So today started with the heartiest of breakfasts, right down to the kippers – ewww! Di and Fras avoided that one.
Our objective was to stay on the north side of the river today and to avoid hitting any of the other myriad of cyclists along the route. It is hard to emphasize just how many bikers are along this bike path system and of course being a weekend just adds substantially to the volume.
There wasn’t much along the way except lots of different fields of produce and unfortunately we were not right beside the river. Besides meaning the scenery was not that good, it also meant that we did not benefit from the coolness we would have got off the water. As we have substantial rain coming this evening the weather was getting more and more humid and very uncomfortable to bike in.
We got into the town of Kitzingen where we met up with Horst who had biked up from Sulzfeld which is our final destination for today. We whiled away a couple of hours underneath some umbrellas and replenished our water levels. Kitzengen is known as the largest wine producing area in Bavaria.
Our final 4K push to Sulzfeld saw us follow right along the rivers edge which was most welcoming.
Sulzfeld is a village of just over 4,000 people but punches above its weight when it comes to higher quality food establishments.
One of their biggest claims to fame is the meter long bratwurst. Fraser decided to tackle the ½ meter long bratwurst instead.
The village is a convoluted maze of cobblestone streets that wind around the houses. It is still a walled city and at one stage had 17 fortification towers.
This is the original gate to the main entrance and unfortunately you cannot see it very clearly but they have put markings on the gate of the different flood levels. The door is situated approximately 50 meters from the Mein River.
We wandered down to the river and watched a lot of locals cooling off in the river. They were swimming in the main shipping channel, so they were pretty brave souls or just plain dumb. We can feel the humidity building up and it is impossible to cool off as there is no such thing as air conditioning in these areas. The rain is meant to start about 10pm tonight, so we are very much hoping it breaks this mugginess. Tomorrow is predicted to be fairly wet which is our final day of cycling, so we will probably end up complaining about that now – can’t win.
Step – 5,676. +31k in 29c
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