Kobern Gondoff - Germany 75 kms The boys take a 12 incher in Cochem !

With threat of an imminent downpour we took it easy in the morning until finding out that Paul and Barb were in town requiring us to shower, dress and eat breakfast in 20 minutes to meet them ( see story below)

By departure time late morning, the rain had eased as we set off soon encountering a few very steep short climbs and short off road sections that had us breathing heavily.

H took time out on the off road section to hone his video skills attempting to film an oncoming train .... slowing to film he lost control of his bike with the end result likely to be more film of his feet than anything else.

Back on the bikes we soon came to an impasse when the bike path once beside the Moselle disappeared under water because of the heavy overnight rain.

A couple of Danish ladies we`d kept bumping into over the last few days also stopped asked us seriously if we intended to keep cycling thru the water !

Maybe the fact that H had on his scuba gear, flippers and a snorkel might have misled them ... we acknowledged their crazy question and headed straight for the road catered at this point for extra width apparently because of known flooding problem on the bike path.

We eventually reached beautiful Cochem on the Moselle at the 40 km mark full of tourists on this public holiday Monday in Germany.
H and self both feeling hungry and now with a sausage fetish decided to tackle the 12 inch Bratwurst and Debrichiners which we both agreed were delicious !

Back on the bike was a dream with the wind behind us for the first time on the trip and good bitumen allowing us to average a goodly 27 km /hr.

One of our days cycling highlights was cycling through Gondof castle an actual castle that the main road goes right through the middle of !

We stopped for the night uplanned in the beautiful time warp town of Kobern Gondof just 15 kms shy of Koblenz.
The town has many half timbered houses going back 300-400 years.

The depth of floods from the Moselle are interestingly recorded in the main street as being in the vicinity of 5-6 meters !

A good hotel and a nice dinner was slightly offset by a bill for what we thought were complimentary tea and coffee when we arrived !

Tomorrow we start tackling the Rhine and heading Sth to Switzerland.