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Dep , arr , dst km.

Wet morning. Most of my things were wet because I let water get on the groundsheet under my tent, and it just soaked up through the floor. Wet.

After an easy downhill with the wind, I spent a while finding an imaginary “Inntalradweg” — the bicycle route which supposedly follows the Inn river. It just isn’t there. So instead of the bicycle way I took a couple B roads, which are fast and direct, but noisy and stressful. At times there were some local routes haphazardly signed, but it was just easier to use the main road.

Got to Innsbruck — it was pleasant enough, with a cute rathaus and a big colonade with mountains behind it, but I thought the tourist interest — the number of tourists around — was unjustified for what it was.

Anyway, the evening was fine. In the Subiaco-like neuestadt some local marketing company put on a “New Orleans Festival,” which seemed to be a blues band playing, and a beer tent, and all the oldies rocking on. I sat nearby and listened for a while and ate a take-away Thai green chicken curry I got inside the yuppie supermarket nearby.

Tried to upload some photos from the world’s slowest net cafe. Returned to camping 6km away, in the dark, with my headlight. It was nice and peaceful cycle. Got back to my tent which was pegged onto a muddy slope with views of the sewerage outlet of the neighbouring caravan. Some Korean boys in their tent were singing to pop music, which was funny.

Dep 10:30, arr 4:45, dst 83km.

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A ski resort town is essentially a lot of guesthouses, shops to buy or rent sporting gear, and places to booze up and eat. The end result is a bland, expensive town, with the picturesque mountains obscured by slightly too quaint guesthouses.

During a break in the rain, I went for a walk around. The town was just full of bored old people. I went back to camping and in a rush finished Anna Karenin for the second time. This was because the post office closed at 6PM and I wanted to send the weight away, along with some old maps and 2 pairs of socks which I inexplicably brought with me.

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Reached the start of the Tauernradweg today (was doing it in the wrong direction), got rained on at the Krimml wasserfall, and the best spent €3.80 ever.

It was a slightly rainy morning; the highlight was passing the valley entrance to a national park. At this point the sun came out ever so teasingly.

Got stuck for several minutes at an electric cattle gate, pondering how to get through without getting zapped. I supposed beast or human would get zapped if it connected the circuit between the two sides of the gate… but then again they had insulators over the ends… what if one made a circuit between ground and gate? Ended up using the bike wheel to push it open.

The last climb up to the Kriml waterfall was on a gravel track through the forest. I was pretty slow on the climb, not sure why. During a break I had a proper look at the map to see where to go after Krimml. And I realised the pass towards Innsbruck was 1600m — another 400m on top of the rather pathetic 200m I had just done.

It was 3:30 and just as I saw the waterfall and was getting out my camera, it started raining cats and dogs. So I stood under the Tauernradweg start point shelter for a while feeling quite helpless, wondering whether to attempt the pass in the rain or go back down to camping in Lahn.

But I visited the tourist information office in Krimml town and found there would be a bus to Königsleiten, the top of Gerlospass at 4:20. So I got on the bus with bike and tried to hold on as the driver flogged it around the hairpins up the pass. Beautiful views of the waterfall.

Got dropped off and the bus driver flogged away in another direction. I was a bit disoriented and left off down where we came from. The big blue road signs aroused my suspicions however and I corrected my bearing, passed back over the top of the hill, and began my descent.

Really nice views flashing past, but the rain stung my face and eyes. Also it was quite cold up there and my hands and legs and nose were cold and wet. If it wasn’t for the spectacular lake and valley panoramas I would be quite miserable. The road flattened out at about 1200m and I passed through some rubbish ski resort towns. Then, just before the day’s final descent I got a great look at the towns spread out over the valley. I’m afraid my photography doesn’t do it justice but here is the picture anyway:

Reached another ski resort town of Zell am Ziller, saw a camping sign, and took it. Unfortunately it was one of those expensive 4-star campings: open winter and summer, almost fully occupied, swimming pool, restaurant, things for the kids to do, etc. And they are usually laid out for the convenience of caravanners, which means the muddy debris-strewn remains of lawn on an awkward slope for me to put my tent.

