View from our hotel room balcony

The hotel was very nice, and right on the beach, but it didn’t feel very much like authentic Mexico. So, on Friday we ventured out to see the Mayan ruins of Cobá, where we borrowed bicycles to get around the fairly large grounds (trust us to turn any trip into a bike trip!). We traveled by taxi to the nearest town (Playa del Carmen), then took a two-hour bus ride to the tiny village of Cobá. After seeing the ruins, we shared a taxi back to the city of Tulúm with a Spanish couple (buses to Cobá are infrequent), caught a “collectivo” (van that acts as informal collective taxi transport between cities) back to Playa del Carmen, and another taxi back to the hotel, where we went for a swim, and had a nice dinner.

Bicycling around the Mayan ruins of Cobá

Jennifer walking towards a Ball Court at Cobá

Typical "collectivo" van transportation

On Saturday, we had most of the day free, so we went on a snorkeling expedition. We went by taxi to Playa del Carmen again, then south to Akumal by collectivo, where we rented some gear and a locker, and snorkeled at the public beach. The big attraction of Akumal is the population of sea turtles, and we saw several of them, as well as some fish and coral. Zach used an underwater camera and I had a waterproof case for my camera, so we were able to take some underwater photos and videos, which was fun.

One of the sea turtles we saw at Akumal. It's a few feet in diameter, and was accompanied by three fish.

Then we caught another collectivo to the Hidden Worlds Cenote, where we unfortunately were not allowed to use cameras on our snorkeling tour of this really neat limestone cave. The Yucatan Peninsula is sprinkled liberally with cenotes, which range from simple swimming holes to huge underground cave systems. Many have been turned into theme parks; Hidden Worlds is relatively natural except for having some lights installed. We returned to Playa del Carmen on yet another collectivo, took a swim on the beach, and were treated to another dinner gathering, this one with an excellent Mexican folk dance troup followed by a really good traditional band.

On Sunday, our last full day, we ventured north (by collectivo, of course!) to the sleepy town of Puerto Morelos so that Zach could shop for something to bring back to the other members of his group at work — we settled on refrigerator magnets, and found some nice ones. That gave us the afternoon free for swimming at the hotel, followed by another nice dinner.

Jennifer heading for the Beach

Monday we got in one last swim before heading for the airport, and arrived back home late. We had a great trip, and didn’t even get very sunburned!

Game note: This trip went through the region of “Tzolk’in: The Mayan Calendar”, which we’ve played several times recently.

Unfortunately, it didn’t really make sense for Zach to join me on this adventure (long way to fly for a short time). So, I teamed up with my Drupal pal Randy Fay, an outdoor enthusiast from Colorado, and we settled on the “Allerdale Ramble”, a several-day walk in the Lake District National Park region of northern England. I bought a guidebook before I left for England, and we set out after the conference was over, caught a train to Penrith, and spent the night in a B&B.

On the last day of every DrupalCon, everyone gets together for a 'sprint' (or work day). I led a large and enthusiastic group working on documentation, and there were hundreds of others in the room working on other projects.

Our trip really started in earnest the next morning (Saturday, August 27), when we left our conference luggage in Penrith and caught a bus to Keswick, carrying “credit-card touring” supplies for 5 days (i.e., no tent and sleeping bag, as we would stay in B&B’s and hostels). When we were nearing Keswick, the woman in the seat in front of us turned to ask us a question (which of course we didn’t know the answer to, not having been there before either). So instead of giving her an answer, we invited her to come hiking with us for the day. That suited her fine, so Randy, Delphine, and I went to one of the zillions of hiking stores in Keswick for a map, picked up some rolls and cheese, and took a bus south to Seatoller. From there we walked back to Keswick via the high route — up to a ridge, and along it to “Catbells” peak, with great views of Derwent Water (one of two lakes near Keswick).

Setting off from Seatoller

Lots of work went into this trail!

Onwards and upwards

Derwent Water from the ridge

After spending the night in Keswick, on Sunday Randy and I set off to climb Skiddaw, at 3000+ feet the highest peak around. We got almost to the top, but as it was very cold and blustery, decided that we would forgo the final ascent in 60 mile per hour gusts, in favor of enjoying our vacation. So we walked down via “The Edge”, a spectacular ridge with beautiful views of Keswick’s other lake, Bassenthwaite Lake. The hike ended up in a tea shop (how very English!), and after enjoying some ice cream there (it was not anywhere near as cold down at that elevation), we returned to Keswick for a second night.

