Minuetto Allegretto

Wesseling.        bachman.turner.overdrive

Distance.        85km

Total.             965km

What an interesting day.  I don’t know where to begin.  We left our hotel in Koblenz suitably fuelled and stolen lunch stashed in our panniers ready for the journey.  The weather this week looks rather mixed but this morning was dry and pleasant and again we managed to stay dry.  Today is day 14 of continuous cycling and we are still going strong.

As we passed a small town we overheard three cyclists talking in English.  We butted in straight away and quickly realised that one of the cyclists was the man from Todmorden that we had met at Worms in the Tourist Info.  We had a lovely chat and eventually introduced everyone.  Wayne was from Todmorden and from Dorset were Patrick and Margaret.  These are the only English people we have come across and we all commented that there weren’t many Brits around.  Wayne cycled along with us for a while till we got to Remagen.  It was nice to hear an accent that is so familiar.

Remagen is famous for the WW2 capture of the bridge by US forces in 1945.  It was the only complete bridge that the Allies secured across the Rhine, all the others had been destroyed by retreating German forces.  The Germans tried to scupper the bridge here but the US forces managed to capture it but it collapsed 10 days later because of the weakness’s caused by the Germans and the stress put on it by the military crossing it.  There is a famous film starring George Segal and Robert Vaughn all about it.

The towers at either side of the river are all that remains of the bridge.  

We stopped in the town, said goodbye to Wayne and got stuck into more cake and coffee.

We had a few more interesting stops.  The first was a restored railway station at Rolandseck.  It was built as a grand building to connect the trains to ferries down the Rhine Gorge.

The first photo is the Station Restaurant, rather grand don’t you think!  If you have very good eyes you might read the small print under the painting.  It includes the names of people who have been to the Station.....Queen Victoria, George Bernard Shaw, Kaiser Wilhelm, Marcel Marceau and others.

On the opposite side of the Rhein is Drachenfels.  We visited here 5 years ago and recall walking uphill to two castles.  The one at the top is a ruined castle but the one half way up is a complete castle that appears to be older than it really is.  The location is connected to the Nibelung Saga where hero Siegfried slays a cave living dragon on this hill.

Another point of interest is....

This was supposedly Hitlers favourite hotel, he stayed over 70 times.  It is particularly famous as the place he met Neville Chamberlain in 1938.  Chamberlain returned to give his ‘Peace in our Time’ speech.....mmm, history can be very cruel.  I have learned what really happened.....there were loads of horse chestnut trees next to the hotel (conkers were falling on us as we cycled) and Hitler and Chamberlain were having a diplomatic conker match BUT it transpired that Hitler had been pickling his conkers in vinegar and drying them out to harden them up.  He thrashed Chamberlains ‘fresh’ conker and as a result he hatched his plan for world conkering!!

Next stop was Bonn.  Apart from being the capital of West Germany before reunification it is the birthplace of Beethoven.  We had our late lunch here and had a walk around the older parts of the city.

Rathaus, Beethoven and his house....in that order.  He lived in Bonn for 22 years, then he went to Vienna.  We hummed a few of his tunes as we walked around.  I tried ‘Minuetto Allegretto’.  Janice was quite impressed till she realised that it was a hit by the Wombles.  I’m great with my classical music knowledge..not!  I must admit I can be stirred by the 1812 Overture as I like the cannons firing....

Our accommodation is a little different tonight.  We are about 20km north of Bonn in a room at a Psychiatric Clinic.  About time I hear you say.  It is part of an old Schloß......

...although, we are in a building next to it.  We were shown our large room which is nice.  Then the staff member went home leaving us alone in what appears to be a six bedroom building with large dining room, kitchen and sitting room fully stocked with beers and wine for use on an honesty basis.  We are the only people here.  I think they must be secretly observing us as part of a case study in temptation.  I am tempted already to drink the beers and cycle away to dispose of the empty bottles so it doesn’t look like we’ve had any....but if they have secret cameras I will be letting down humanity as I will have surcumbed to evil.  Oh dear, it’s a sober night then because Janice wouldn’t countenance any wrong doing....of course not!  It is a pretty good deal to stay here...especially at the price.

Just wondered if anyone noticed the spoof ‘what3words’ location I gave at the top of the blog.  I couldn’t resist!  The correct one is.    hamper.beard.congas