At least the showers were hot… but I forgot to bring my towel and had to dry myself with my undies. No worries. Even though I wussed out and took the bus, I felt another section of the tour was complete.

Dep 10:00, arr 5:45, dst 98km.

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Took the bus from Krimml (1100m) to Königsleiten, the top of Gerlospass (1600m).

Rain today, decided to rest after yesterday’s mountain conquest, and — more importantly — stay dry.

No such comforts for the pair of becherovka drinking, smoking, Czech cyclists camped next to me. They were touring their way back to Prague, and on a deadline. So they set up their tent during the rain last night, and packed it up during the rain this morning. What’s worse, they only had a drop left in their bottle of becherovka, and 500km to go!

Not much of interest happened today, except during one of my rests by the lake, I couldn’t help noticing the various recreational sailors, clothed in burkas, repeatedly barging an giant innocent promotional wooden swan.

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No time to write any other entries, but here is the high point of my tour so far: The Großglockner High Alpine Road. As you can see in the photo, all bags bar one were off.

It took about 5 hours of cycling to get to the end of the 50km road, and I certainly had my doubts about finishing, in fact these doubts were well formed at the 11km mark — before I even reached the toll gate at the entrance of the national park. Somehow things got better even though the road stayed a pretty much constant 12% (I think) until Fuscher Törl (2400m). At about 1200-2000m I went through some clouds and visibility was at worst about 15m.

A quite thrilling descent after Fuscher Törl, though I regretted dumping my hard-earned altitude so quickly. Of course I checked my brakes before going down. Next up through two tunnels to the highest point, Hochtor (2504m).

Here were some breathtaking views. In the sense of being astonishing as well as causing breathlessness. All the time I wish for another gear on my bike. I never seem to have a granny gear easy enough for the present slope. I adopted a strategy of “micro-rests”. That is, climbing a short distance then stopping to take a photo, or eat something, or pretending to admire the view. Probably not optimal from an athletic perspective but it got me there.

It was a very quick ride down from Hochtor through endless switchbacks. A few times I dared to take my eyes off the road and look at the speedo, and it was by far quicker than I’ve ever gone on two wheels. The view opened up over a valley, impressive.

Now, down at the bottom, below 2000m again, and passing the 36km mark. It wasn’t long ago I was battling past the 12,4km mark, then 12,5km, etc. From this I gained the mental energy necessary to complete the final ascent… well except for pushing the bike the last 500m because it was so f. steep and I was knackered.

At the end at 2369m, seeing a glacier for the first time, and revelling in my personal triumph, I felt like I could do it again, but nonetheless opted to take a bus back to Fuscher Törl. This somewhat diluted the purity of my pedal-powered victory over petrol, but I bowed to pragmatism and sensibility.

It was a beautiful seeing all I had conquered once more, from the comfort of the bus. However I was quite worried that the driver would drive the bus over the side, he was that quick. Also I wondered what peril awaited my bike which was rather flimsily attached to the rack on the back of the bus.

Nonetheless, bus, bike, and myself survived, I was dumped on the top of the hill, and the bus sped away. I took off my beanie, jacket; put on gloves, sunglasses, helmet. Checked the brakes again, then rolled down, to take revenge on Fuscher Törl. As I dropped altitude it got much warmer, and I could feel it had been a lovely hot day by the lake.

When I got to Bruck, the town at the very start of the road, a big dark storm was gathered over the Zeller See. I rushed towards camping, but about 3km from home, had to shelter under a bridge while hailstones bigger than 1cm diameter pelted everything. I found hailstones under the opening of my tent when I got back. Had a nice hot shower then went out for a pizza.

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Dep 7:30, arr 1:30 at Kaiser-Franz-Josefs-Höhe, dst 55km.
Bus to Fuscher Törl dep 3:10.
Fuscher Törl to Zell am See, arr 4:45, total dst 86km.

(Unfortunately my GPS “froze” due to some software problem, just before the end. So the profile and map only show my ascent… I suppose that’s no big issue but I’ll never know what my max speed was going down.)