Tromping through the sheep fields

One of many stiles we climbed over - since we were walking in a lot of sheep fields, at every fence we either had a gate or a stile

View on the way up Skiddaw

Along the Edge

On Monday, we left our Keswick B&B and headed off northwesterly. We paused briefly on our way out of Keswick to watch some sheep dog trials at the local agricultural fair, and then walked through Dodd Wood to the same teahouse we had visited the day before. Then we headed farther north along the Bassenthwaite Lake shore, circled around the top of the lake, and finished our walk at a B&B in the village of Dubwath.

Sheep dog trials in Keswick

Top of Lake Bassenthwaite

On Tuesday, we headed for Cockermouth. En route, we encountered the first real rain we had seen — though it wasn’t too bad, except that our feet got soaked due to walking through wet grass (much of hiking in this region involves tromping through sheep fields). We took one unintended detour, but still made it to Cokermouth without any real trouble. There we spent the night at its delightful YHA hostel — one of the old-style “simple” hostels — a quiet place by the river, with only two other people staying there that night.

Derwent River

An unplanned detour takes us into the deep, dark woods

Wednesday morning we took the bus to Maryport on the coast of the Solway Firth, which separates England from Scotland along the west coast. In Maryport, we visited a really neat Roman museum, and then set off up the coast to Allonby, via a combination of grassy paths and beach walking. The tourist information office in Maryport had told us the only reason to go to Allonby was for the ice cream, so we of course had to sample that when we arrived, and we stayed the night there in a pleasant inn.

One of several Roman ruins along this section of coast - this one was a spot where they evaporated salt from sea water

Solway Firth coast

'The Codfather' fish and chips restaurant, where we had dinner in Allonby

Thursday we continued up the coast as far as Silloth, where we caught a bus to Carlisle, and another back to Penrith, where we retrieved our luggage and stayed the night at the same B&B.

Wild roses

Along the Solway Firth

It sure was a nice walk — very peaceful, beautiful scenery, lots of variety (hills, lakes, sheep fields, coast), and a nice break from work and Drupal. I’ll be heading back to the US this weekend, after a day or so in London… so that’s it until the next adventure!

A few notes, if you found this page because you are thinking of doing the Allerdale Ramble:

• The guidebook was really useful for directions, but the lodging information was EXTREMELY out of date! Many of the places it says there were lodging didn’t even have any at all. Check the Internet or a local tourist information office (which will happily book lodging in your price range).
• The RambleFest web page on the Allerdale Ramble has some good accommodation information.
• Get the Ordinance Survey OL4 Lake District map (northwest section — careful, there are 4 maps with similar names!). There are many outdoor shops in Keswick, and the first one we walked into was well stocked in maps, so no reason to buy the map ahead of time (and Amazon didn’t stock the right one).
• Bring a compass! There are a LOT of trails in the Lake District, and you’ll want map, guide book, and compass to figure out which one to take.
• The end of August time frame was good, weather-wise — perfect temperature for hiking most of the time. Keep in mind that the last (or fourth?) Monday in August is a “bank holiday” weekend in England, so you’ll need to book ahead on lodging.

Front of the old house

But I (Jennifer) was getting pretty tired of living in the city, dealing with the traffic, etc., and I also wanted to be able to spend more time with my dad (who lives in Pullman, Washington, on the other side of the state). Zach wanted a shorter commute and a bigger living space, without paying more for new real estate. So we decided to move to the Spokane area, which is a much smaller city with (at least for now) no traffic issues, relatively inexpensive real estate market — and the company where Zach works (F5 Networks) has an office here, I have four cousins with families in the area, there is really great cross-country skiing at Mount Spokane that we’ve enjoyed at Christmas time while visiting my dad, and there is also plenty of climbing, hiking, and canoeing in the area. So, we came out for a house-hunting trip in March, found a house, put in an offer, closed the deal on April 20th, and moved on April 30th, whew!

