Riding the Rhine River cycle route

[dirtman]

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  Day 10.  Monday 4 September: Worms to Bacharach.  100 km

   

  Breakfast was included in the hotel rate, so I fuelled up for the day ahead and had six croissants with honey, yogurt and muesli as well as three cups of coffee. Just out of Worms we encountered the first vineyars and pretty wine towns.  Reminded me of the area around Stellenbosch, but without the hills.  Very nice riding for most of the way. Had our ice cream stop in Mainz after which we entered the proper Rhine gorge with vineyards along the steep sides and castles around every corner. Bike path ran very close to the river with beautiful scenery all the way. Overnight stop and rest day in Bacharach, a stunning medieval village.

   

  Day 11.  Tuesday 5 September - Rest day Bacharach. Got all our washing done.  Did a hike up to the castle behind the town, had coffee next to the river watching the ships go by and just took it easy.

[Sepia]

Enjoying this thread.  Very jealous indeed.

Nice going guys.

[dirtman]

^{Day 12: 6 Sept - Bacharach to Unkel -  105 km}

 

^{Accuweather forecasted a good tailwind down the RhineValley, but the wind did not read the forecast! We battled againt the wind for most of the day, but it was a very good day in the saddle anyway.  Speaking of saddles, we met a rider on one of the ferry crossings with a very interesting saddle - see photo.} 

 

^{We rode next to the river most of the way with more stunning villages and scenery all the way to Unkel where spent the night. Had dinner with friends I did a home-exchange with in 2011. Very pleasant evening and good to have a home-cooked meal after two weeks of eating pre-prepared meals out of supermarkets.}

 

[dirtman]

 

 

Day 13: 7 Sept - Unkel to Orsoy 80 km

 

As part of our route planning, we had from the outset decided to do the middle section of the stage from Cologne to Duisberg by train, as this is a very heavy industrialized area. From Unkel we rode 50 km to Cologne, again a very pleasant ride. Also clocked up 1000 km on this stage. Visited the massive cathedral and then caught a train to Duisberg.  Met a Dutchman on the train who was also busy touring by bike. He had a proper state of the art touring bike that had a 14 speed internal gearbox - same system as the 3 speed bikes we rode as kids.  He looked very incredulous at our 29'er full suspension bikes with knobbies that we were using as touring bikes - could not believe that we were riding across Europe on that. From Duisburg we rode another 30 km to our overnight stop in Orsay, another pretty little town.

[Sepia]

Lovely trip.  Keep them coming with the pics.

[dirtman]

Day 14 : 8 Sept Orsay to Millingen aan de Rijn - 80 km

 

They say that many books start with the following frase: 'It was a dark and storrmy night ......'  In our case it was a dark and stormy morning. It started raining during the night ad we could hear the wind picking up speed. We rode the first 30 minutes in dry conditions before the rain started again, together with a very strong wind that drove the rain across our path.  With the wind behind us we managed to reach speeds up to 35 km/h on a bike weighting 30 kg and fitted with knobbies, but these stretches were few. Mosty struggled with very strong cross winds and also head winds that forced us to put down or heads and just slog away to the end of the stage - another small town just over the border in the Netherlands. Even a bad day on a bike is however still better than a good day at work!

[dirtman]

Day 15:  9 September.  Millingen aan de Rhijn to Geldermalsen - 90 km

 

We started off in the rain, but it cleared soon. Wind however was still a problem. Just outside Arnhem we rode one of the best sections on the entire route - I called it MTB'ing on paved single track. We rode through a big forest with a network of narrow paths, all tarred but about 1.2 meters wide with a number of small uphills and downhills - was as close to proper MTB riding one could get. Also beautiful paths through the farming areas - another good day in the saddle.

[scubes]

Wow awesome... great pics... looks like a fantastic ride! 

[dirtman]

Day 16: 10 Sept Geldermalsen to Dordrecht - 75 km

 

Wind was again a challenge, but the route made up for that.  Rode throuh a number of small towns.  Saw a lot of riders on the route, since it was Sunday. As a result of the wind we took a few shortcuts to shorten the distance to 75 km from the original planned 90 km. Reaching Dordrecht also meant the end of our Rhine route, as we would be turning south towards Belgium after our rest day.

