Thursday, September 24

From	To	Distance (km)	Average Speed (km/hr)	Max Speed (km/hr)	Odometer (km)	Riding Time (hr:min:sec)	Push-Ups
Beringen, Switzerland	Meerburg, Germany	80.24	15.3	55.0	896	5:14:33	300

(1537 words)

This morning Matt and I slept 45 minutes past the alarm, which sounded at 6:30 AM. I think we were a bit worn out by our big day of climbing in Feldberg two days earlier. At 7:15 we got up and walked to the main building of the Gasthaus, where a buffet-style breakfast was awaiting us. Sadly, the coffee had grown tired of waiting for us and was no longer hot. After eating a mediocre breakfast, whose one redeeming feature for me was a crunchy chocolate cereal, Matt and I packed our panniers and readied our bikes for another day of riding.

We began our ride by following a bike path that ran next to some railroads tracks to Neuhausen. Once in Neuhausen, we followed signs that promised to take us to Schaffhausen, but these signs led us to an autobahn. As bicycles are not welcome on autobahns, we consulted our map. We devised what we thought was a reasonable bike route to Schaffhausen and rode onwards. But either this bike route didn't exist or we didn't find it, because our path soon ended at the base of a long column of cement steps that led up a hill. We backtracked a short distance and turned onto a steep path that took us up the hill for a while, but eventually this path also ended at the base of some steps. This time we just got off our bikes and carried them up the steps.

At the top of the steps, we emerged onto a street surrounded by big houses in walled yards. We seemed to finally have arrived at the top of the hill. We set out in a best-guess direction, but after about ten meters we came to a fork in the road. Here we paused because our preferred direction would take us through some road construction. We asked two construction workers, who were standing nearby discussing their next project, how best to get to Schaffhausen. They said we could go either way at the fork, so we continued in our preferred direction, through the middle of the construction. About 30 meters later, we arrived at a schoolyard full of children. Here we stopped again so Matt could snap a picture of one of the big houses and I could add some air to my front tire. After about another 20 meters of progress, we came to a T intersection. We figured we should go to the right, because it was downhill, but just to be sure we decided to ask the opinion of two women standing on the corner. I interrupted their conversation long enough to ask them how to get to Schaffhausen. They pointed to the right, so we turned right and coasted downhill into Schaffhausen.

At the first red light in Schaffhausen, I pulled over onto the sidewalk and unfolded the map. As our next target, Matt and I selected a town named Thayngen. When we looked around, however, we saw no hint of Thayngen on any sign. Just then a fellow pulled up next to me on a bike, and forgetting momentarily where I was, I asked him how to get to Schaffhausen. After he reminded me that I was already in Schaffhausen, I asked him how to get to Thayngen. He didn't know. So Matt and I headed off in yet another best-guess direction. We soon started seeing signs for Thayngen, and followed them until we were out of Schaffhausen.

From Schaffhausen to Thayngen, we followed a nice bike path that was paved and flat, with gentle left and right curves. This path took us through a clearing between some woods and a busy highway (the 34). Because the cars and trucks were usually about 20 to 30 meters away from us, the ride was quite pleasant.

At one point on this path, we came upon a herd of schoolchildren walking with their teacher. As we approached from behind, the teacher yelled something to his students that struck me as a good example of the way languages mix at the edges. In this part of Switzerland, I realized, French was beginning to infiltrate German. The night before, I had noticed that the people who ran the Gasthof in Beringen thanked me with "Merci" instead of "Danke," even though they otherwise spoke German. The teacher on the path impressed me even more. He yelled, "Achtung, velo!" to his students, mixing German and French in one two-word sentence that warned of approaching bicycles.

In Thayngen, just inside the swiss border, we stopped for groceries. Our purchases included a big bottle of orange juice, which we split between us by pouring it into our water bottles. When then crossed over the border into Germany and took a bike path to Gottmadingen.

Although it had clouded over and I was beginning to feel cold in my blue windbreaker, I didn't want to take the time stop and change jackets. On our bike trips, Matt and I have a healthy competition of trying to avoid making the other guy wait. We both try to get ready first in the morning, and we try not to stop during the day unless the other guy also wants to stop. During my ride to Gottmadingen, I felt this pressure of not holding up the show, but I also felt I might be fighting a off a potential cold. So as I rode I mentally debated whether I should keep going in the name of progress or stop and change into a warmer jacket in the name of fighting off a cold. In the end, progress won and I made it all the way to Gottmadingen in my blue windbreaker.

Once in Gottmadingen, we stopped in a park that had a small fountain and pulled out our groceries. I put on more layers of jackets and sat down on a bench facing the fountain. While watching and listening to the water flowing in the fountain, I ate a delicious lunch of peanut butter spread on bread, granola mixed into yogurt, and orange juice. After lunch I continued to sit on the bench, contemplating the fountain and sipping orange juice, while Matt did some repair work on his pedals.

From Gottmading, we took the road to Singen. In Singen, we asked a large woman on the sidewalk how best to get to Steißlingen. She yelled to a friend of hers further up the sidewalk and asked him the same question. He approached us and talked it over with the large woman for a while, then turned to us and recommended we take a path next the the "Aach," which he said was a nearby brook. We followed this path, an unpaved path bordered on one side by the the Aach and lined on the other by trees, all the way to Beuren. In Beuren, we got back onto roads and followed signs to Steißlingen. These roads, which took us through fields, were narrow, smoothly paved, partly flat and partly downhill, with gentle curves and almost no traffic. By this time the sun was shining. It was great riding.

We navigated through Steißlingen by looking at a map of the town posted on a building. Once through Steißlingen, we asked a very friendly man in a red sweater how to go to Wahlweis. He recommended we go to Stahring and Güttingen instead. We were suspicious of his advice at first, but decided in the end to follow it, and he turned out to be right. His advice led us to a small, paved bike path. This path took us past several apple trees full of apples, past a teenage boy driving a tractor, past a strange old man on a bench who wanted to know where our girlfriends were, up a hill and into a beautiful forest with rays of sunlight streaming down between the trees. Once through the forest, we emerged into some sunny, rolling hills.

We began rolling downhill through rural scenery to Stahring and Güttingen. At one point we zoomed past an older couple, dressed like German country folk, picking apples off a big tree and filling up a trailer attached to a tractor. I saw them looking at me as I was looking at them. To me, they looked like a quintessential German farming couple, with a simple, happy life that included picking apples in the fall. I wondered what their lives were really like and what they thought of me when they saw me rolling by.

From Güttingen we rode through Liggeringen, Dettingen, and Dingelsdorf and on down into Konstanz. In Konstanz we followed a path through the Mainau park until we arrived at a ferry terminal. About 20 seconds after we arrived at the ferry terminal, they started letting bikes on the next boat to Meersburg, a small town on the north side of the Bodensee. We made a quick decision to take the boat, rode alongside the other bicycles to the front of the ferry, locked our bikes, and went upstairs to sit at a table. I wrote in my journal as we crossed the Bodensee to Meersburg. In Meersburg, we found a nice room upstairs from a restaurant and stopped for the night.