem to work well especially when you eat all your meals there.

When we arrived, we found that the Youth Hostel had booked us in for two days since they had a cancellation. We were set for the next two nights with all meals included! We went to our room to clean up and headed straight down to dinner. Food at the Youth Hostels is simple but good. The strange thing about youth hostels is that they don't have many youths in them at all. Our experience is that they are filled with families. The one in Bad Ems was no exception.

In the evening we sat at the back of the Youth Hostel and rested as Alex play soccer. Another boy started playing with Alex and his dad came over to talk with us. He spoke English very well so the whole family was able to join in on the conversation. He and his son were also cycling and he was able to give us some great tips on the next couple of days. One tip that he gave us that I think we will actually use, is that we should skip part of the Rhine and cycle between Konstanz and Basel in Switzerland. This area, as we have hear before, is the most beautiful.

We reflected back on our trip and noticed something interesting. We are riding in cycling shorts. In Holland and the north of Germany it was definitely not the thing to do. As we move south, cycling shorts, cleats and helmets become more usual. At the same time, cyclist especially in the city becomes less prevalent. The north sees cycling as more of a part of daily life that does not require special clothing. The southern part sees it as more of a specialized activity.

Over and out from Bad Ems.

August 6th – Köln to Remagen

I awoke at 3 AM to a hot, humid room. It's pretty easy to overwhelm the limited AC provided in German hotels. I opened the window to let some fresh air in the room (yes you can open the windows!) only to hear a lot of activity coming from the area where are tandems were stored. I got dressed and went to check on the tandems. Luckily I could just open the window at the end of the hall and pear down over the area. As it turns out, there was a number of delivery trucks dropping off food for breakfast. Wow fresh food for breakfast, what a concept. Tandems were safe so I could fall back asleep.

I awoke at 7 AM to start the bicycling maintenance. At quarter after eight, I was finished and really dirty. The kids were coming down for breakfast just as I was going up to get cleaned up. We had a nice breakfast as a continued my frantic search for accommodations. I was able to find a hotel that looked very nice but was rather expensive and a youth hostel that was a bit out of the way. I decided to book both.

After loading up the bikes we realized that we really should replace the tube that we had blown the previous day. We once again stopped at the unfriendly bike store for a couple of items. By the time we started it was close to 10:30 AM. We rolled along through down town Köln. It was beautiful until my front tire went flat. Not sure what caused the flat but I'm suspecting that it was improper installation of the tube. It was the last tire that I changed and I was in a hurry.

We replace the tube with a spare one and continued on our way. About 10 minutes later, I got another flat on the same tire. I think this was a bad tube, since I was very careful to install it correctly the last time (only 20 minutes ago). We had one spare left and no patch kit. By this time we were in down town Köln right by the cathedral. Riding without spares or a patch kit is inviting a long walk to the next bike store. We decided to head into down town Köln to find a couple of spare tubes and a patch kit. After wandering around a bit, we found a sports store and purchased the replacements.

By the time we got back on the path, it was after noon and we still had almost all of our ride ahead of us. Luckily we had accommodations and we didn't have to search for them when we arrived. We pushed on and arrived at our accommodations at about 5:30 PM.

We had booked ourselves into a hotel in Remagen and we all had visions of luxury accommodations. Unfortunately that was not the case. While not bad accommodations, the price was higher than other places and it was not as nice as other places. It seems places charge by how difficult it is to book them. This hotel was very easy to book on-line while most of the B&Bs don't have on-line booking.

After showering and having a quick dinner, we wandered around town a bit. We had some ice cream and found the bank and a small grocery store. Occasionally we have had lunch at a restaurant, but it is much nicer to have food and stop when you feel like it.

Today we left the loud noises of the city and moved into the Rhine valley. Navigation has been very easy and we barely need a map now. The bike path follows the Rhine except when there is a harbor or a plant. These detours are usually short and the are well mapped.

