Our first day of our bike trip, so we were all pretty excited. We had a distance of 30k to go today.
The sky looked slightly threatening but the forecast was for no rain. Fraser, Di and Elfi, headed off on the bikes whilst Horst drove to our next accommodation in the village of Zell em Main.
So we are following the Mainz River that flows into the Rhine River at the city of Mainz which was where we finished our bike/barge trip two weeks ago.
A brief history of the most major waterway in Europe. The North Sea near Amsterdam is connected via the Rhine River, Mainz River and Mainz Canal plus the Danube River to the Black Sea. This is a total of 3,500 kilometers. The portion called the Mainz Canal is man made and is 171 kilometers long and was completed 1992.
The idea of connecting the Rhine to the Danube dates back centuries. The Mainz Canal has 16 locks on it to manage the elevation as this is the highest point in the total length from The North Sea to the Black Sea. Di is absolutely fascinated with all this stuff as her obvious passion shows when she talks about the UK inland waterways. You will just have to bear with us for a few more days.
We arrived into the very quaint village of Zell em Main. What we can find about this town is pretty much non-existant. It seems to originate from 1128 and that is it.
It seems to be a good stopping place for people like us who are doing the Bamberg to Warzburg bike ride.
Di and Elfi found the local ice cream shop…..
……whilst Fraser and Horst found the local biergarten.
This trip is absolutely killing our waistlines!!! Horst is tucking into a pork loin chop with copious crackling.
Fras revelled in his dinner which was a local specialty catering around, what else but, cheese.
Then of course, everything was flushed down with the proverbial stein of beer.
The evening was completed with a sudoku competition between Elfi, Horst and Di with Fraser the adjudicator who tried with all his might to break the concentration of the contestants by nefarious tactics.
Steps – 6,796 – Di doesn’t know how to get the fitbit to count a bicycle ride so we will just say +30k.
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