Weltenburg to Wörth an der Danau

The day started off with bells, lots of bells. Bells for morning prayers (5.45 - we didn't attend...). Bells every 15 minutes afterwards. Which was quite pretty really, once you were awake. After breakfast with the other patrons of the St Georg Gasthaus, plus some of the priests, we were on our way.

HILL! This is how we started. We knew this from the map, but there was no way round it - the consequence of the beautiful gorge from yesterday's pictures. However, it was steep and required mostly walking the bikes to get to the top. You'd think that was the end of it, but we had to walk them most of the way down as well. James was worried about cooking his (and everyone's) brakes, and even with caution Kieran managed to go over the handlebars. He has been told that if there's no blood or bruising it doesn't count as a proper crash...

Once we got back to the bottom, it was pretty much all flat and we enjoyed the run to Kapfelburg for morning tea. We passed through Bad Abbach, where Kieran has a friend who had inconveniently scheduled a camping trip for our transit through and we continued on to Regensburg for lunch. It started raining again, but again waited until we were sat down to eat and stopped again before we headed off. We may have lingered over a coffee to make sure...

The rest of the ride was very enjoyable, with a brief stop after lunch to reapply chamois cream (Gillian sends out thanks to Fiona and Maria for some frank and fearless advice on our trip in Victoria last year!). Most of the way fromm Regensburg to Wörth an der Danau was paved (and quiet) - a luxury after spending the last few days on gravel tracks. We finished our longest day so far (cracked the 70km mark) just before 4pm.

Well, finished, apart from the walk up the hill to see the old castle, which is now apparently a retirement home. I think it says something for the developing fitness levels that there was pretty much no discussion after James' suggestion of heading upwards (after a shower and change, of course). Spectacular location and views, although we're unclear as to how the oldies get up and down the hill.

Dinner was Italian and huge and notable for the fact that Kieran found the first German beer he didn't like (it was non-alcoholic, of course). We're now about all ready to roll into bed. Looking forward to our shortest day on tour tomorrow.

Relive 'Danube day 4'