Today, a food crisis, unpleasant slopes, and the initial psychological conditioning for Grossglockerstrasse.

For a change, it was perfect weather this morning. I went into a bit of a buying frenzy at the supermarkt the night before and as a result couldn’t fit everything into my panniers. Had to offload a banana and tin of fruit to the Dutchies nextdoor.

Since Heinz’s BBQ in Vienna I was excited by the idea of cycling the Grossglocknerstrasse. It was a suggestion of someone there. The road is a monument, built for cars. So to cycle it would be a symbolic message about the destructive pointlessness of automobiles. The neighbours expressed their reservations about the slope, but Holland is flat so I could safely discount their opinions.

However, during today’s first slope I started to reconsider the necessity of rising to any challenges, and/or sending symbolic messages.

I think my difficulties were just due to a lack of warmup and perhaps too much traditional Dutch cuisine the night before. After that climb, the route took the contour of the hills, and the scenery was quite pleasant. I lost my vertical orientation again. Sometimes I wondered “why am I going so slow? The ground is level, there is no wind. Are my brakes stuck down? This is hard work!” Then I looked at my GPS and saw I was actually ascending. Similarly, it always seemed that when I went downhill, I lost more altitude than I had climbed.

It was a short day, reached a great camping spot next to the Zellersee. Relaxed in the afternoon with a view of snow-peaked mountains (wow!), wondering which one was Grossglockner, and which way the road would go.

Honeymoon over, today was my entry into the alps. I saw snow-peaked mountains in summer for the first time, and almost wore out my camera snapping pictures of them.

This morning I awoke to the sounds of campers trying to unbog their caravans. For some reason I gained a small amount of satisfaction from this. There was one caravan, with German numberplates, which was actually as big as the flat I lived in in Wroclaw.

The rain didn’t stop in the morning, so I rolled up my soaking wet tent and left Salzberg with the usual moderate navigational difficulties. These distracted me enough that I forgot to visit the Wasserschloss — a castle on a lake which apparently was filmed in the Sound of Music.

I did, however, go and see Festung Hohenwerfen. Festung means fortress, like Festung Breslau. Well I didn’t actually go in, just walked to the door and took some photos (it cost €10, not even including the nanna train up the hill).

Coughed the affordable €3 to walk through the Liechtensteinklamm. I went there without any faint idea what a klamm is. It’s actually a gorge with waterfalls and rivers through it. This one had a boardwalk, with signposts ominously but not quite eloquently disclaiming all liability if they fall down onto the rocky creek below. Was wet, and worth the look.

Got to Schwarzach in the afternoon, just as the tourist bureau closed, and spent about an hour asking about and looking for a tent campsite. Had to go backwards to Sankt Johann im Pongau to an OK place run from a restaurant, with toilets and showers in a cool underground bunker. Scored the left-overs of a “traditional Dutch dish” from my neighbours. More food: almost always welcome.

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Dep 9:30, arr 5:45, dst 89km.

Rain today, was stuck in my tent. Took the opportunity to do the washing, drink coffee at the campsite, write postcards. Also read some of Anna Karenin, my objective being to finish it for the second time, and mail it away to lose the weight.

Was somewhat distracted in the evening by the American couple in the tent next to me singing “Do, a deer, a female deer.”

Spent the day wandering around Salzburg. Woke up nice and early because I had picked the optimum position for my tent so that it would get the first sun in the campsite (this isn’t always successful for me). Coughed €7 and checked the castle. They don’t permit bikes on the cable car up the hill so I saved €3 by cycling/pushing/carrying my bike up. It is super awesome weather, no clouds at all, so the view from the tower of the alps, etc, was pretty good.

I’m about fed up with stinking net cafes. This one’s drinks fridge just blew up and is spewing black smoke. Also I have reason to believe the money I pay to net cafes is financing terrorism. Speaking of which there are always noisy computer illiterate Americans going in and out trying to work out how to get an @ symbol. So about a week ago I decided to get a Nokia N800 Internet tablet, on the condition that it reads SD cards, weighs less than 250g, and costs about €200. This device isn’t a phone, it is a very small Linux computer that can browse the web in wifi hotspots.