Talk to you tomorrow

August 5 – Düsseldorf to Köln

Today was a difficult day for a number of . First the weather has been warmer reaching the upper 80s. While we have been doing in the range of 30 miles the past days today we traveled in the range of 60 km (40 miles). I'm not sure because my cycle computer was not properly mounted and was not registering the distance traveled for an unknown period of time.

We have also had annoying tire problems. The tires we are running on the tandem are relatively small (28c for the cyclists in the audience). In order to have them withstand the weight of two people and our junk we have to pump them up to about 100 psi. On Tuesday (the 5^th) we were riding and I noticed a weird bump on my front tire. I made a mental note to investigate when we arrived at our hotel (Holiday Inn Express again). When we were about 10 kilometers from our hotel, the other tandem started making a weird whacking noise. After about 30 seconds of the whacking noise a loud bang was heard and suddenly the rear tire was flat. I immediately knew that we had blown out the sidewall of the tire. A flat tire is not a big problem but a destroyed tire is a problem, especially if you don't have a spare which we didn't. Luckily my years of reading cycling magazines had prepared me for this moment. I heard that you could patch a blown tire with a piece cardboard. The cover of a cycling map was sacrificed in the name of forward progress. After inserting the cardboard around the tube in the area of the blown sidewall, we pumped up the tire and were back in business. While we were getting back on the bike I noticed a wear spot rear tire of my tandem. That combined with the strange bump on my front tire, resolved me to replace all the tires on the tandem and get a spare.

We rolled into Köln (Colgne) and stopped in a main square area to find out if there was a cycling store in the area. I was accosted by a animals rights activist but I was ready. After about a one minute speech in German, I replied, in English, that I didn't have any idea what she said and wondered if she knew if there was a cycling store in the area. Befuddled she walked away. I need to try this with German while back home.

I found somebody who knew of a store right on our way. Right as we were leaving, a lady fell off a bench and rolled to the ground face first. Her friends tried to put her back in the bench but she was rather large and they struggled with the task. On the bike ride to the store I explained to Sarah that she was not hurt but rather was drunk. So drunk that she could not control herself anymore. Nice conversation.

We arrive at the bike store that was very well stocked but with less than friendly staff. I really wanted to talk to a sales person but they were way too busy to help anybody. I did find four new tires and a foldable tire just in case. After being belittled by the cashier (she does this to all the customers), we were on our way to the hotel only a few kms away.

The hotel was nice enough but didn't have a great place to store our bikes. There was some area behind the hotel that was enclosed by a 6 foot fence and had a gate. This would have to suffice. I locked the tandems to a fence and closed the gate behind me. When I met up with the rest of the family, I could not find the room keys and realized I must have put them down when I was locking the bikes. I went inside and asked for the keys to the fence.

“Yah the keys must be here somewhere” was the reply from the clerk. Visions of lifting two tandems over a 6 foot fence suddenly flashed through my brain. After a few minutes of looking she informed me that she didn't have a key and this was reserved for the maintenance people.

“Will the maintenance people be here in the morning?” I asked.

“No” The clerk replied.

“How will we get the bikes out in the morning?” My questioning continued.

“We can access that space through the conference room”

“Can I look for my keys now?”

“No the room is full with a business conference”

“When will it be done?”

“Eight PM”

“OK. Can you make me another room key?”

“Yes”

All this time, people are waiting to get to our room and take a shower. This was quite an impositions for our family. A shower feels really good after seven hours of cycling in the hot sun. I'm sure is was quite an imposition for the other people in the lobby. A family of four smells quite nasty after seven hours of cycling in the hot sun.

I was hoping to swap the tires before going to bed but the lack of a key and on-going business conference makes this impossible. The best part of the conversation with the clerk, was that it continually shifted from English to German. I guess I was frustrated with her poor English and she was likely frustrated with my poor German. Each of us was trying to shift the conversation to the language we thought would work best. Likely if I spoke English and she spoke German we would have the best luck since it is easier to understand a language than it is to speak it. Instead I spoke German and she spoke English... the worst of both worlds.

That evening I spent most of my time trying to find accommodations. We are riding through a tourist area and approaching a weekend. That combination made finding accommodations difficult. After three hours I had a line on a couple place but nothing solid.

