Awfully early start as Fraser and Elfi needed to bike down to the railway station in Aschaffenburg on Di’s rental e-bike and Fraser’s bike. Horst dropped Di off at the station to meet up with Elfi and Fraser and then he drove to Bamberg with the two small e-bikes that Horst and Elfi own – confused???? A bit logistical to start the day with but a method in our craziness. We will meet Horst in Bamberg which should take us two hours by train.
So this is our train trip. It was quite the clusterf@#ck getting onto the train with our bikes as there was limited availability in the carriage and at least eight people with bikes trying to get in the bike carriage. Also, you do not know how many bikes are already in the carriage. If there is not enough room in the carriage, you have to wait for another train which was, for us, in two hours time. This would have been bothersome for us. As it was, Di paved the way to get our two bikes onto the train as she was not hampered by a bike and used the elbows up technique.
Whilst waiting for our train at Aschaffenburg station, this rather elite train full of nice new Mercedes cars took our attention. We were not quick enough to catch the train going the other way loaded to the gunnels with Audi’s. Later on when travelling to Bamberg, we passed a train carrying only BMW’s. Imagine how much money in tariffs on all these 🚗!
After a successful way around the cobbled streets of Bamberg and the pouring rain, we settled into our hotel then headed into the city of Bamberg itself on our bikes.
Firstly we went up to St Peter’s Cathedral. The cathedral was completed in the 13th century, which sounds impressive but was founded in 1002. None of our photos actually did it any justice. We found some lovely rose gardens up there and looking at the plants, some of them were very old.
It was then down to the picturesque area of the city. The town is very famous for the Rathaus. Bamberg’s 1462 Old Town Hall was built on an artifical island in the Regnitz River, allegedly because the local bishop had refused to give the town’s citizens any land for its construction.
Further wanderings took us to a few more picturesque points in town.
The skies were becoming ominous again, so we found some much needed solace in a biergarten.
Bamberg is famous for its smoked beer that smells like bacon and the most famous of the biergartens that sells it is called Aecht Schlenkerla. Try to pronounce that when you have had a few.
AND, this is the result. The food at this establishment was hideously heavy. We saw huge pork knuckles with 5 inches of crackling on top coming out of the kitchen. We decided to bike back to our accommodation and found a local pub where the food was more palatable.
You were only able to manage one of the beers as they were filling.
Steps – too drunk to be able to focus on the numbers.
Rowkin Rovings Blog 