Linda and I spent Sunday wandering around Regensburg. We visited the Thurin and Taxis (badger and tower) palace, as well as several churches. And a marketplace while searching for a bathroom. A quiet day for both of us to recover. Except for a few minutes of rain that caught us hiding out under an overpass, the weather left us alone.
Our bicycles were locked in the patio at the hotel, and I noted when we settled in for the night that the patio was locked until 8:30 a.m.
On the other hand, the weather forecasts for Monday suggested that rain would start sometime between 5:00 pm. and 7:00 p.m., so we wanted an early start. At 8:15 a.m. Fortunately, someone at Reception unlocked the patio for us. We loaded up the bikes, and headed out.
Except for a brief stop at a supermarket to pick up food Monday, we spent the day almost exclusively on dedicated bicycle path. 13 km outside of Regensburg we stopped at the castle in Donaustauf, a ruin but still keeping watch over the Danube. Only a few kilometers from there we came to Walhalla, a monument built in the early 1800s to honor those people who had provided great social and cultural advancements. And of course the Bavarian King Ludwig the First, originator of the idea.
Walhalla had a lot of steps.
From there we had a pleasant ride all the way to Straubing, our intended destination for the night, about 50 km from where we started. For a while we had our own personal rain cloud following us. One cloud, overhead, with blue skies all around it. Occasionally sending stray droplets our way.
We arrived at the campground at 5:00 p.m., with plenty of time to unload the bicycles, put up the tent, and head out for dinner, before the rain. We did not arrive in time to get back from dinner before the rain arrived. We had walked about a kilometer to a Greek restaurant. We pondered our options at the restaurant as torrential rain fell from the sky. We had decided to get an Uber back to camp, but one of the staff at the restaurant kindly drove us back the campground!
The moderately heavy rain stopped in the wee early hours of the morning, I agreed with Linda that perhaps camping in the rain far from the bath house was not optimal.
We packed up Tuesday morning, and rode into Straubing to check out the castle that was not. On the way to Deggendorf I explored Saint Ulrich’s Chapel while Linda waited at the bottom of the hill.
Just outside of Deggendorf Linda found a park which she deemed an acceptable place to rest.
From there we finished the 45 km ride to Deggendorf where we spent the night.
Overall the weather forecast had shown intermittent rain for Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Looking at the forecast Tuesday night, the weather radar showed, and forecast, rain all around, except a 70 km circle centered on our route from Deggendorf to Passau!
As we began to ride out of Deggendorf, Linda’s front shifting stopped working. We stopped for me to take a look. Linda’s front derailleur has always been really stiff. Enough so that at one point I had changed the front shifter to make shifting easier. I tinkered with the shifting for a while, but had reached the point that I thought I wasn’t going to be able to fix it. But in my final steps of tinkering a 3 mm pebble fell out! After recalibrating everything, Linda said her shifting works better than it ever has! That pebble has probably been there the entire time!
The forecast held true for our entire ride to Passau Wednesday! While the temperatures were cool, we had only the occasional scattering of rain.
Along the way we stopped at Bergrune Winzer. The climb was steep enough we walked the bikes up the hill. But a lovely view of the castle and valley.
We cycled by Hilgartsberg Castle, which I visited 9 years ago. While we stopped to eat at the base, we skipped the climb. From there we pushed on to Passau, with the ride being over 60 km, Linda’s farthest ride yet! Next, Austria!