Chaos of boxes in the old sun room

Moving van being loaded

Our new place is located in the unincorporated semi-rural area of Otis Orchards, Washington, on a cul-de-sac street with 6 houses. It’s a slightly bigger house than the one we left, and is a “split-level” house (lots of half-flights of stairs), built in 1995. Otis Orchards is in the Spokane River valley, which is quite flat and mostly grassland, with a few trees here and there, and hills and mountains all around. The river has a really nice walking and bicycling trail all along it, which is about 1.5 miles south of us. There are 6 medium-sized trees in our new back yard, but I am not sure what they are (the leaves are not out yet) — I suspect there is at least one oak, based on the leaves in the yard (but they could be from a neighbor’s tree), and there may be an apple and a cherry tree — we’ll find out soon!

Front of the new house

View out the front of the new house

View of the back yard from Jennifer's new office

Chaos of boxes in the new living room

Kitchen in the new house

We were sad to leave a few dear friends, our Sunday board gaming group, Zach’s office camaraderie, the Seattle Drupal group, and my choir behind in Seattle… But we really like the new house and surroundings, and we’ve located a new gaming group and a couple of possible choirs for me, so we’ll adjust. And we only moved a 5-hour drive away, so I’m sure there will be visits — we’ll get back to Seattle, and hopefully our friends will come to see us here!

Note: The elevation profile below seems to be in meters instead of feet… and anyway we were driving and not cycling on this trip!

• Highlight: daily cycling. I really enjoyed the rhythm of the days we spent cycling. We weren’t riding fast, and we didn’t have a quota of kilometers to cover each day or for the trip, so we could enjoy the riding, stop for snacks and photos and points of interest, and make a longer stop in the middle of the day to change out of our cycling shoes and walk around. I enjoyed the days we didn’t cycle too — mostly when we were visiting cities — but it felt good afterwards to get back to cycling, and it was a bit of a letdown when we got to Leipzig and realized the long-distance cycling portion of our trip was over.
• Highlight and lowlight: cycling conditions. We had good maps for most of the route, and most of it was very pleasant cycling (reasonably good weather, not too strenous hills, good scenery, low traffic bike trails or small roads). We did run into a couple of places with very poor conditions. These included deep mud, gravel and sand loose enough that I had to get off and push, narrow spots and stairs that we had to carry bikes over/through, and many short stretches of cobblestones. These weren’t as much fun as the bulk of our cycling; luckily, they were a very small percentage of the time we spent cycling.
• Highlight: cycling culture and infrastructure. We were impressed by the cycling infrastructure we encountered — good directional signs, many bike trails and bike lanes, and long-distance routes — especially in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria. The number of people we saw cycling was also impressive in these countries, between commuters, people running errands, and people just out for a Sunday ride. The cars were definitely used to having cyclists around, and there were even special cycling traffic lights in many of the cities.
• Lowlight: mechanical difficulties. I can’t complain too much about our mechanical difficulties. We only had one semi-flat tire between our 7 wheels in 6 weeks — and even that was only a slow leak in one of my trailer tires, which occurred about a week before the end and I had to pump it up only every few days — hardly worth mentioning. Other than that, I found that my trailer hitch was not up to the demands of the trip, and Zach had problems with his brakes and his internal hub shifter. Not too bad, and nothing we couldn’t overcome (though still each problem was discouraging when it occurred).
• Highlight: cities. We visited many large and/or famous cities in our trip: Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest, Prague, Dresden, Leipzig, Berlin, Frankfurt — including capitals of five of the six countries we cycled through. It’s hard to pick a favorite… Budapest was the least tourist-overrun and very pretty, so that’s probably what I’d say at the moment. It was also fun to see the smaller cities whose names we knew from games that we play: Ulm, Sigmaringen, etc.
• Highlight: small towns. We cycled through many small towns, and enjoyed staying in small towns many of the nights. Each had its historical buildings and “something-est” points of interest (e.g., the longest bridge made of logs in Europe, the biggest flat-ceiling fresco in Germany, etc.); they were peaceful and pleasant, and we soon got used to the church bells chiming every 15 minutes, day and night — so much so that we missed them when we left Austria (they didn’t seem to be as common for the rest of the trip).
• Highlight: scenery. We cycled through many scenic areas, but I guess the most spectacular scenery was probably the day we spent hiking in the Bohemian Switzerland National Park in the Czech Republic. The rural countryside we were cycling through every day was also very nice, and we frequently had spectacular cliffs along the Danube and Elbe rivers.
• Highlight: music. We went to a few musical performances on the trip; my favorite was in Vienna. As we were nearing Vienna, we stopped in a park briefly, and a local guy came up to us to learn more about our strange bicycles. He spoke excellent English, and when we said we were interested in classical music, suggested we go to the Sunday mass in the AugustinerKirche. We did — and it was a beautiful performance of a Haydn mass, in the setting that it was intended for (as music for a mass in a church from his time), by a very good chamber orchestra and choir. A close second was the performance of all six of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos on period instruments that we went to in Berlin.
• Highlight: recent history. I was really impressed with how the city of Berlin has chosen to preserve and present the sobering events of their recent history, and in particular, the Berlin Wall. Other recent history of note: a church in Berlin bombed in the second world war, preserved as a monument, and evidence of more WWII bombing in Dresden.
• Highlight: museums. My favorite museum that we visited was the Musical Instrument Museum in Prague. They had a huge collection of interesting instruments, and many sound clips you could listen to that were played on those same instruments. Another favorite was the Bach museum in Leipzig, which conveyed a good understanding of the course of his life, as well as the interesting process of cataloguing and preserving the archives of his music and other papers. I also enjoyed a small bicycle history museum that we visited in Ybbs, Austria.
• Highlight: ruins. The most interesting church we visited along the way was the St. Laurenz Basilica in Enns, Austria. When remodeling, they discovered roman ruins of a much earlier church in the basement, which they had excavated, and they were amazing. We also saw a large Roman ruin site in Slovakia, just downstream from Bratislava, and a really nice ruined castle (not as ancient but still interesting) at Spitz, Austria.
• Highlight: food. Pretty much every guest house and hotel we stayed in came with a good Central European breakfast: a variety of breads, meats, cheeses, jam, yogurt, boiled eggs, fruit, juice, coffee, and tea — perfect for hungry cyclists! We also enjoyed sampling other food along the way: pastries (my favorites were the sour cherry ones; Zach favored chocolate croissants, and we both enjoyed many apple streudels), grilled bratwurst from sidewalk stands, goulash, etc.
• Lowlight: hostel in Budapest The worst place we stayed was a hostel in Budapest that I booked on-line. It had no good place for us to park our bikes, no good breakfast, and because we were shuttled off to a separate building, no Internet. But it was at least clean, and definitely cheap!
• Highlight: camping with thermal bath. The nicest camping experience we had was in Komárom, Hungary, where there was a thermal bath attached to the campground, and some friendly German folks staying in the next camping spot that gave us food, beer, and good cheer into the evening. We also visited even better Hungarian thermal baths in Györ (a very elaborite bath complex, my favorite) and Budapest.