New Post is coming

We have had two long days with various problems that have limited the blogging time. We are in Remagen and doing fine (other than tired). Stay tuned for an update soon.

August 4th - Rest Day in Duesseldorf

Today was a rest day in Düsseldorf. I have visited Düsseldorf a number of times since this is where my dad was born and grandmother lived. Each time our family visited Germany, we would spend a week or more here. I also visited Düsseldorf a number of times while I was studying in Germany.

We wandered around down town and we were eventually able to find what we needed. I remember just enough to be a dangerous navigator in Düsseldorf.

"I'm sure the Altstadt is right down this street" I would say.

We would turn a corner and nothing looked familiar. Am I wrong or have the stores changed? Well it turns out I was right but I second guessed myself. We backtracked, asked for directions and eventually got headed in the right direction.

In the afternoon, we had a picnic with my relatives that live in the area. They choose a very nice spot in the town of Kaisers Werth. Kaisers Werth has an abandoned castle right on the river Rhine and the town itself is filled with old buildings. There was a picnic table in a shaded area along side the Rhine. I have attached a few pictures of the ruins of the castle.

Many people have asked why we didn't bring a GPS unit with us. Well I was thinking that the GPS would not be very useful since it would not be able to route us along the bike paths . I also thought that it would be require charging each night which would be yet another item that required charging. Even if I was right on these two accounts we should have brought one along. As we now have so much experience with being lost, I have determined that there are two types of lost. The first happens when you don't know how to get to where you want to go. Usually this happens when you don't have map or don't know the address of your destination. The second type of lost happens when you can't determine where you are in relation to your route. The GPS would not help with the first type of lost but it would help quite a bit with the second type of lost. We are seeking to purchase one now but it will be difficult to find one and ensure that it has the right features.

2009-08-04 Duesseldorf - Kaisers Werth

Pictures from Xanten

I was able to fix my 'technical difficulties'. Here are the pictures from Xanten.

2009-08-01 Xanten

August 3rd - Duisburg to Düsseldorf

Despite getting very detailed maps for Duisburg, today's ride was challenging. While we were never far off track, navigating city streets, especially the side streets, is hard. At one point, we had the map fully extended and we were all looking around for a street sign, any street sign that would indicate our location. Two cyclist had pity on us and asked us where we were going. I said Düsseldorf. They said follow us we are going there too.

They were two older people who cycled at a slower pace. Since they knew the way and didn't stop every five minutes, our average speed was two or three times higher. As we rode, I talked with them. They had ridden from the Boden See to Düsseldorf in one week. This is about 1000 km (600 miles). Their house was outside of Düsseldorf but showed us directions to a Rhine path. This path was right along the Rhine that was a welcome change from the congested streets of Duisburg.

From this point forward, the navigation was relatively easy to the Holiday Inn Express. Staying on points tonight and the next two nights. As we rode, we passed directly by a large Mercedes factory and the largest Mercedes dealership I have every seen. As we ate dinner, there were a number of Fortuna Düsseldorf (soccer of course) fans gathering and preparing for the game (buying beer). After dinner we watched Fortuna Düsseldorf's first game of the season. Last year, they advanced from the 3^rd division to the 2^nd division last year and have hopes of reaching the Bundesliga (Germany's 1^st division).

As the evening wore on, the adults were finding interesting new sore points. My right knee was sore, I'm assuming from pushing hard on the right pedal at each of our starts. S has sore thumb muscles, that were likely caused by holding the tandem up at stops. I think it is more difficult to ride half the distance in the city rather than twice the distance in the country. We should only have a couple more days of city riding and then we will be back to long distance riding.

Riding in the city also means that we have not been very close to the Rhine. Many factories are directly on the Rhine and we have been riding back roads. This means that we don't get to see the Rhine as much and can't use it as a navigation tool.

Overall we are settling into the rhythm of riding. We purchase supplies early in the morning and stop somewhere to eat lunch. Usually we can find a park bench or picnic table. Bathrooms are often hard to find. Now when we find a bathroom we all use it since we are not sure when the next one will appear. Water is another item that causes us problems. We can carry about 6 liters of water on the bike but usually use twice that amount per day. We often find small grocery stores where we can buy a few liters of water.

