Eurovelo 15

Our last two days on two wheels

by twowheeljourneyblog

My phone had an episode last night in which it did not work therefore I took the night off from blogging. Have I yet touted the benefits of buying a phone for $150 off of Amazon? I guess that is why they say “ya get what ya pay for”. 🙄

In our penultimate ride we journeyed from Bonn to Köln (aka kauhyoon aka Cologne) and today, our final leg, we rode to Düsseldorf (dussadawhf).

I slept in yesterday and then Mark made the mistake of letting me go to breakfast solo. It was the best breakfast eva so far on this trip and I ate one hundred croissants and pancakes and fruit salad, et cetera and we didn’t get on the road until 10:30ish. I don’t typically get this much physical activity at home and my appetite is basically insatiable. Who gains weight on a cycling trip??? This chick, that’s who. I’ve been taking some food photos and plan to make a dedicated post in a few days. The amount of pizza/pasta is a bit silly and you may think we actually went to some sort of knock off Italy but if you know me or Mark that shouldn’t surprise you.

Today we actually got going before 8 am and made it to Düsseldorf in the early afternoon. A large thunderstorm was on the radar so we had an extra incentive to make it here ASAP. Our dear Magellan/Gerard convinced his son and Düsseldorf resident David to gather our bicycles and Gerard will be storing them for us in Munich until our next Eurovelo adventure. ¡Muchos gracias, Gerard! Somos muy aprecianados para todo su ayuda. 

Tomorrow we will take a train to Amsterdam where we will spend a few days exploring and will meet back up with Lisa and Mike. 

There were some pretty sweet stretches of bike trails on the road from Bonn to Köln. There were many other touring cyclists out including children with cute mini panniers. We expected to see more folks on the trails for this trip as it was our impression that Europe as a whole took the summer off from work. Seems like we beat the crowd and they are just getting out.
I was kinda lazy yesterday and didnt take many pictures. This one was taken from the same vantage point as the previous photo.
I regret not taking more pictures of the various signage we encountered. From what I can decifer, this doggy is sad because his owner isn’t holding his leash.

We missed a turn and took a bit of an urban shortcut yesterday when we could have been riding along the Rhine. Good news is that we found this enormous wooden horse outside of what smelled like a farm. I guessed that reitsport means riding sport. 

Took this when we made it back to the river trail on the outskirts of Köln.
Short day from Bonn to Köln. Also a rather warm day.
The main cathedral was just a few blocks from our hotel and was extremely large and impressive. Seems like every landmark I’ve seen in Europe over the past two trips has scaffolding that ruins the aesthetic. Oh well. Lisa suggested that they are installing security cameras which seems like a legitimate reason to be messing around with these super old buildings. There is never anyone actually on the scaffolding that we have seen in here in Köln, Strasbourg, Budapest, Vienna, Melk, maybe others I’m forgetting.
It was very bright so that is my excuse for this dark photo. We walked around this shopping district and there were SooOoO many people. Also a great deal of very talented buskers including a Brazilian salsa dancer, Peruvian musicians and even one young artist who brought a whole piano out on to the street.
The path out of Köln this morning was top notch. We got on the road early enough to avoid the crowds we saw yesterday and it was very peaceful and calm. That’s Mark in the blue shirt out ahead of me.
We quickly got past the peaceful and pretty path and into more industrialness. Containers as far as the eye can see! After this we rode through a Ford factory.
We also rode through lots of farms today.
We saw some sheep.
We took a fahre (ferry).
Got up close and personal with some hay on the fahre.
I think these are poppies… Maybe? The land is so flat here I felt like I could see for miles.
There have been a lot of murals and other random graffiti throughout our trip. This giant Freddy Mercury painting actually got me to pull out my phone for a photo. There have been many others that i wish i had been more proactive about capturing.
Waddap, Düsseldorf!?? Nice to see you finally
The sun wasn’t on the right side to be taking these pictures but this city has a very cool skyline! I was also getting a little hot and bothered by this point so I took more mental photos than actual ones.
I forgot to reset my computer this morning so our total for today is actually closer to 60km. It was a warm and sunny morning and we were concerned about getting caught in a thunderstorm so we took as few breaks as possible other than the fifty breaks we took to consult the gps tracks we were following.
610 kilometers total since leaving Chur, Switzerland!!!! That is almlst equivalent to riding from Boston, MA to Baltimore, MD. We took the train a few times and aren’t attempting to cycle all the way to Amsterdam but this isn’t the Tour de France (which started here in Düsseldorf about a week ago). I’d say we did pretty well for a couple of amateurs. 
Hilton Düsseldorf!! Had to crop and filter this one because that increases our photogenicness. As an international travel blogger I think I have the right to filter, crop and make up a few words.

I am ~exhausted~. Also very excited to travel to our sixth and final country tomorrow via train. Yayyy Amsterdam! We may just have to rent some bicycles to have a small two wheel journey while we are there.

One thought on “Our last two days on two wheels”

  1. Good journey guys! It looks like so much fun in the sun! Have a time in Amsterdam and then take a minute or two to prepare for transition back to the “real” world 😳✈️ 🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐🥐

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