Jennifer's SRAM dual drive pin was damaged in transit. This is the same pin that got damaged on Zach's trike on outbound trip.

Jennifer’s front bike light was damaged beyond repair, but I was unable to capture a picture of it before it ended up in the trash.

The brown tape is still suck to the trike handles. This is only cosmetic, and it'll come off eventually

The trike seat was in a large green duffel bag with other items, and somehow these very thick metal brackets got mangled.

Zach's trike, all wrapped up and ready to go home

That taken care of, we went out to explore what we could of Frankfurt. It is the only city we saw in Europe that has a skyline with tall buildings in it, largely due to the banking industry. The old section of town had some neat looking buildings and a beautiful church, a nice place to spend our last evening in Europe.

Picturesque buildings in Frankfurt, juxtaposed with a giant billboard

The next morning, we got to the airport and checked in very early, to allow plenty of time for issues regarding my trike. As it turned out, they allowed me to check the trike without a box, though they did say they could not be responsible for damage incurred due to its unboxed state. I think they were surprised at the unusual item of luggage, so they forgot to charge me the $100 bicycle fee. Score!

Jennifer with all our luggage and bikes at the Frankfurt airport. Zach's trike seat and most of Jennifer's stuff is in the giant green duffle bag we bought at the flea market in Berlin. Jennifer's bike is in the stickered suitcase.

After spending a long day (9 hours extra to be exact) in airports and on planes, we finally touched down in Seattle. Jennifer’s bike did not show up with us — for some unknown reason they misplaced it. We went on home, as they assured us the bike would be delivered to our house the next day, which they finally did at about 9:30 PM (it was tough fighting the jet lag waiting for the delivery).

