Strasbourg to Germerheim

Not being totally stupid (it’s an age thing!) I checked the weather forecast after crawling into my sleeping bag last night.  RAIN!  Starting at 8am.   There aren’t many worse things than packing up a campsite in the rain.  It would be an early start!  I was awake at 6am and packed by 6.45.  No sign of the rain but the sky was grey.  As forecast, it started to rain at 8am.  Only lightly and then it stopped around 10am.  The sky cleared and the sun came out.

I headed north along the eastern side of the Rhine.  The first third of the day was spent cycling on the eastern side of the flood embankment.  No view of the Rhine from the base of the embankment.  the scenery to the east was either woodland or farms.

The major disappointment of the day occurred when I reached Karlsruhe.  There is a major inland port here with the EV15 route on the map shown as crossing it at the entrance (red arrow below).

My initial impression was the crossing would be achieved via a lift bridge.  Then my heart sank when I realised the bike had to be taken up and down two flights of steps.  I would be doing the same action as I did at an earlier bridge where I damaged the bike.

On the building side of the steps was a 4” wide shallow steel trough.  Obviously the cyclist is expected to push their bike up and down the steps using the trough,   My problem is the bike is just too heavy for me to push up the gradient.  Moreover the panniers on the bike foul on the side of the building meaning I’d need to both push the bike up the ramp whilst simultaneously holding it at 30 degrees away from the wall.  

Perhaps I could detour around the port.   Looking at the map I quickly realised I’d be cycling for miles.   The other option was to unload the bike and carry everything up the stairs in three trips.  Then push the bike to the top.  The entire process was then repeated on the downward side.  Needless to say I wasn’t pleased!  But it had to be done…. And carefully!

A few kilometres later the route crossed the Rhine and headed inland before skirting around a large industrial area.  Eventually the route took me back to the Rhine.  This time I was on the western side of the flood bank.  Next the route took me up onto the top of the flood bank where there was a sealed path.  However this didn’t last long and I was forced onto yet another detour to the west due to major earthworks.  Either the flood bank was being repaired or raised.

The detour subsequently brought be back to the main EV15 route.  But not to the Rhine.  Good, sealed and flat riding through woodlands.  The route became busier with more day cyclists out enjoying the weather. 

Two kilometres before Germerheim; my destination for the day; the route was on the river bank with views of the river traffic.  It was also very busy with numerous families out cycling. 

According to my posterior I rode 120km today and am now 670km into my return journey.  Only 850km to go!