So yesterday I did some research and found it met the first two criteria, not sure about the third, so I today I got on the bike and went to the three places in Salzburg listed on www.nokia.at that sell the N-series gadgets. None of them had any. Media Markt had the cool little Asus EeePC, but it’s 900g and too big.

But anyway it was a nice day for visiting edge of town shopping malls. The cycleways in Salzburg are pretty good… better than Vienna and Linz. There was actually a signposted route — Europarkradweg — which took you from the zentrum to the shopping mall, and was pretty scenic. And the Europark had a nice big bicycle parking area with a security guard watching.

Made lunch in some garden and watched a team of gardeners out in the sun, navigating their lawn mowers around the delicate lines of flowerbeds. Rest of the day just cruising around taking photos of big old looking things.

Read older blog entries and realized they are quite dull.

Have decided on a route after the Taurnradweg. This route stops near the waterfall in Krimml at about 1100m. I’m not sure if there is a good route to Innsbruck, couldn’t find any cycle route maps, but probably there is a way… this is Austria.

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Fine weather today, but cool. Ended up in the town of Mozart’s birth, but am still wondering about his connection to fairly ordinary tasting balls of chocolate.

As you can see in the profile, today was mostly flat, slight uphill, along the river. The bump at the beginning was my exit from Burghausen. Had to make up my own route after losing the signs. The hills at the end were where I went out of the centre of Salzburg to my campsite, which is at the base of the hills.

It was a fairly quick day. Just stopped at the bäckerie in Oberndorf for a little lunch, but not much because I chowed fairly well into the included breakfast at the hostel.

Looked around town for a little while. Learnt from a postcard stand that The Sound of Music was set around Salzburg… there you go. I reckon there are about as many tourists in Salzburg as there are in Vienna, but it’s much smaller. So it’s mayhem in the little lanes.

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Dep 9:30, arr 1:30, dst 62km.

Went soft, succumbed to the weather, chose luxury instead of nature. Viewed the longest castle in the universe.

It was a drizzly, cloudy morning, so I was pretty slow to leave camping. Wanting more liquidity than about €2.43, I went to a net cafe to refill my money card, and check if anyone had posted comments on the blog (no they hadn’t… why do I bother?). Then to the Spar for some food and to the bike shop for some degreaser. The dude at the bikeshop didn’t have a can of degreaser, and suggested it might be easier to put on a new chain than to clean off the filthy muck. Of course that might also mean new gear wheels if the old ones have worn a lot.

So my strategy is to wait until the chain starts slipping too much, or for it to break. Then new chain and gears. Unfortunately I threw away the instruction book for my multitool so I hope I can work out the chain link remover in the hour of crisis… otherwise there might be some walking. In the meantime I will source some degrease spray and try to clean it because it’s disgusting.

Just after 12:00 I was taking my bike down the stairs in the town wall, onto the cycleway. There were some quite nice roads through forest today. Stopped at a lookout over the convergence of the Inns and Salzach rivers, and then it started raining. Went down into the nice town of Ãœberackern, and then back up to the main road again. It started raining and I stood under the eaves of a barn while families of white ducks waddled past.

Took a very steep descent into Burghausen. I have to say the signs were quite stupid here. They took a very steep footpath down to the river, when there was a road with switchbacks next to it. The less steep road was much safer. The conditions were quite slippery. I would have taken the road if I had have known where it was going.

Admired the castle in Berghausen for a little while and then headed up the hill which goes behind it. The castle is about 1km long and supposedly the longest in Europe. After losing the radweg signs (because I was in Germany and the route was in Austria), I made up my own way. This was going OK until it started pouring with rain. So I stood under the eaves on the side of a garage and ate a cheese sandwich waiting for it to stop. This was OK until the owner showed up. She offered me a cup of tea and so I accepted on the 2nd “are you sure?” The house was only 4 years old and pretty bloody nice inside. It had a huge view over Berghausen and the castle, and the church in this particular village.