So, we’re back home and getting settled in. We’ll hopefully soon get around to unpacking the bikes and inspecting for damage, but for now we are just trying to adjust to the time change, and enjoying wearing cotton clothing and unlimited laundry privileges.

Game notes: Frankfurt is in Power Grid’s classic Germany board, Thurn and Taxis Power and Glory, and Ticket to Ride Europe.

Description of our Setups

I have been riding a Bike Friday Sat-R-Day recumbent bicycle (which they aren’t making any more), and towing the Bike Friday travel trailer that it packs in, with a small under-seat bag that I made. I keep my camera and a few other items in the under-seat bag (inside a zip-lock plastic bag if it’s raining), and my camping gear, clothes, etc. in dry-sacks inside the trailer.

Jennifer's bicycle with the trailer and under-seat bag

Zach has been riding a HP Velotechnik Scorpion FX recumbent tricycle, with 4 Ortlieb waterproof panniers and two Terra Cycle FastBack bags on the boom. He keeps his camera, bike tools, and a few other items in the Terra Cycle bags, and everything else in the panniers.

Zach's tricycle with panniers and frame bags

Height

My bike puts my head about a foot (30 cm) higher than Zach’s trike puts his head, although I’m still probably a foot lower than an upright bike. Zach can’t see over the corn fields, fences, walls, etc. as well as I can, so I’ve had a better view of the scenery.

Width

Both of our setups are kind of wide, and Zach’s trike is a few inches wider than my trailer. This has been a bit of an issue a few times, such as riding through gates meant to prevent cars from using the bike paths (especially in Slovakia), and getting through doorways (night storage of bikes, getting onto ferries, etc.). Zach can pick up his bike and turn it sideways to be narrower, and has also managed to go under some of the gates, and I can lift or turn the trailer, but it’s a bit of an operation in either case. Zach has the advantage that the wide part of his setup is in the front, so he can see whether it’s going to fit or not, though after a few weeks of riding with my trailer, I do have a fairly good sense of where the wheels behind me will land.

Zach carrying his trike over a narrow ferry ramp

Jennifer wondering whether the trailer will fit through a narrow gate

Zach ducking under the sides of the gate

Weight

We haven’t really weighed our setups, but they probably weigh about the same in total.

Stability

We’ve ridden on quite a bit more unpaved surfaces (gravel, dirt, etc.) here than we normally would at home, and also had to climb some hills. Zach’s trike is more stable than my two-wheeler, of course, so he’s better able to handle the instability from the surfaces and from going slowly. So I’ve had to get off my bike and push it much more than he has. Zach can take corners faster than I can, too, since he’s not in danger of falling over unless he really goes fast. On the other hand, Zach is more affected by non-level surfaces than I am. If the road is sloped sideways, his trike is sloped sideways, whereas I will stay vertical automatically on my two-wheeler.

Parking and Breaks

When we pause for a break, Zach can basically stop anywhere and his trike won’t ever fall over, and he can lock the brakes to keep it from rolling if the surface isn’t level. I have to either find something to lean my bike on (sometimes that’s Zach’s trike), or use the Click-Stand I got just before the trip, which involves getting the stand out of the under-seat bag, locking the brakes, and setting it up. The Click-Stand doesn’t work well on loose gravel, and Zach also has the advantage of having a nice place to sit for the break even if we didn’t find a bench (I can also sit on my bike, but have to balance it while sitting, so it’s not so relaxing). That was only rarely been an issue on this trip though — Europeans seem to love putting benches along cycle routes.

Jennifer's bicycle propped up with the Click-Stand

Packing for Transport

If you check out our packing posts, you’ll see that my bike packs up somewhat easier and ends up quite a bit smaller than Zach’s trike, for purposes of taking it on the plane. Zach will need to try to find a box in Frankfurt for the trip home, or at least some bubble wrap, whereas I am towing my bike’s box (the trailer is the travel case, and the trailer wheels and frame fit inside too).

