Day 8 - Goddelau to Koblenz on a spoke and a prayer

I started mid-morning and in the first two hours made 40km of good progress along fast smooth cycle tracks to the city of Mainz.

I stopped for an amazing 15 euro set lunch at a yacht club on the bank of the Rhine. It was incredible value and one of the best meals of the trip so far.

I was making giood progress, free from the directional issues that had plagued me the previous morning, and set off again at 1.45pm.

However today the issues would all be mechanical.

I couldn't have been more than 10 mins into the afternoon's ride when I heard a sickeningly familiar clanking from the rear wheel.

I'd broken another spoke.

At least this time it hadn't wedged itself in the derailleur, and I was in a city full of bikes and bike shops. The only problem was finding one that could fit me in for an unscheduled repair. It took four attempts, but eventually I found one and got work underway.

It seems there is an underlying radial problem with the wheel, but they hoped that by replacing the spokes immediately either side of the broken one that the repair would hold this time.

We shall see.

So it wasn't until 3.30pm that the mission for the day could resume, and I set out to complete the further 100km to Koblenz.

The section of the Rhine just beyond Mainz was pretty industrial, but after 15km or so it gave way to open countryside and then beyond  Bingen (the end of stage 4) the valley sides steepened and I was into a long section of picture postcard perfect town's overlooked by castles as the Rhine flowed beneath.

The riding was also pretty good, with smooth surfaces and long sections in shade that enabled me to put in a steady 25kmph average.

With the unscheduled repairs I hadn't been sure whether I could make it to Koblenz, but arrive I did just before 9pm and checked into my hotel.

I wasn't sure how I felt about being assigned room 101, but let's hope it's not an omen for the rest of the journey.

Distance, 140km
Time 10hrs 20mins (8hrs 20mins ride time)
Total distance so far, 1172kms
 

Day 7 - Karlsruhe to Goddelau and more getting lost

The day started out well enough.

I headed west from Karlsruhe and picked up the thin band of parkland that I had followed coming into town the day previously, criss-crossing the small river and picking up signs for the Rhine Cycle route.

This brought me to a nature reserve like a delta of lakes, small chanels of water and trails running in all directions. The problem was the bike trail is not very well signed here, and on reaching points where the trail was not signed at all it left me with little option other than to guess.

This led to a lot of backtracking and frustration.

After 3 hours I eventually spotted a sign for what should have been my first destination of the day, Speyer which was 25km away. Given the amount of time I'd been cycling I initially thought I must have gone 25km past it, but no, I was basically only about 15km into my intended journey because of all the difficulties following the route.

The next 10km were no problem, taking me to Lingenfield which was in theory about 11km from Speyer, however every cycle or road route I tried just kept looping me back in to the village 30mins later. After 3 attempts like that and in utter frustration, I almost bought a map.

Well at least I tried, however the outdoors shop didn't sell them.

However the owner did explain why I was having so much trouble. The bike route is in the process of being re-routed because of some closed roads and to make it more scenic (i.e. longer) which means that may of the signs are missing or wrong.

So even with a map I would not have stood much chance, but he directed me out of town where a couple of kms later I picked up the new 'scenic' route, another 18km into Speyer arriving a full 6 hours after setting out from Karlsruhe. I had covered an official distance of about 35km, but must have cycled at least 75km in the process.

I had also realised that my directions from mission control were a mixture of locations on each side of the Rhine, on two different bike routes. So I decided to stick to the left bank, just using the bike route signs and to see how far I could get.

Along the way I met and chatted to another cyclist called Frederick who had exactly the same route issues around Lingenfield.

So it wasn't just me.

From here it was easier, and I made 60km of relatively quick progress to Ludwigshafen and then Worms for my ice-cream stop at 6.45pm. I was tempted to stop here, but saw then the next location of Gernshiem was only another 24km, so figured it was worth a go.

I made it to 'Gernsheim' by 8pm to find what is known as a NATO ramp on the bank of the Rhine, with the town on the other side. I was stuck out in the middle of nowhere, so caught the next ferry over.

At which point I found my situation immediately worsened.

I could find nowhere to stay in Gernsheim and to be honest didn't really want to from the look of it. There was only one thing to do, pick up the cycle track on the other side and ride until I did find somewhere.