The rain didn’t stop so I resolved to go back to Berghausen, stay in the hostel, and visit the castle. The hostel was just one of those boring HI youth hostels, however it was full of little school children away on some song singing camp, and they were barely tolerable. My room mate Johannes was Austrian, in Berghausen for work. We decided to check the castle, then have a beer at a biergaarten somewhere.

So this was done, but we had our 1L glass (eine maas I think it’s called) inside because the soft waitress said they would they won’t go out into the garden because their costumes have short sleeves and it’s too cold. After that we got some more beers, I got a schnitzel burger, and we headed back to the hostel and watched episodes of Family Guy on his laptop. Good time, Johannes is a cool dude.

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Dep 12:00, arr 4:00, dst 39km.

Saw and heard the biggest organ in the universe, donned beanie instead of helmet, ended up in Hitler’s birthplace.

Cloudy weather this morning. Went into town again with Dani to check out the cathedral, where they give an organ recital every weekday. Unfortunately this was a Sunday and mass gets in the way of things. We had a coffee, looked at the pretty old buildings and medieval lanes, viewed the outdoor crypt that is next to the cathedral, then joined the mob of tourists waiting at the doors for the mass to finish. Went inside when the true believers started emerging from the church. Luckily for us the organist was still playing the closing piece. Was very impressive, as was the cathedral’s interior.

At about 12, said farewell to Dani; today was rest day and she was catching a ferry to Linz, then headed to the south of town to find the Innradweg. Over the river it was also a very beautiful old town. There was a slight headwind and the rain wasn’t coming which was good, and also bad because I was waiting for a rain break so I could eat my lunch.

About the time I was underneath an autobahn bridge the rain came down so I stopped there for lunch. Actually it was a little cold so I put on my trousers, another shirt, and my beanie. Took off the trousers but left the rest on and pushed on. After a second rain stop in Mühlheim, the last stretch to Braunau was slow due to the wind. No major hills except a 15% downhill.

Lots of cruising along gravel tracks on the top of the flood banks next to the river. It was nice but my bike was getting really dirty. The chain is quite mucky and I ran out of degreaser to clean it with.

Got to the nice riverside concrete path underneath Braunau and decided to call it a day. Found camping without a problem, enjoyed a nice hot €0.50 shower, ate the rest of my food, and went into town looking for Hitler’s birthplace. For some reason they keep it pretty low key and try to focus on the town’s other attractions. Went back to camping and it started raining again.

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Dep 12:00, arr 5:30, dst 74km.

P.S. This picture is for Stu, Adam, and Michelle.

After squandering two days of hot sunny weather in smokey Linz net cafes, the rain started as soon as I was back on the road.

My first mission was to decide where to go next and then find a good map. After a short browse of the bookshop I found a nice booklet for the Taurnradweg from Passau to Salzberg to some other village I forgot the name of. Then I checked out the flea markets in the main square, which seemed to be mostly the contents of various dead persons’ estates. It started drizzling and so the sellers put out their cigarettes and started folding up their tables and packing away the junk.

Despite the clouds and drizzle I left Linz in a good mood, because I knew where I was to go for the next 500km or so. Just out of Linz the cycle way was next to a main road, so not very peaceful, but then it dipped under the road, over a railway line, and into a forest. This was quite a pleasant stretch, just next to the river with the trees and the hills which mostly didn’t have buildings on them.

At some point I crossed into Germany. I only realised this because the number plates on cars said “D” instead of “A”. This section was a pretty boring slog to Passau. Passau is a beautiful town built that lies on the convergence of the Inns and Outes rivers which form the Donau. I crossed the bridge into town, about to have a look around, but thought twice about this due to the storm clouds overhead.

Rushed into camping and set up tent. Met a girl from Vancouver who was cycling from Bavaria to Budapest. She was pulling more than 100km every day and wanted to finish her tour in the next 10 days, and I think she will. The storm showed up and it bucketed. Went with Dani to the supermarket in the pouring rain. Later it cleared up and we had a look at the old town.

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Dep 8:30, arr 4:00, dst 109km.