Adjustability

I can move my seat forwards and backwards, and adjust the tilt, which has been useful for preventing knee pain. Also, if I ever wanted to let someone else use the bicycle, it could be adjusted for them (with limitations of course — for instance, Zach would need a larger frame). Zach’s trike has a fixed seat position, with an adjustable tilt. The boom the pedals are on can be adjusted in our out, but not by much without adding or removing links from the chain.

Gear Hauling

I suspected that my trailer might not be completely waterproof, so I packed everything that would matter if it got wet in lightweight dry sacks (not the kind made for kayaking, but the lightweight type made to hold up to rain rather than submersion). This turned out to be a good idea — when riding on rainy days, there has definitely been a little water in the trailer. Zach’s Ortlieb panniers are waterproof.

When I stop and plan to get something out of the trailer, I’ve found that I need to unhitch it (which is quick and easy, so not really a problem), because latching it generally tips over the bicycle if it’s still hitched. I also can’t get into my trailer while I’m still on the bike, whereas Zach can reach into the panniers in the front part of his rack quite easily, even while he’s riding. My under-seat bag was a good idea, for quick photos especially, and Zach’s Terra Cycle bags serve the same purpose.

I also had several problems with the trailer hitch — I don’t think the design is all that great for the kind of rough riding we ended up doing some of the time, or maybe just in general for a long trip. I may design a new hitch before I try traveling with the trailer again, or maybe just use panniers for the next trip, we’ll see (I have a rack I use at home).

One advantage of the trailer: I was able to make a nice sticker collection during the trip

Pedals

Both of us are using Speedplay Frog Pedals, which we both generally like. However, we’ve both occasionally run into issues where mud, grit, etc. has clogged the attachment system, and we’ve had trouble clipping into the pedals. I also had to adjust one of the cleats that wasn’t clipping well once. But if you keep them clean and have them adjusted to the right angles, they are great (we’ve both been using them for many years on these and our past bikes).

Visibility

Being visible to cars is always a concern with bicycles, and especially so with recumbents, because you’re not as high. Soon after I bought my Bike Friday, I outfitted the seat back with a “safety vest” that I made — bright orange with a reflective triangle (see Click-Stand photo above). I’ve also added some reflective stickers to the trailer (the trailer itself is black, not the best color to stand out on a road), and I’ve also been collecting stickers from places we’ve visited (see photos above). When I’m at home, I ride with some orange/reflector safety leggings as well, to help my visibility from the front and sides, but I didn’t bring them on this trip.

Zach’s trike is a sea of black from the back (seat back and panniers), so I made him an orange mesh bag for his sleeping pad, which helps his rear visibility as well (see photos above).

We also wear bright jackets and jerseys while cycling, which is something we didn’t see much in other riders in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland — probably because they don’t spend much time riding with traffic. In Hungary and Slovakia, we noticed more people using safety vests on bicycles, which is a good idea given that you’re riding along with some pretty fast traffic at times!

We arrived in Berlin mid-day on Friday, and cycled the couple of kilometers to our hotel. The route turned out to be along the former Berlin Wall, and our hotel was in the former “no man’s land” maintained by the East German border guards, and right near a memorial/historical site. So after checking in, we walked over to the site to absorb some history, as my friend Renate was due to arrive in a few hours. Over the next few days, we visited many other historical markers — the Berlin Wall was obviously a large part of recent history in Berlin, and the city has put a lot of effort into preserving sections of the wall, and putting up historical markers, complete with photographs and descriptions in English and German (and in some cases French and Russian as well — the US, Britain, France, and Russia were the original occupying powers of Germany after World War II). It was a fascinating history lesson. One of the interesting sites near our hotel was where a church had once stood. It was gradually incorporated into the no-man’s land area, then demolished by the East Germans to improve security. Having visited many similar, beautiful, old churches on this trip, seeing the photograph of the steeple of this one falling was quite sad.

Berlin Wall memorial near our hotel

Berlin Wall marker incorporated into a sidewalk - the path of the wall was made visible nearly everywhere

We did some other typical Berlin activities as well. Saturday we wandered around the center of Berlin, took a boat tour on the Spree River, and went shoe shopping with Renate in the trendy Hackescher Markt area. Sunday we went a little more down-scale, and along with seemingly half the residents of Berlin, visited a flea market, conveniently located in the park across the street from our hotel. We picked up a couple of German games (which we’ll hopefully find the rules to in English) and a well-used duffle bag (which we needed to replace the one we’d ditched upon our arrival in Zurich airport — the trailer I’ve been towing with my stuff in it all trip long is a suitcase, which will have the bike inside it on the plane home, so I need something else to put the stuff in). We also visited a once-beautiful church that was badly damaged by the allied bombing in World War II, a sober reminder of the side effects of wars.

