Eurovelo 15

It rains in Mainz

by twowheeljourneyblog

Today was a very gray day! Also a pretty rainy day so we took a shortcut aka the train a skipped a city on our tour. We are therefore in Mainz a day early which means I get to tour the Steinberg winery with Lisa, Mike and one of Lisa’s old friends tomorrow. 😀

Mark and I enjoyed no less than fifteen croissants each this morning at our hotel before hitting the road around 8:30. We knew there was a big storm heading our way so it was a bit of a race against the clock to make it to Karlsruhe to take a 12:30ish train to Mainz. The Eurovelo 15 trails are pretty well marked (much better than Eurovelo 6 ever was!) but we still had a few “um where do we go now” moments. Mark’s phone was supposed to have a data plan working so we thought we’d be able to Google map our way around. As luck would have it, the data and cell service on his phone completely stopped working once we crossed over to Germany which was about one kilometer from our hotel. Side note: we stumbled into a T Mobile store tonight in Mainz and one of the workers changed the settings on his phone so we are now reconnected and Google mappin’ with no issues.

We will be spending tomorrow night in the same spot in Mainz before getting back in the saddle towards Koblenz on Monday morning. We are eliminating quite a few (hundred) kilometers from our trip with the train rides but I ain’t complaining!! If there was ever a time to stop and smell the roses, it’s on a bicycle trip through Europe with one’s dad.

I wanted to add some additional photos to this post but I’m having persistent techincal difficulties that may be but are probably not the result of operator error. I’m planning to post a few follow-ups once I get to a computer (especially one with a QWERTYUIOP keyboard).

Took this around 9 am and added no filters oe other photo enhancements. It was a monochrome day but we stayed by the river for the most part so it was beautiful nonetheless.
We took the fahre across the river from France to Germany kinda. The signs changed languages a few kilometers before we got on. You can see the fahre across the river here towards the left of the photo.

XXXXXXXX

I’ve got over a week left and my panniers are getting kinda full. Everyone is getting postcards for souvenirs, sorry. Except for Layla (my doggy) and Denise (my mommy). It’s too late for postcards.
Took this from the train. If you can believe it, we passed another two hundred thousand cornfields. (Did I count correctly, Mark?? You know I studied finance so I’ve got to be good with numbers)
Short day in terms of pedaling. Also pretty chilly! Actually we are sort of happy to have had a cold/rainy day because otherwise we would have carried coats, pants and other miscellaneous waterproof gear for naught.
It would seem this building was first constructed in the 1500s! Europe is old, man.
There’s no executive lounge at this Hilton so there is no happy hour. They were kind enough to give us some vouchers for a few free drinks at the hotel restaurant. Mark is upstairs snoozing while I’m enjoying a nice glass of Secco on the patio. The bartender rolled her eyes when I asked if it was okay to bring it outside. But hey, it’s not every day that I get to experience this view! Like I said… It is time to smell the roses.

One thought on “It rains in Mainz”

  1. Sounds like you are having the best of both worlds as they say! You know I’m all about kicking back with a cold drink on a patio. Love and miss you!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a comment