After spending some time drying out my tent in the morning, I headed over the hill of Wallsee, then over the kraftwerk to the opposite bank of the Donau. Today all the Austrian air force were out. There were planes and helicopters everywhere. During the night a couple of really loud planes boomed overhead. I imagined huge multi-propellor bombers overloaded with tonnes of H-bombs were headed for Russia. I haven’t been keeping up with the news so my suspicion was that due to some political blunder Russia had cut off the gas supply to Western Europe. Europe, no longer with enough gas to cook their käsekrainers, declared war in retaliation.

Since then Europe hasn’t been turned into a smoking pile of rubble so either they won the war or the situation calmed down. Anyway. The Donau Radweg is a bit of a nanna route. The hills next to the river (such as the ones I drove through this morning) are something different. They’re not huge but with my luggage I would only do 60-80km through these in a full day. Usually one would find some 10% or steeper inclines, especially if one gets lost. I would only want to do a couple of such inclines per day as they are quite tiring. Now here is the GPS tracklog of today’s route.

Look a bit south and there are the proper hills — the ones that stick their big rocky heads through the clouds. My goal is to get to France, through Switzerland and Leichtenstein. So at some point I would need to cycle through these. So while huffing and puffing up these little 350m hills, using my last granny gear, I decided that the next step from Linz would require some serious contemplation.

Added to this I remembered my dream last night. It’s one I’ve had before where I’m walking in sand dunes near the beach on a cool cloudy day with a big swell and lots of noise from the waves and then it starts snowing a lot and everything including me gets covered in snow and then I wake up. I guess the obvious interpretation is that I’m worried about the forces of nature — mountains, rain, wind, etc.

Anyway today’s cycling wasn’t too exciting. I just powered it along the river through the headwind. Decided to carry the bike up the stairs and cross the bridge at Mauthasen which was a bit of a mistake because I ended going through another horrible soulless industrial estate, then next to the railway/autobahn. But I got to the nice town of Enns which is on a hill where I took a photo, and bought some cakes from the markets there.

Back down to the river and across another kraftwerk, more driving next to the bank through the wind. Got passed by a racing cyclist and decided to draft him for a bit but the pace was a little much. Later on was passed by an old guy on his mountain bike bouncing up and down on his shocks with the fat tires buzzing. Got a good tow from him going about 27km/h all the way to Linz, where he turned off.

Found the centre of Linz at about 2:30, went to the tourist bureau, ate my cakes, and watched some of a game of chess on the street with those huge 15:1 scale chess pieces. Black’s “pawns & bishops only” opening was pretty pathetic and so I left as soon as — with careful and long consideration — he sacrificed his first bishop. Went and blew some cash at a smokey R&B hip hop music internet cafe, then headed back out to camping at about 4:30.

Dep 9:20, arr 2:30, dst 60km.

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Slept in a bit until 8:30, woke in the reasonable hope that the sunny weather at this moment would continue, alas the clouds closed in again, I packed my wet tent and left. A banana on the road for breakfast. Plenty of slugs out today and a few unfortunate ones ended up splattered all over various parts of my bike, which annoyed me a bit.

Today a slightly stiff headwind. Most cyclists around seemed to be going in the other direction, and good for them. Today was my geology day because I saw lots of rocks up close, the cycle way being right between the hills and the water’s edge.

In Ybbs I went shopping at Lidl. Gave a beggar outside the supermarket €1, partly out of sympathy, and partly as protection money for my bike. He also went inside and spent a long time choosing which can of sardines to go with his bread, so I felt a little mean only giving him €1. I realised that there aren’t many beggars in Austria — not sure why this is since the cost of living is so high. There are heaps of bums and beggars in other places. For example in Poland I’m quite stingey I don’t think I gave more than 10zł all up while I was there.

Ate lunch by the river next to a church, then continued, going through plenty of forest. Went past a nice island with fishers then at Grein crossed the river on a radfähre (bike ferry). The captain was nice, spoke some Englisch, and he could drive well.