Renate and Jennifer in front of the WWII bombed Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche and its modern replacement

The lengths Zach will go through for a photo (the previous photo, to be specific)

Renate shopping for shoes at a trendy store in Hackescher Markt

Renate and Zach at the flea market in Mauerpark

Then Renate had to go home, and Zach and I went to see some of the usual tourist sites, and then went to a performance of the complete set of Bach’s 6 Brandenburg Concertos on authentic period instruments. Monday we got on the bikes and rode (minus luggage) to Potsdam, a pretty town about 35 km from where we were staying — which would have been a bit more fun to see if it hadn’t been fairly cold and quite cloudy. But it was still good to be on the bikes one last time, and kind of neat to ride with the Berlin commuters in the morning on our way through the middle of town.

Sony Center at Potsdammer Platz

Philharmonie concert hall, where the audience sits all around the stage

At this point, as I compose this post, we’ve taken the night train to Frankfurt, I’ve packed up my bike, and Zach is packing up his. We might have the time and energy to head into Frankfurt for some sight-seeing in the afternoon, before heading to the airport tomorrow. So there might be one more post about Frankfurt for this trip, or there might not… Thanks for reading!

Game notes: Berlin is in Power Grid’s classic Germany board, Thurn and Taxis Power and Glory, and Ticket to Ride Europe (ditto for Frankfurt).

The first day was spent riding down pleasant paths along the Elbe river. We stopped midday in the town of Meißen, which was dominated by a large medieval fortress called Albrechtsburg. There we were able to stock up on some important supplies, and we had a nice bratwurst. We were also still seeing some detours here and there due to the high water, but they were well marked with helpful signs. That evening we ended up in a town called Riesa.

Medieval fortress in Meißen

The cycle path goes underwater

The next day we left the Elbe river and headed west. This was the first time in a long while that we were not cycling alongside a river. This meant we also had to stop using our familiar Bikeline maps, which were focused on riverside cycling. The new map we obtained had many routes and options for where we needed to go, and it took some effort to adapt ourselves to this “overland” mode of travel. The new map also had a lower level of detail; in particular, it was not very specific about the cycling conditions we would encounter. Nevertheless, we had a generally pleasant ride, mixed with a few wrong turns, some inefficient routing, tight spots, and riding surfaces in a variety of conditions, from smooth asphalt to single track. As time was running short, we decided to stop for the night in a small town called Trebsen, but that left us with only a short trip the following day to reach Leipzig.

I had to get off the trike and try this again

Leipzig is one of the cities I most wanted to visit, because it is where the great baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach spent most of his career. Soon after we arrived, we were able to visit the Thomaskirche (St. Thomas Church), where Bach was the cantor for many years. His remains are buried on the floor of the sanctuary there, and he is memorialized in a large statue outside the church.

The remains of Johann Sebastian Bach

Zach stands next to Bach

Across the street is a great museum dedicated to Bach, in the same building where many of the composer’s original manuscripts are archived and studied. The meticulous process of researching and analyzing the scores was fascinating, as it involved handwriting analysis of Bach and the many scribes who assisted him, researching the paper technology of the time, and cross referencing with other documents and collections. Also, the museum gave many detailed descriptions of Bach’s musical career, both in Leipzig and in other locations nearby. Altogether a very satisfying look into the composer’s accomplishments.

Leipzig itself is an interesting town, set up differently from most of the other towns we have visited on this trip. Mixed in with the historic and beautiful buildings are covered passageways containing upscale shopping areas and restaurants. There are lots of local people milling around, seemingly just for the shopping, and once again we find ourselves in a town filled with cyclists. Hordes of practical and sturdy bikes are parked everywhere along the streets, many of them with baskets mounted on the front handelbars.

Many bikes, with modern and historic Leipzig buildings in the background

Next, we will hop on a train to Berlin. Stay tuned.

Game notes: Leipzig is in Thurn and Taxis Power and Glory, and Power Grid classic German board.