Allez, Allez, Allez!

Current Location: St. Valentin, Austria

I am not sure what makes a cycling tourer what they are but we are a different breed than your average wanderer, and not in a bad way.  I don’t think of us as the crazy wanderer type, instead every tourer I have met has been particularly well balanced and gregarious.  We have all fought the same hills and raced down the hills which I think gives us all similar outlooks towards cycling, we will fight the hills when necessary but will avoid them when we can, we don’t go backwards on ourselves, we will ride in the rain because we dry out.  Though I must say that the sun does have the nice affect of changing the way I feel about a country, it is always infinitely better when the sun is shining.  Our most precious possession is our bike and you will rarely find a tourer far from it.

I am sure some people look at us as if we were crazy but well grounded is the only way I have found other tourers, maybe because it is not the easy way.

“The only bad thing I have to say about Germany is that I have nothing bad to say about Germany.”  This was a quote given to me by a touring couple I met in Luxembourg and I have found this to be right on the money.  They gave me their thoughts on cycling here as they had done it the previous year.  I have found the people to be extremely helpful and nice, more than a few times I have found myself puzzling over a map or a sign trying to figure out which way to turn when another cyclist will pull up and ask if I need help.  If they cannot speak English they will often sign for me to follow along and I will eventually be led to where I need to go (This has happened more than once.)  The cycle routes are second only to Holland and well signed, for the most part.  And to compare the size of Germanyto Holland the cycle routes become all the more amazing.

The route I took through Germany to get to Austria has basically been to follow as many rivers I can mostly for two reasons.  One is that it makes navigating relatively easy as I just have to know on which side of the river I am on to know which direction to go.  The other is simply that it makes for easier cycling.  By far the nicest cycling to date in Europe has been along the Donau (Danube) river.  I rode along its banks for 3 days solid and the last day cycling from Passau into Austria was really spectacular, I can now see why river cruises along there are so popular.  Also getting popular in that area is the weekend warrior cycling, I passed many families and groups of people doing the route to Wien (Vienna.)

I think the plan at the moment is to cycle to Copenhagen to try and meet mom and dad on the 10th.  I am not sure how that will work and may involve a train somewhere, we will see how long it takes me to get out of here first.

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