I had a Slight Misunderstanding with regards to the location of the camp site, so I headed away from the river to the town of Strengberg. Now Austria is a pretty easy place to cycle — if you only cycle along the Donau. So the decent hills here gave me a bit of a surprise. Anyway I got the Strengberg and looked at the big map in town and it said the camping was next to the river. Of course I got myself a bit lost going back to the Danube — my map isn’t very good and the contouring roads don’t really help with navigation.

I got back to the river then had to push the bike through a swampy footpath until I reached a bridle trail. This was actually a pretty cool track for riding horses on. Then the clouds and thunder opened up and it started pissing rain.

Dashed the last 500m out to the road, regardless of weather the man from snowy river might be coming in the other direction, and found an open garage to shelter under. A woman poked her head out and I asked “Woher ist das campingplatz?” and she said it was here; she was actually the manager. She gave me a coffee and towels and we had a chat because she spoke English. It cleared up and there was a rainbow so then we went to the camping field, with cows in the next paddock.

Dep 9:45, arr 6:15, dst 91km.

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Ah weather.

Woke up and it was raining, so naturally, stayed in bed until it stopped. Hit the hypermarket for food, then munched my food and caught up the last 4 days’ entries in my Tagenbuch. By 12:03 I was ready to leave. All the other cycle tourers at camping had left. The weather was OK but cloudy.

Krems is the beginning of the hills by the Donau. There are some really pretty riverside villages and vineyards in this region. Many restaurants, cafes, and wine cellars in the cobbled lanes. I believe some of the villages were established by the Romans for the purpose of enhancing the empire’s tourism sector.

I had to shelter from the rain twice. Once in the entrance of a wine cellar with garlic fumes wafting out, the second time in a bus shelter where I made my lunch. A Dutch cyclist showed up as well and we had a chat. He had come from Holland and was on his way to the Dead Sea, where the Donau ends (didn’t know that actually), then to Istanbul. He was 50, had done quite a few solo bike tours, his first was to Paris when he was 16 — on a 3 gear bike with one bag; others such as that Holland to Spain pilgrimage, and one tour in Indonesia. He is still in one piece so that’s a good sign.

Crossed a big bridge with a big crosswind and landed in Melk. Enjoyed the symmetry of this name, set up tent, but couldn’t go out because it started pouring with rain.

Dep 12:00, arr 4:15, dst 41km.

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Woke up to the heat at 7:30 feeling pretty tired. Packed up very neatly and left. No breakfast this morning because I didn’t go shopping the night before, because of the free parade. There are 3 good ways to cycle out of Vienna: on the bank of the Alte Donau, on the bank of the Neue Donou, or along the Donau isle.

I decided to cycle out on the island. It’s very long. Passed bathers, picnickers, then a lot of naturists tanning their wrinkly bums. There were many cyclists using this cyclebahn. Also plenty of rollerbladers looking silly and getting in the way, an old man jogging only in a pair of undies, no shoes or anything else, and a unicyclist going at 18km/h. That’s pretty fast by the way, he was overtaking rollerbladers.

Eventually reached the end of the island, where the old and new Danubes split, then to the left bank. Crossed a Kraftwerk (hydro power station), and made it my rule to cross any kraftwerk that I see. They are all accessible to cyclists which is cool. Found a little snack/beer hut and had a käsekreiner for breakfast. It’s a big sausage with cheese exploding out of it.

Passed the nice town of Tulln, a town of many fountains. Ate some Mozart chocolates for lunch… nothing was open this Sunday. After that a pretty uninteresting slog to Krems. The campsite was on the river, with a big f/o palace on a hill overlooking everything. Set up tent, then found a Chinese restaurant and raided the buffet.

Four plates full later, I returned home bloated and had to lay down for an hour. A super storm came in, lightning everywhere. I spent a while trying to catch a picture by continuously taking photos with 1″ exposure time. Needless to say this didn’t work and when it started bucketing down rain with thunder cracking right overhead I passed the time in my tent deleting the 300 photos I took.

Dep 10:30, arr 4:45, dst 98km.