Talk to you tomorrow.

August 2nd - Xanten to Duisburg

We were lucky with the weather today. The day started and ended wet but for the most part it was dry. As we woke and ate breakfast, the window was being pelted with a hard rain. By the time we packed up and load the bikes the rain had slowed. Once underway the rain stopped and didn't start until we were about 30 minutes from our accommodations. By the time we were at the youth hostel, we were pretty much soaked.

The past few nights we have been staying in Bed and Breakfasts. Each time they have been clean and comfortable. Tonight we have our second stay in a Youth Hostel. The Youth Hostels in Europe are very nice and have a number of families staying in them along with a number of youths. I think we will be looking for more Bed and Breakfasts going forward since they seem to work better for a family and are similarly priced to the B&Bs.

We completed our ride today at about 2 PM showing that our riding speed and navigation skills are both improving. We didn't get lost once today!
We rode through more farm country today and more farm country smells. Yesterday a farmer was spreading manure on his fields right next to the road. The smell was overwhelming. All I heard from the back of the bike was “It stinks. It stinks.” My reply was “Pedal as fast as we can so we can get out of this smell!” By the time we left the stink zone our eyes were watering and I don't think my nose will ever be the same. Ten minutes later, our eyes were still watering. Today we didn't hit anything that bad but we did hit a number of minor stink zones.

These smells should be over as we are leaving the agricultural section of Germany and heading into the Industrial part. The Ruhrgebiet (area around the Ruhr river) has much of Germany's heavy industry. This grew from the abundance of coal in the area. Duisburg is at one end of the Ruhrgebiet. Our youth hostel is right beside an abandoned steel mill that has been turned into a park.

We are entering the Ruhrgebiet!









A tug boat pushing a barge. Very typical site on the Rhine.











Dad working on the blog!












The Industrial Park. You can wander all over this area.

August 1st – Emmerich to Xanten

We decided to change our route just a bit to visit Xanten. Xanten was the site of a Roman settlement and also has large cathedral. Xanten is about 10 miles short of our planned destination Wissel so our ride today was short. This also means that the ride tomorrow will be longer.

Additional maps didn't stop us from getting lost once again. We were on track until the cycling path adjacent to the road stopped and we took a path through the country-side. We came to a point were there were no direction signs and had to guess which way to go. Eventually we did find another cycling path with destination signs (e.g. Xanten 23 km) and followed these. It turns out we were quite far away from the Rhine. I don't think it added distance to our but it did add time since we often stopped trying to find our location on the map.

We had not made arrangement for accommodations and our first stop was the information center. Since Xanten is a tourist town and it was Saturday night, accommodations were mostly booked. They were able to find us some accommodations outside of town which we gladly took. The lesson is that we need to book Saturday night stays well ahead of time.

Xanten has a nice pedestrian area with many shops and cafes. Once we had our reservations confirmed, we were able to relax with some ice cream and coffee.

Xanten is an amazing city. Roman ruins, a huge cathedral and a windmill all withing walking distance of each other. I did manage to get all three into the same picture. Pictures will be posted later I'm having some slight technical difficulties.

The Cathedral in the downtown core took over 200 years to build and has several large gates surrounding it. While you can see the church steeples from all over town, most of the church is not visible until you pass through one of the gates. This makes for a very dramatic scene but it also makes it very difficult to take pictures. Even with my 18 mm lens, I could not get more that a small portion of the cathedral in the frame.

We then wandered through the old city (altstadt) looking at the working windmill the city walls. The archaeological park containing the Roman ruins just outside the downtown core. Xanten was initially used as a military base for the Romans in 15 BC and a city was built there around 100 AD. We walked around the Roman temple and the colosseum. At this point everybody was tired and hungry and we started to our B&B. Luckily it was not as far as we had thought.

The day ended with a light meal and a some soccer on the front lawn of the B&B.