For the next hour I cycled through open countryside and forest, eventually having to put lights on the bike in order to see where I was going. It was exciting stuff, and reminded me of the time Mel and I got stuck in the cloud forest on Mt Fuji.

In other words it was getting a bit scary.

When I eventually came to another village at 9.45pm it was time to make a more concerted effort to find lodgings. Of course there were none in the village, but I managed to recruit a teenager on roller blades (who was seemingly out having a crafty fag) to guide me to the next town of Goddelau where there was a hotel.

I hoped the unexpected exercise would offset the smoking, but in reality he probably just had another cigarette on the way home.

I just mamaged to persaude the kitchen to stay open, and at 10.30pm settled down to a steak dinner and a couple of Grosse Biers.

Tomorrow I will study the map more closely before setting off.

Distance, 165km (est), vs route distance of 125km
Time, 14hrs (13hrs ride time)
Total distance so far, 932kms

(it is going to be a lot more than 1320kms by the time I'm done)

Day 6 - Strasbourg to Karlsruhe

At last a relatively easy day.

I set off after lunch, preferring to make up my own route rather than following the designated Eurovelo 15 and headed over the Rhine to Kehl in Germany.

What I saw of Kehl was purely industrial, but I soon picked up a cycle route right alongside the Rhine, and started racing with a cargo barge a few hundred metres ahead. It took me over an hour to catch up and overtake, after which I headed 'inland' to a nearby town for my ice-cream stop.

The ice-cream stop is now a sacrosanct part of every day, and it was the main reason I decided to travel on the German side - everywhere in rural France is shut as I found out yesterday.

I'd been riding for over 2 hours and had already covered 50km for the distance to Karlsruhe. The final 30km was entirely 'inland' as I tracked (but manged to stay off) the highway headed north.

Karlsruhe is one of those places I instantly liked, it's quite a big city (hard to tell when cycling around, but maybe the same size as Sheffield?) and has lots of bars and cafes. It just seemed to have a good atmosphere.

I finished the day with a grosse bier and schnitzel on one of the main squares before getting an early night ready to put in some more km's tomorrow.

Distance, 80km
Time, 5hrs (4hrs 30mins ride time)
Total distance so far, 767kms

Day 5 - Strasbourg or burst?

I set out this morning with every intention of following the German side of the Rhine.

100 yards from the hotel door I spotted a sign for the cycle route into France and thought, why not?

I could probably give your several reasons now, but the previous evening I'd been weighing up the merits of both and so felt equally underprepared for the French side.

I was the first in a series of poor decisions I would make today.

I'd popped over the border within 10 minutes of leaving the hotel to find the French side rather less well marked than my trusty cycle route 2 in Switzerland had ever been, leading to a good few wrong turinings into Rhineside docks and industrial estates in the first couple of km's alone (in 4 days in Switzerland I'd only ever taken a single wrong turn).

However I quickly got back on route finding the wide sweeping Rhine canal and made rapid progress for almost an hour along a good cycle track. I then hit a sign indicating that the surface ahead was not suitable for cycles, and diverting me onto the road.

This caused me some concern as without the Rhine canal in sight and without clear route marking there was a clear potential for getting lost. So a couple of km's up the road I hopped back onto it anyway.

Second bad decision of the day.

It was pretty bumpy, but not entirely unrideable and I still managed to make a decent rate of progress.

However I was just starting to think about what it might be doing to the bike when wallop, another puncture. I changed the tube in pretty quick time and made it back onto the road to Kembs and the beginning of the Rhine au Rhone canal.

Reaching the confluence of a handful of canals I studied the information board carefully, before selecting the Rhine-Rhone cycle route and following the canal northwards in the direction of Strasbourg.

The riding was good until 50 minutes north I was forced onto the road for a section just before the town of Mulhouse. This didn't present a significant problem as I could still easily see the canal from the road bridge passing over it and manage to select a road running paralell, before rejoining it near the train station and continuing onwards.

It was now the middle of the day, but somehow over the course of the next hour I became aware that the sun wasn't in quite the right position versus my direction of travel. I stopped for lunch and got the smartphone out, emailing mission control for route confirmation.

Finally I managed to get a good enough signal to bring up a small Google map confirming I was indeed on a section of canal running in a NW direction, which gave me enough confidence to continue for another 40 mins. The sun however was definitely not in right position now, so I stopped again to check email and recieved some bad news from mission control.

