Fourth installment:
I’m sitting in the lounge of a stylist hotel husking unsalted peanuts (hotel provided) in Regensburg, Germany, a world heritage city in Bavaria (Southern Germany). It’s been a long few days.
Last email, I was in Prague. The next morning, I walked to the bus stop and discovered the value of a reserved seat. The bus was completely full and I got bounced around from seat to seat, finally ending up in the middle of the rear bench seat. It was a long but uneventful ride.
I got to Cesky Krumlov about noon, walked 20 minutes to the apartment, got my bike, changed into bike shorts in a tiny alcove, and rode off. It was cold and overcast. I was riding toward the southwest to Horni Plana, a tiny town (village really) on a big reservoir on the Voltava river about 20 up and down miles from Cesky Krumlov. The route was scenic with wide views of green rolling hills, sections of forest, pretty ponds, and a smattering of corn fields, of course. The light traffic (a car every 10 minutes) helped a lot.
It didn’t rain, but it sure felt like it would any minute. For the first time, I was a bit cold while riding. Frankly, I think heat is easier to deal with than cold.
Horni Plana looks like a real town on the map and it did have a restaurant, grocery store, and pharmacy. But, that was it. My apartment had a tiny cooking area and I made a tasty meal from dehydrated broccoli and some veggies from the market. I didn’t go out once I arrived.
The weather predictions have been showing a major rain storm coming. There are flood warning advising people not to drive. I had hoped I could simply ride through the rain, but the dire predictions had scared me.
It rain steadily overnight and it was cold and wet the next morning. The owner of the apartment offered to drive me to Strazny 20 miles away, where I’d rented a room at the Imperial Casino. It had just stopped raining when I went outside, but I decided to accept his offer. In addition to renting apartments, he runs a linen service and one of his clients is the Imperial Casino. I was there by 10am. In truth, had I been a bit braver, I’d have ridden as the rain was not heavy and from the van it looked like a nice route.
The Imperial Casino is a real casino with hundreds of slot machines and several gaming (card) tables. The man at reception didn’t speak English or Italian, so we communicated with Google Czech to English translations, handing my phone back and forth. After filling out several forms, mostly so I could get a magnetic card to open the curtained turnstiles into the casino, he arranged an early check-in for me.
The room was nice and after getting situated, I walked out to see Strazny. The village is a few miles from the Czech -German border. The Czech Republic doesn’t use Euros (it uses koruna) and clearly the taxes on cigarettes and booze are lower there than in Germany. The two tiny stores were, at least, half cigarettes and alcohol. In addition, there were several flea-market type stalls all over the village all with hanging clothes for sale.
Strazny is also adjacent to a national park popular with hikers. I saw several groups with backpacks and hiking poles sitting in the square. There was also a sign to a ski lift.
I found a restaurant that had a vegetarian item on the menu (deep fried cauliflower with mashed potatoes) for lunch. I returned to the casino which was just starting to see some people. I went up to my room and tried to decide what my plan was, given the rain and scary warnings.
After hitting the same restaurant for dinner, I returned to the now humming casino and watched the action for a while. Because it was Thursday, I’d been given €15 to play with. Eventually, a seat at a blackjack table opened up and I sat down. The €15 euros lasted about 30 minutes. I think my high water mark was €27.50. I was disappointed that there were several roulette tables but no dice table. I asked the dealer and she said in Europe they don’t have dice tables.
It was fun (and didn’t cost me anything). The dealers spoke English and were fun to talk with. After I was cleaned out, I went up and to bed.
The next morning, I woke up to steady, heavy rain. What’s more, the first few miles of my route were on a 4-lane highway without a bike path. I had hoped to get an early start to beat the traffic, but the rain nixed that plan.
I had been given the number of a taxi cab company in nearby Germany that would come and pick me up and take where I wanted to go. Now, I had to figure out where that was.
In doing some research, I discovered that Regensburg was a world heritage city and it wasn’t too far away. To get there, I first had to find a city with a train station with connections there. When I contacted the taxi company (after preparing a list of sentences translated with Google), I was quoted €200 ($220) for a trip to Deggendorf (a city that was on my bike route) where I could catch a train to Regensburg.
I swallowed hard and ordered the taxi. The driver was a 50-something man who was the owner of the taxi company who had learned English 30 years before in the army but didn’t remember much. We talked in a mixture of English, German (I studied German in High School), and Google translate. It was interesting and I enjoyed the expensive ride. The driver/owner complained that he worked 7 days a week, had 14 cabs (no Uber in his area), and wanted to travel but couldn’t take the time off. I tried to advise him that making money by sacrificing time when healthy was a bad idea. I even invoked Julia. I doubt it even made an impact.
I caught two very crowded trains (always fun with a loaded touring bike) to Regensburg where I had reserved a room in the middle of the old town. While not as big or pretty as Prague, Regensburg’s old town is from a different era and has cobblestone streets, narrow alleyways, old facades, stylish stores, a huge church, and a famous stone bridge over the Danube, which runs right through the town. There is also a monument to the pogrom that emptied the town of Jews in the 1600s.
I’ve been out for a look around this morning in the constant rain and will go out again soon to see more. One odd thing is that my hotel room has 3 posters of paintings of naked women. Just what I need…
Tomorrow, the prediction is for clouds but no rain. So, yet again, I am planning to ride. I am on schedule to return to Trento around the 24th of September. I have also asked if I can stay here for another night should the weather require it.
This is the first time in over 20 years of bike touring that I have encountered a period of heavy rain that lasted more than a day or two. I am prepared to ride in the rain, but as I’m not really on a schedule (I can take a train to Trento any day I want), hanging out in a pretty town for day isn’t so bad either.