Friday July 30th – Rest Day in Emmerich

We were scheduled to take a rest day either today or tomorrow. Since our accommodations are nice here in Emmerich we decided to say an additional day.

Breakfast was an additional charge of six euros per person but it was well worth it. Since we were still recovering from jet lag we requested to have breakfast around 9:00 AM. At 9:00 AM (probably to the second) there was a knock at the door and several trays arrived. Orange juice, eggs, bread buns, cheeses, meats, jams, nutella, chocolate sprinkles, honey, coffee and tea all arrived. Per person they provided were two buns, two pieces of dark bread, an egg, orange juice, tea and coffee. There was also several types of cheeses and sliced meat. The buns were perfectly warmed to be crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. The eggs were small but clearly farm fresh with hand written numbers on the shells.

We feasted on this breakfast for about an hour. Towards the end of the meal when everybody was starting to fill up, I started taking ¼ of a bun and placing one variety of cheese, jam or meat on it. I cut this into small pieces and passed them around the family so we could try everything. The honey had a distinct buckwheat taste; one of the jams was actually a ginger spread; another jam was a combination of red fruits that included raspberry. It was a taste experience. If you were expecting a standard pancakes and bacon breakfast, I guess this could have been a disappointment but we enjoyed it completely.

I spent most of the morning making future accommodations. I'm making request using the city web sites and send emails. So far email has not been very successfully, Europeans don't seem to be as tied to their email as we are. I will get an email back but it will take several days. All but tomorrow's overnight has been confirmed. Based on the city website there is plenty of availability, we will likely be rolling into town and trying to find something. We have a few places that look good and available but no confirmations. We are planning to get up early (so far this has been an immense challenge) so we are arrive in town early.

We walked into Emmerich and went shopping. We wanted to find some better bike route maps, bells for our bikes and a map holder for our bikes. Yes, we still believe it is possible to get less lost. We found the map at the city information booth and finally found a bike store where we were able to get the map holder and bells. Unfortunately the bells could not be installed on our handlebars since the handle bars were too wide. We will see how the new map and map holder work tomorrow.

We also had lunch at a restaurant on the Rhine. The food was not very good but the view was great. As I was translating the families orders for the waiter, he asked where we were from. I explained that the parents were Canadians and the kids were Americans and we were all living in the U.S.

“You moved from Canada to the US” he asked with a puzzled look.

Yes I explained.

“Canada is better right” he continued.

“They are different not really one better than the other” I replied as best I could with my broken German.

“Canada is good, America not so much” he replied.

The kids asked about the conversation was about, so I recounted the story. This started a conversation that included difficult questions like “Why don't people like the U.S.?” and “Should we say we are from Canada?”. As we left the restaurant the waiter said “Goodbye Canadians”

It was clear that he intentionally didn't include the kids. I maybe it was just the parent in me but I started thinking that this was a form of racism. Why dislike my children just because of their country of birth? Is that any different than disliking them for the color of their skin? Maybe just wishful thinking or maybe I was being naïve but I thought this type of negativity would not be as prevalent. We talked as we walked along the Rhine board walk and didn't really come to any conclusions.

We are going to pose as Canadians (not so hard) for the next week and see if our reception changes. Maybe the email turnaround time will improve when we use a Canadian address.

We ended the day with a light dinner and went to bed early in preparation for our early start in the morning.

The breakfast spread!

















Warm buns, jams, chocolate spread and chocolate sprinkles











Cute boiled egg warmers

Thursday July 30th Arnhem to Emmerich

We traveled from Arnhem to Emmerich today with fewer problems than yesterday. We now understand the Dutch cycling routes and it is a relatively simple system. The Dutch don't label bike paths but rather destination points. Each destination point has a number. When you want to get somewhere you plot the route and write down the destination points along the way. As you are riding, you look for these destination points and follow the signs that lead you to you destination point. Doing this meant we were able to quickly move through the country side.

