Day 6 - Fri 5 Jun 15: Aschaffenburg to Wertheim am Main
Estimated km: 46 or 72; Actual km: 75.5; Total km: 194; Ride time: 4h31m; Start time: 8am; End time: 2:30pm; Av speed: 16.7 kph
13-35 deg C, fine and sunny.
Summer has arrived in Germany, however despite the rather high temp it didn't feel too bad. Mick and Kate, who arrived in Europe a few weeks before us, said that it has been fairly cool up to now.
A great brekkie in a very well run and immaculately clean hotel kicked off another nice day. After a short ride across country to avoid a bend in the river, we elected to stay on the river paths today despite the fact that it was nearly twice as far as the cross country route. This was done just to avoid the hills for those amongst us who don't like them. It wasn't too long before people were looking for a bakery. German bakeries are designed to lure you in and "make you" eat a whole lot of yummy stuff that you don't really need. And, not too much further down the road it was coffee time at, yep, another bakery.
Just before lunch we reached Miltenberg, an historic old town right on the river. We spent a very pleasant half hour or so wandering around the cobbled mall before setting off again. The next 33km were fairly well straight forward along a beautiful hot-mix cycle path. Although it was fairly busy with cyclists all day, it was not quite as bad as yesterday. We saw some fine looking vineyards and grain crops today. The vineyards were mostly on slopes that Australians wouldn't plant anything on as you would have to be part mountain goat to work the crop.
We were at the hotel (Altstadthotel Baunachshof) and booked in before 3pm. Upon check-in, we were told there was no room for “Crowe”. Hmmmm…. Now what? The lady that checked us in kindly phoned around a number of hotels before finding the very last room in Wertheim. It was a little more expensive, however they needed a place to sleep, so took it. It wasn't until later when Wendy checked Booking.com that Kate realised her mistake and Wendy felt a little guilty for not remembering; Wendy had booked a different hotel for them as out hotel was already booked out by the time Mick and Kate decided they would join us on tour. However, Wendy had emailed all hotel bookings to all tour members so they could do their own admin. Due to the "mistake", Mick and Kate had to pay for 2 rooms tonight! To look at the hotel from the outside you imagine the rooms to be old and pokey. However, they had obviously been recently renovated as they were quite large with decent bathrooms.
After a freshen-up, it was time for our compulsory post-ride ice-cream/yoghurt and a wander around Wertheim; more classic Bavarian architecture, both old (about 13th century), and new. To continue the Bavarian theme, Mick and Kate chose a local Biergarten where we had the traditional local fare (bratwurst and sauerkraut, and schnitzel and cold potato salad) for dinner, including the black beer part. Wow, how nice was that? Will sleep well tonight.
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