• View the photos from today

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Slightly cloudy morning, first thing was to go to tourist information and get the right map. Rather unmemorable cycling to meet up with the EV-9 route. Lots of rolling hills through the country side and I was feeling a little bit hot. Walked the bike up a not particularly steep hill which was pretty pathetic.

Got my second wind and powered on until Wolkersdorf where I missed a sign and went through a bland industrial estate. Actually they are all bland. Got unlost by driving along a B road with the trucks. On the way a nice fruit seller gave me some cherries. Seeing some signs again, back onto small roads and cycle ways through the flat farmland north of Vienna. Could see the hills around Vienna and the Donau on the horizon.

They were building an autobahn and tunnel in this hot dusty desert region. I got lost on the detours so just headed up the hill in the vague direction of Vienna. Eventually got to the Donau isle — after following some circular route in the wrong direction — at 4PM or so. Then I thought it would be an easy task to find the Rathaus or some other tourist office and get a map and the address of one of the four campsites in Vienna. After all, Vienna’s not so big, right?

Well anyway I arrived at my campsite at 9PM after visiting 2 tourist bureaus which were closed by the time I found them, a call to Magda in Poland, asking numerous people for directions, and cycling around pretty much everywhere. My cycle computer said 80km or less when I was crossing the Alte Donau. There is a nice park next to the middle of the city which is surely 10km long or more. Vienna is a big city.

On the way I did meet a nice guy called Heinz who helped me navigate the inner ring road and then invited me to a BBQ that he was hosting the next evening.

Dep 9:30, arr 9:00, dst 126km

No tracklog today, GPS still out of order.

View all the photos for today

First around the lake and through the forest, past a run-down estate with huge palace, a big gothic St. Hubert statue in a clearing. (put photos here)

Went to the Austrian-Czech border at Valtice, with an awesome Kolonade on top of the hill. Didn’t realize that the other side of Kolonade was Österreich, and so accidentally entered the Prussian empire. Returned and took a rather bad road along the border until Hevlin. Not an interesting town except there was a potraviny there so I could burn my last crowns on lunch.

Then through to the Austrian town of Laa an der Thaya. First mission was to find the campsite. Of course on any map the tent picture means nothing — there was no campsite here. Went into the Rathaus for some maps. It took me a while to find the right room, the rathaus being a bit of a rabbit hole.

Received a quite good map of the area to the east of where I wanted to be. Nonetheless got a large-scale cycle route map with information that there is camping in Poysdorf, and headed there. The cycling signs in Austria are very good. It was no problem getting there, apart from the warm weather, the somewhat uninteresting farm land, and running out of water.

Followed a route called the Veltliner. I have no idea what that means but it goes around a hilly region, takes you up the side a bit so you can get a little view and see some grape vines, then drops you back down into Poysdorf.

I was the only one in a tent at the camping, until a Polish couple arrived on their bikes, Lukasz and Ola. They had caught the train from Katowice at 3AM to Brno and then cycled from there. Nice guys. Though weary, they offered to share their soup and still had time for a chat.

Dep 9:30, arr 5:00, dst 97.5km

Cloudy weather in the morning so I was sluggish getting away. I even considered not going anywhere this day but then I realized I would have to stay in Hustopece.

Lots of vine yards in this region, as well as the usual corn, wheat, sunflowers, poppies. I wish I could get my photos up, it’s just a challenge to find a decent cheap internet cafe to do this from.

Went to Breclav and had a look at the campsite. It was rubbish so I had a look around the town and went shopping. The town was quite nice — a river, big old palace type buildings, nice cycle lanes inside the town. At the shop I bought some Czech delicasies to bring to Austria as gifts — A bottle of Kofola, a big bar of Studentska chocolate, and some obscure beer.

Went back to Lednica and found a minicamping there in a vineyard, next to the lake. Relaxed there for the afternoon as it was quite hot. The owners of the vineyard were shaking overripe cherries out of the cherry trees — perhaps for wine or jam I don’t know. A thunderstorm passed by in the evening but only a little rain. Drank the Kofola and ate the Studentska by accident.

Dep 10:30, arr 3:15, dst 52km.