Donauworth to Ingolstadt 75 km

So far on this ride we have had one very hot day and one cold and wet day. Just like the story of the three bears, today turned out to be “just right”. In fact it would be hard to imagine better cycling conditions – blue sky all day, temp in mid 20s and virtually no wind. To do justice to the weather, the region we were cycling through was also cycling heaven. We enjoyed a delightful mixture of bike paths (radweigs) and quiet rural roads. Throw in a few steep hills to keep everyone honest and you have a perfect riding day.

Although our aim is to follow the Danube, this is not always possible as there are regions where the river has a wide flood plain making it impractical to construct a bike path. However there were long sections where the path runs directly alongside the mighty river and we were able to witness the many different aspectos of this waterway – sometimes wide and as smooth as glass and at other times running strongly through much narrower sections.

We left the river at Bertoldsheim to climb up a steep hill past an old Baroque Palace for a perfect morning tea overlooking the entire district. One aspect that mystifies us is the lack of people. Time after time we rode throught beautiful towns that seemed to be completely deserted. There was no sign of humans anywhere. It almost felt like everyone was in hiding. In one town we even noticed that there was a soccer ball in the middle of the sports field but NO ONE playing. Weird!

Our lunch stop was at Neuburg (New Castle) so named because of the impressive castle in the centre of town. After lunch we proceeded to our pit stop at Ingolstadt. This is an impressive city and well known as the setting for Mary Shelley’s Frankinstein novel. By the time we arrived at our hotel we had covered 75 km. For several of our riders this was the furthest they had ever ridden in a single day and clear indication that they have been getting progressively stronger with each day in the saddle.

With the weather forecast promising a succession of similar days we are all looking foward to even more fun in the days ahead.