I’m sitting in the lounge of a stylist hotel husking unsalted peanuts (hotel provided) in Regensburg, Germany, a world heritage city in Bavaria (Southern Germany). It’s been a long few days.
Last email, I was in Prague. The next morning, I walked to the bus stop and discovered the value of a reserved seat. The bus was completely full and I got bounced around from seat to seat, finally ending up in the middle of the rear bench seat. It was a long but uneventful ride.
I got to Cesky Krumlov about noon, walked 20 minutes to the apartment, got my bike, changed into bike shorts in a tiny alcove, and rode off. It was cold and overcast. I was riding toward the southwest to Horni Plana, a tiny town (village really) on a big reservoir on the Voltava river about 20 up and down miles from Cesky Krumlov. The route was scenic with wide views of green rolling hills, sections of forest, pretty ponds, and a smattering of corn fields, of course. The light traffic (a car every 10 minutes) helped a lot.
It didn’t rain, but it sure felt like it would any minute. For the first time, I was a bit cold while riding. Frankly, I think heat is easier to deal with than cold.
Horni Plana looks like a real town on the map and it did have a restaurant, grocery store, and pharmacy. But, that was it. My apartment had a tiny cooking area and I made a tasty meal from dehydrated broccoli and some veggies from the market. I didn’t go out once I arrived.
The weather predictions have been showing a major rain storm coming. There are flood warning advising people not to drive. I had hoped I could simply ride through the rain, but the dire predictions had scared me.
It rain steadily overnight and it was cold and wet the next morning. The owner of the apartment offered to drive me to Strazny 20 miles away, where I’d rented a room at the Imperial Casino. It had just stopped raining when I went outside, but I decided to accept his offer. In addition to renting apartments, he runs a linen service and one of his clients is the Imperial Casino. I was there by 10am. In truth, had I been a bit braver, I’d have ridden as the rain was not heavy and from the van it looked like a nice route.
The Imperial Casino is a real casino with hundreds of slot machines and several gaming (card) tables. The man at reception didn’t speak English or Italian, so we communicated with Google Czech to English translations, handing my phone back and forth. After filling out several forms, mostly so I could get a magnetic card to open the curtained turnstiles into the casino, he arranged an early check-in for me.
The room was nice and after getting situated, I walked out to see Strazny. The village is a few miles from the Czech -German border. The Czech Republic doesn’t use Euros (it uses koruna) and clearly the taxes on cigarettes and booze are lower there than in Germany. The two tiny stores were, at least, half cigarettes and alcohol. In addition, there were several flea-market type stalls all over the village all with hanging clothes for sale.
Strazny is also adjacent to a national park popular with hikers. I saw several groups with backpacks and hiking poles sitting in the square. There was also a sign to a ski lift.
I found a restaurant that had a vegetarian item on the menu (deep fried cauliflower with mashed potatoes) for lunch. I returned to the casino which was just starting to see some people. I went up to my room and tried to decide what my plan was, given the rain and scary warnings.
After hitting the same restaurant for dinner, I returned to the now humming casino and watched the action for a while. Because it was Thursday, I’d been given €15 to play with. Eventually, a seat at a blackjack table opened up and I sat down. The €15 euros lasted about 30 minutes. I think my high water mark was €27.50. I was disappointed that there were several roulette tables but no dice table. I asked the dealer and she said in Europe they don’t have dice tables.
It was fun (and didn’t cost me anything). The dealers spoke English and were fun to talk with. After I was cleaned out, I went up and to bed.
The next morning, I woke up to steady, heavy rain. What’s more, the first few miles of my route were on a 4-lane highway without a bike path. I had hoped to get an early start to beat the traffic, but the rain nixed that plan.
I had been given the number of a taxi cab company in nearby Germany that would come and pick me up and take where I wanted to go. Now, I had to figure out where that was.
In doing some research, I discovered that Regensburg was a world heritage city and it wasn’t too far away. To get there, I first had to find a city with a train station with connections there. When I contacted the taxi company (after preparing a list of sentences translated with Google), I was quoted €200 ($220) for a trip to Deggendorf (a city that was on my bike route) where I could catch a train to Regensburg.
I swallowed hard and ordered the taxi. The driver was a 50-something man who was the owner of the taxi company who had learned English 30 years before in the army but didn’t remember much. We talked in a mixture of English, German (I studied German in High School), and Google translate. It was interesting and I enjoyed the expensive ride. The driver/owner complained that he worked 7 days a week, had 14 cabs (no Uber in his area), and wanted to travel but couldn’t take the time off. I tried to advise him that making money by sacrificing time when healthy was a bad idea. I even invoked Julia. I doubt it even made an impact.
I caught two very crowded trains (always fun with a loaded touring bike) to Regensburg where I had reserved a room in the middle of the old town. While not as big or pretty as Prague, Regensburg’s old town is from a different era and has cobblestone streets, narrow alleyways, old facades, stylish stores, a huge church, and a famous stone bridge over the Danube, which runs right through the town. There is also a monument to the pogrom that emptied the town of Jews in the 1600s.
I’ve been out for a look around this morning in the constant rain and will go out again soon to see more. One odd thing is that my hotel room has 3 posters of paintings of naked women. Just what I need…
Tomorrow, the prediction is for clouds but no rain. So, yet again, I am planning to ride. I am on schedule to return to Trento around the 24th of September. I have also asked if I can stay here for another night should the weather require it.
This is the first time in over 20 years of bike touring that I have encountered a period of heavy rain that lasted more than a day or two. I am prepared to ride in the rain, but as I’m not really on a schedule (I can take a train to Trento any day I want), hanging out in a pretty town for day isn’t so bad either.
Statistics: Posted by Raybo — Fri Sep 20, 2024 2:04 am — Replies 15 — Views 4137