I was headed SW on the canal in the exact opposite direction of Strasbourg, having now reached a position some 150km away. Having started 120km away at 10am and it now being 2.45pm this was soul destroying news.

70km of riding for a net loss of 30km. How could I ever hope to get to Strasbourg now?

In the debrief we worked out that I had taken a NNW canal (instead of NNE) that had somewhere turned back on itself to lead me heading in the wrong direction. The only option was to head back to Mulhouse, and then Kembs in order to pick up the right canal.

I was furious with myself and put in some of the fastest riding of the trip so far on the route back to Mulhouse.

On the way back I could see clearly what I had not noticed on the route out. The turn in the canal was under the road bridge and I could also see a main road that continued as far as the eye could see following the previous trajectory of the canal.

What would happen if I followed it?

Over the next 1hr 40mins I put in some hard and fast miles on the road in blistering heat with the sun in exqctly the right position just over my left shoulder. I reached Colmar for my afternoon ice-cream and soda stop (now a daily ritual) in a state of near exhaustion - though it had been worth it.

Finally some good news from the smartphone, which confirmed I was only 76km by road from Strasbourg and for the first time I realised I could do this.

I set off with renewed vigour at 5.45pm to continue following the main road North east and having crossed motorway junction headed back onto my road. Or so I thought.

You wouldn't believe the fuss people make when you try and take a pushbike on a motorway!

I realised my error about two thirds of the way down the sliproad in the extra wide bicycle lane (a.k.a. the hard shoulder), and rather than head back up against the flow of traffic I continued down until  spotted the opportunity to manhandle the fully loaded biike over the crass barrier and down the embankment into a retail shopping park.

My only problem now was how to get out of it and back on route.

As my luck for the day would have it, the only route out took me a few km's north in wrong direction into the foothills of the Rhine valley, and pictureseque vineyards before I was able to head east again in roughly the direction of Strasbourg.

The hills were slowing me up, so I once again heqded south to try and get back on route, but never quite finding a road with the right trajectory to do so. I think we have already established that France is effectively closed at this time of year, and I was becoming increasingly needful of water, eventually interrupting the evening meal of an old couple in their back garden to get my water bottle filled.

It was now 7.30pm and I checked where I was on my phone to discover to my horror that I was only 10km from Colmar.

I needed to drastically rethink my strategy, and headed for the only reliable constant in the trip, The Rhine.

Heading east I found the Rhine au Rhone canal running through a small village just 20 mins later, and the waymarkers confirmed a distance of 49km to Strasbourg.

I could still do it!

It was 7.50pm and the sun was falling low in the sky, but I was finally on my intended route and proceeded to smash out the km's over the next 2hrs 15mins reqching Strasbourg just after 10pm arriving to this.

They'd heard I was coming!

The day had one final challenge left for me and as I rode round town looking for somewhere to stay a thunderstorm of almost biblical proportions erupted, delivering me like a drowned rat on an unsuspecting hotelier at 10.45pm.


Distance covered   260km (est), vs route distance of 120km
Time, 12hrs 45mins (11hrs 40 ride time)
Total distance so far 687kms

Days 1-4 - round up of photos

Daimian does not function well on little sleep

Overoptimistic use of yellow jersey at the foot of the Oberalp Pass Road

Reaching the summit of the Oberalp Pass

The source of the Rhine

Great riding down to Descentis from Oberalp Pass.

Stunning alpine scenery

Chur at the end of the hardest day

Lunch in Vaduz, Lichtenstein

The Harbour in Rorschach on Lake Constance

Heading through the underpass into Konstanz

Where I had my bike fixed in Kreuzlingen

Typical views on the ride down to Schaffhausen

Schaffhausen

Day 4 - Schaffausen to Basel and the end of the Swiss section

Today was easily the best riding so far.

Since Chur I've been following Swiss National Cycle Route No. 2 - the 'Rhein Route'. It's not always the quickest route from point to point (as I discovered cycling from Chur to Rorschach) however it's interesting, is always easy to follow the way markers, and follows the Rhine very closely.

Does anyone else think these might be fun in a raft?

First stop downriver today was just 4km into the route, at the Rhine Falls. 

The 5 Swiss Francs is well worth paying for access to the view platforms, as you don't get a clear view from anywhere on the bike trail.

It was very impressive but I had a long ride ahead so didn't hang around too long.