 

Day 17: 11 Sept - Rest day Dordrecht. Beautifull old city. Very strong winds the whole of the day with heavy rain towards the evening. Glad we were not riding today.

[Odinson]

I'm enjoying the write-up. 

 

Regarding your choice of bikes, do you think you would've been better served on a CX/touring bike?

[dirtman]

 

Regarding your choice of bikes, do you think you would've been better served on a CX/touring bike?

 

 

It would be much easier doing it with a CX or touring bike - we might have been the first riders doing the route on 29er full suspension bikes with knobbies!   I however only have a  MTB and have never owned any other bike, so it really did not bother me riding the 29'er.   As per my first post - we decided not to fit slicks, as slicks on a 29er full suspension bike would just look terrible!

 

I must add that the 29'ers made easy meat of the cobble roads in many of the old towns along the route.

[dirtman]

Day 18: 12 Sept. Dordrecht to Zierikzee. 75 km

 

Today we turned south on our last leg of three days' riding to the south of Belguim where I wanted to visit friends.  When planning the route, I did contemplate doing the 240 km that remained in two stages of 120 km each, but all reports on the web warned about the possibility of very strong headwinds riding south. I therefore decided to divide the distance into three stages.

 

This was shown to be a very wise decision, as we rode the whole of the stage straight into a howling wind. On the flat Holland polders there was nowhere to hide - we just had to buckle down and kept on pedalling. Kudo's to Riaan who rode in front for the entire 75 km, shielding me from the wind.  Even with the wind it was still a very good day on the bike with nice scenery and routes. The next day we had to ride 80 km - with accuweather forecasting a headwind of  70 km/h and there also was an official warning from the Dutch weather service for severe winds, so I was quite concerned.

[dirtman]

Day 19: 13 Sept Zierikzee to Bruges

 

We woke up at 6 am and could hear the wind howling outside. Checked the weather forecast which showed wind speeds of up to 70 km/h + directly from the front. We realised there was no chance we can ride 80 km in that. Problem was that we were in Zierikzee on one of the Dutch Zuider Zee islands and the nearest train station was 25 km away on the next island.  Further problem was that we had to cross a 8 km long bridge that connect the two islands. Left with no choice we saddled up and started riding. Crossing that bridge was both scary but also exilirating. The bridge is dead straight for a distance of 8 km, with a 2 meter wide bike path (behind a concrete barrier) next to the vehicle lanes.  At the edge there is a metal barrier of three horizontal poles - getting blown over that would mean a long way down to the ocean.  We made it across the bridge in an hour and 15 minutes whilst trying to keep as far away from the edge as possible.  Rode for another hour batttling the wind before reaching the train station from where we took the train via Antwerpen to Bruges.  Antwerpen must have one of the most spectacular railway stations in Europe (see photo)

[dirtman]

Day 20:  14 Sept - Bruges to Kortrijk

 

Seeing that we only had a flat 80 km to ride to Kortrijk, we did a tour of the old town of Bruges first and also visited a bike shop.  Started riding at 11 am and within the first 30 minutes the weather turned ugly and it started to rain.  Rained non-stop for about 3 hours and only cleared the last 30 minutes of the ride.  Temperature dropped to 11 degrees at 2 pm and we just had to keep going to stay warm.  Was not the best day to end our tour.  Reached our destination just after 4 pm. Total distance covered 1492 km.  

 

 

   

[dirtman]

End of our tour - 15 - 17 Sept

 

Stayed with friends in Kortrijk for three nights.  They have organised bike boxes for us, so we packed our bikes and on Sunday 17 Sept we took the train to Brussels Airport, got on the plane and was back in Cape Town on Monday the 18th at noon.       

 

I hope you have enjoyed riding the Rhine with us.  Feel free to PM me if you have any questions (or if you are looking for a tour guide!!) 

[Stan The Man 1961]

What a great ride and a great report. Looks like you had an awesome time.

Well done, and thanks for sharing.