The routes are made up of various different types of paths. They are a combination of bike paths, roads, and dike roads. Some of the routes are dedicated bike paths much like the WO&D. All the roads we have have traveled have bicycle paths of some sort. Some roads have a dedicated path that is separate from the road surface like Fairfax County Parkway. Generally roads with high vehicular traffic have this arrangement. Some roads have a bike paths between the road surface and the sidewalk. Generally there is the road surface, a curb, a cycling surface (often a red brick) and a walking surface often white. Many roads have this arrangement. Other times there are cycling lanes painted on the roads. Mostly this is done in city centers where there is little room for a dedicated bike lanes. On all the roads, cars expect to have cyclists. When there is a dedicated cycling path drivers will look and stop for cyclists on the bike paths. We have assumed the cars would not stop and it has resulted in one or two awkward moments where we are both waving each other on. I would hate to see what would happen if a Dutch or German cyclist assumed the cars would stop while traveling on Fairfax County Parkway.

Dike roads are roads that are on top of dikes and therefore the road surface is only about one and a half cars wide. The road is marked with two bike lanes, one going in each direction. This means that the road for cars is a single lane road. Cars will pass cyclists and use the opposing cycling lane to provide space. If there are two cyclists going in opposite directions, the cars will wait until the road is clear. Since traffic is light rarely do two cars traveling in opposite directions meet. If this does happen, they squeeze by each other by using both cycling lanes.

Overall the cycling has been very pleasant and safe compared to the US or Canada.

Today we cycled out of the Netherlands and entered Germany. There was no boarder crossing or even a marking saying that we were moving from one country to the next. Now that we are traveling in Germany it means a few different things. First, we need to learn a new cycle path system. So far there has been a well marked path along the Rhine but I'm not sure if this continues. It also means I can read street signs again.

There were far fewer difficulties today and we arrived much earlier at our destination. Each time we traveled through a city we made at least one wrong turn. These were not costly since we quickly noticed that the route signs were missing and doubled back until we found our mistake. Never the less, turning around a fully loaded tandem is a chore and we would like to avoid it if possible. We saw what seemed to be and advertisement for a detailed cycling map. We will see if we can purchase this map.

We were worried about it being hot but so far the exact opposite has been true. This morning it was in the lower 60s and we had a few brief showers. They were only about fifteen minutes long but were enough to make the ride cold for a while. We could have used a base layer for the first hour of riding this morning. Also the wind was quite strong in the morning. We spent some time heading straight into the wind and some time with it as a cross wind. A tandem with panniers has a significant surface area and difficult to steer in a cross wind. In the afternoon it was sunny with temperatures in the high 70s and low 80s. The wind was still there but was now a tailwind! Very comfortable cycling whether. Another interesting observation is that the sun is not nearly as strong here as in Canada or the US. We forgot to put on sunscreen today and all of us have a slight burn on our faces after spending the entire day in the sun. The last couple of hours warmed up to the point where we removed our jackets and our arms are not sunburned at all.

Now that we have left Holland, we can make a few final notes. The people were warm and friendly and the cycling was great. I have never seen so many farm animals before. Every available piece of land has a cow, goat, sheep or horse grazing on it. We cycled past thousands and thousands of animals. In the small towns there were farm animals within the city. We saw chickens, goats and horses in tiny back yards. I sounds strange but the dairy products are outstanding in Holland. Cheese, yogurt, and quark should not be missed if you travel here.

The kids are doing well and clearly learning a lot. I can say that already I have had a great time talking on the long rides through the Dutch country side. The kids are asking a lot of questions and really have not complained other than when we were lost.

We are staying on at a B&B on a farm just outside of Emmerich. Very nice place and reasonably priced. Tomorrow we plan to take a rest day and spend the day in Emmerich. This depends on availability of the B&B on Friday night. So far we are on schedule but we will see what happens over the next week as the mileage increases.

Wednesday July 29th – The day of learning

The first day of any endeavor always provides significant learning opportunities, today's trip from Amerongen to Arnhem was no exception. Here is a few of the items that we learned.

Always reset your cycle computer - Our touring the Rhine book has the distances marked from the beginning of each ride. When you don't reset the cycle computer it is hard to know how far you have gone.