To reach the viewing areas the trail had gone up while the river went down, so the next few kilometers were spent on country roads with smooth tarmac and very few cars, sweeping up and down the rolling countryside making use of gravity as I returned to the waters edge.

The bike trail then delivered long sections of woodland trails, which gave a welcome break from the beating sun before a long uphill climb (though nothing on the scale of the alps) which eventually gave way to the best down hill section so far. 

It wasn't as fast as the descent from the Oberalp Pass, but the absence of switchback turns and far reaching views of the road ahead made it a lot more relaxing and comfortable.

On reaching the first set of distance marked signposts for the bike trail it soon became clear that today's distance was going to be rather longer than the expected 103km - 128km to Basel.

I stopped for lunch after the first 60km and resolved on an additional tactical ice-cream stop in order to be able to make the extra distance.

The remainder of the ride continued in much the same vein as the morning, a huge variety of surfaces and scenery ranging from industrial estates to picturesque villages and views of the Rhine. There were plenty of gradients (of both types), but with every uphill delivering a corresponding downhill I didn't mind that too much.

When I have needed water and there have been no shops to hand, I've occasionally been using the fountains that feed little water troughs in villages. It was only today I noticed as sign informing me that the water troughs are only for dogs. 

Oops.

It made me think of the recumbent cyclist and of course I followed the chain of thought to its natural conclusion. From here onwards I resolved to only drink tap water and Evian.

128km makes for a long day, and I didn't make it to Basel until 8pm looking forward to a couple of well earned cold drinks and my rest day tomorrow.

Distance, 128km

Elevation, quite a bit!

Time, 9hrs 40m total (8hrs 30m ride time)

Total distance covered, 427km (ave. 107km per day)

You will have noticed that the photos are back! So as tomorrow is a rest day I will take the opportunity to publish a round-up of the pictures so far instead of my normal blog post.

Day 3 - Rorschach to Schaffhausen and the need for professional help

This was the easy day that turned out to be anything but.

I set out early with the objective of completing stage one by lunchtime before heading back onto the Rhine proper as it leaves Lake Constance.

The first incident happened just after pulling out of the hotel garage, following two althletic looking guys in matching lycra on their very expensive looking mountain bikes. Poseurs in the extreme who somehow managed to end up crashing into each other while turning left and ending up in a heap in the middle of the road.

I tried not to laugh, I really did.

Setting off early was a good move. It was much cooler, and I really enjoyed the run along the lakeshore as the route ducked in and out of little villages and towns with wooden framed houses, vineyards, orchards and seafront.

It was after about 15km that it happened.

I was cycling along casually when all of a sudden there was a mass of clanking from the bike and the gears started jumping around. I pulled up quickly to retrieve the end of a broken spoke from my derailleur, managing to bend and twist it into a position so that I could carry on riding.

However all was not well with the bike. It quickly became apparent that spokes serve a very useful purpose, and my wheel was now slightly warped, with the net affect that the rear brakes were being applied during every turn of the wheel.

It's been said before, but I was in need of professional help.

I managed to limp along the next 20km to Kreuzlingen where I spent an hour finding a bike shop, and leaving it with them went off the grab lunch.

I must have spent so long on the bike now that I found myself wandering through the edge of town in a bike lane, like someone out of a Flann O'Brien novel.

Yesterday I managed to eat lunch in Lichtenstein without realising. Today whilst wandering through a park I accidentally wandered into the adjoining town of Konstanz in Germany. I didn't even realise until it came to pay and I discovered the bill was in Euros.

If I had a map I would know about these things.

After picking my bike up I made a very belated start on the next section of the journey to Schaffhausen.

Or at least I tried.

Just 2km down the road I got a flat tyre in the rear had had just been changed in order to fit my new spoke. The culprit a sharp piece of plastic that must have somehow found its way in there while in the bike shop.

Grrr.

New tube in, I was finally able to set off for the final 46km down the Rhine to Schaffhausen, and what a lovely section of river it was. The route swept up and down through vineyards and villages, criss-crossing the Rhine several times and would have been even better had it not been for the advancing hours and the need to get to my destination and find lodgings and food for the evening.

I was now in the Rhine Valley proper.


Statistics for the day

Distance, 85km
Elevation, 300m (estimated)
10 hours total (5hrs ride time)
Total distance covered, 299km (ave. 100km per day)