Always bring more water than you think you need – Even if you think your ride will be easy, you may get lost and end up on the road much longer than you had thought.

Route selection is important - We have two separate maps for the Rhine cycling routes. The first set of maps is part of a book called Cycling the Rhine. The second, is a series of maps that are based on the official Rhine cycling route. As we found out today, each has its own benefits and drawbacks. The Cycling the Rhine routes seems to take you over more roads and fewer paths but also keeps you closer to the Rhine itself. It also tends to follow official paths that are marked. The drawback is that it is oriented to go from south to north. Reversing the direction is not so easy and can get you lost (happened a number of times today). The directions compound this problem since they only provide a series of paths or streets and not turn by turn directions. Today we made a family decision to follow the Rhine maps. While we were on these paths, it was a beautiful ride. Then we would arrive at an intersection and have no idea which way to go. At one point we ended up at a highway but had no idea where we were on this highway. Luckily this was Europe and there was a bike path along the highway. We followed the highway in the right direction until we reached something that we could recognize on the map.

In Europe, an information sign refers to a map not an information booth - When we saw the blue sign with white lower case 'I' we expected a booth or building. As we unsuccessfully search for a booth or building, we did find a map. This was moderately helpful. After seeing a few signs and only maps, I realized that the information sign means map.

In Europe, street signs are optional - I already knew this but it was again etched in my brain. We finally reached Arnhem after being lost several times and switched over to our turn by turn directions from Google maps. Turn by turn directions are useless if the streets are not marked. Several times arrived at an intersection with no street signs. Taking our best guess we turned down the wrong street. After a few blocks, a street sign would appear and let us know we were most definitely on the wrong path.

Murphy's Law applies touring - When it is the end of the day and you are tired and frustrated, your accommodations inevitably are at the top of a hill. Impossible you say, Holland is flat! Well that is what we thought too.

You don't really need everything you have – At the end of a long, frustrating day, you are ruthless when repacking your bags. A number of items will be left behind here in Arnhem.

In the end we cycled about 30 miles today. Not an exceptionally long bike ride. It did take us five hours to complete this ride and that doesn't include lunch. While riding we averaged over 10 miles per hour. Do the math and you will realize that we spent over two hours trying to find out which way we should go. This touring is very different that my cross Canada trip. Only in a few sections on my cross-Canada cycling trip had difficult navigation. Mostly the directions were similar to, travel this rode for 1000 km, turn left. You could daydream through a few days and not miss anything. In Europe, there are many turns and you always need to be watching for signs. The directions are more like, at sign post 1232.32, turn left in the direction of Arnhem travel 400 m, then just beyond the city information sign, turn right over the bridge. You need to keep watching for signs all the time.

Not all was bad today the following items went well.

When we were lost in Wageningen an elderly gentleman was kind enough to show us to the Rhine route. While we were driving through the town he pointed at a hotel and stated that this was where the Germans surrendered in 1945. Sure enough this is true. From the wikipedia article on Wageningen

“Wageningen is also world famous for its military history. On May 5, 1945, the German general Blaskowitz surrendered to the Canadian general Charles Foulkes, which officially ended the Second World War in the Netherlands. The Generals negotiated the terms of surrender in the Hotel de Wereld, which since 2004 has again been serving as a hotel. On May 5, which in the Netherlands is Liberation Day, the city hosts a large festival to celebrate the liberation. At this festival, veteran soldiers parade through the city and are honoured for their service. Wageningen is home to the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation ACP-EU (CTA).”

At first, I was thankful for the simple hospitality and later was amazed how we stumbled upon history.

We stayed in a youth hostel which was very nice. Dinner and breakfast were simple and good and the accommodations worked well. Most of the people staying that the youth hostel were families so the kids were able to fine some playmates. A found an outdoor table tennis table and was kicking the ball around, someone came up and in crude English he asked to play tennis soccer. They played for more that an hour. It was a good way for him to burn of some energy.

Tomorrow we will follow the Cycling the Rhine route, hopefully with more success. This will both keep us closer to the Rhine and less lost.