annhig

just found this and am enjoying pedalling along with both of you, bilbo.

Slightly worried about whether you'll make it to Dresden though!

bilboburgler

Do not despair Ann, we will get there but may not be staying in facilities that you would use.

Bohemian History and a day off

I guess all the world knows the history of the Sudetenland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudetenland , how successive rulers of the area brought in hard working (and trained) Germans to help the locals develop the area of Bohemia, how their most famous king “the Blind King of Bohemia” was hacked down by the ever destructive English (blush) and the Prince of Wales was so impressed he stole the guys tag-line and ostrich feathers, how the discovery of some very large silver mines allowed the king of Bohemia to not only found the first Porcelain factory in Europe, but the money made allowed him to (buy) get elected King of Poland.

All of which collapsed when Hitler took the Sudetenland into the German Reich (forcing Czechs to leave the area, 95% of the town in fact), with this process then working the other way with Germans being forced to march to Germany leaving the Czechs to be ruled by the Russians and their own version of the Stasi (StB).

Day off.

Decin has the benefit of a large castle on a rock sitting over the town, used by most of the above as a centre of control it even acted as the Red Army's officer's wives maternity centre (good to see even in the soviet union rank had its benefits).

Now the peacocks strut and you can pay a large sum to see the rose garden (avoided), the town on the right bank proved a little too 1960s for us, but once on the left bank we stopped to watch people climb the cliff face and then headed off to see a very disappointing Synagogue from the 1920s in the “eastern style”.

Still the town museum was a revelation, with lots of interesting details on the Elbe as a industrial waterway, a video of the town replacing its bridge in roughly 1923 and a guide who wandered around with us as the place was empty. It seems that Decin was the site of an important bicycle manufacturer in 1890.

After a short visit to the bus station to photograph bicycle transport on buses (yes in Europe they let you put bikes on the back of buses or on trailers behind) we ran back across the bridge in a sudden downpour and landed in a great little cafe right by the bridge (Caesar Salad).

Once the rain let off we walked back through the medieval town (thoughtfully flattened by the Red Army into a lawn, well a lawn surrounded by a medieval wall) and back to our hotel. That night there was a local concert in the nearby park (think “the Specials” in Czech) and a river bar fed us.

Ingo

I've been following your report closely, enjoyed reading the unusual adventures of a cycling trip (have done parts myself). Keep it coming! Just want to point out a few minor things.

"Both Bohemia and Saxony have small wine areas, famously average to poor quality." It's not the poor quality that at least the Saxon wine is famous for (quite the opposite, some wineries are listed among the best in Germany), it's the outrageously price.

And as for Czech wine, it is too bad you did not find the castle in Litomerice, which is the "House of Czech Wine" with a wonderful vinoteka where you can taste and buy the wine!

"Day 4 to Decin
After yesterday's rather sad day we start to ride into Bohemian Switzerland..." It's not Bohemian Switzerland, which is between Decin and the German border, it's Ceske stredohori (Bohemian mid-range mountains) between Litomerice and Usti nad Labem/Decin, in case someone wants to look up this beautiful region.

"... how the discovery of some very large silver mines allowed the king of Bohemia to not only found the first Porcelain factory in Europe, but the money made allowed him to (buy) get elected King of Poland." That was Elector Prince August the Strong (of Saxony), not the King of Bohemia - and the first porcelain factory was in Meißen.

Very glad you took a day off in Decin. I've seen the town museum and was quite impressed, too. That sandstone cliff with the climbing routes is quite impressive, isn't it? Looking forward to read more!

bilboburgler

Yes I know it Meisen (see later) (but his influence was wide) and I hope you can see the lighthearted way I play with history

Saxon wine is still famous for the poor quality, that it also has good wine (and I had a bit) (as you suggest) is good news but the prices rose too steeply for me. (NB last year's visit report; Bordeaux)

Didn't know there was a sub region of the mountains. It looks like good hiking area, as indeed does much of this land all the way to eastern hungary. As we peddled along people waved from the mountain tops, always nice and made up for the silent Czech cyclists (someone I spoke to suggested the silence was due to the StB and the reign of fear, but people were helpful just not "greeters") and, as we will see the change to the chatter as we cross the border is amazing.

Ingo

LOL, yes, I smiled and laughed quite often while reading your report

Ha, I didn't know people outside Saxony knew about our wine at all ;-) Yep, it's *way* too expensive.

annhig

Do not despair Ann, we will get there but may not be staying in facilities that you would use.>>

mmm - not quite sure how to take that, bilbo.

let's see when we get there, shall we?

bilboburgler

we will leave it floating then...

bilboburgler

Day 6 Decin to Pirna

We left Decin with rains around us and a steady drizzle which slowly stopped. Not to bad to ride if wet and warm, it is just wet and cold that gets me. Our heading is Pirna in Germany and the Villa Hennes. The rain ensures that we see very few people. We cross the border and things change pretty fast, the first is the quality of the signage drops through the floor but at least we can ask people where to go, suddenly there is more beer and cake and finally everyone starts chatting to us as we past, lots of people about it must be Sunday.

We had considered stopping in one of these spa towns but they were a little past there best so after a good lunch we carried onto Pirna, crossed the first bridge and came back on the minor-track side, the RHS. Nice little B&B clean warm, own sauna in the room (you can follow my hotel selection on tripadvisor).

I'd carefully chosen this B&B to be near a great restaurant so Mrs B insisted that we headed in the other direction to Pirna to eat and we passed and then joined a wine tasting in the village. My goodness they had run out of sausages. (Yes, I know, Germans who run out of sausages at a festival). Still good fun, they had brought along the village cake-princess (that would be the local expert in cakes) who sat in a mild downpour and watched us drink.

We struggled into town, where they were carefully pulling up tarmac and replacing it with noisy/slippy cobbles and at 6pm the place was almost shut, but we found a Mexican. No panic, German beer is almost as good as Czech and there is more choice of weizen.

annhig

My goodness they had run out of sausages. (Yes, I know, Germans who run out of sausages at a festival).>>

when we were last in Germany, our friends showed us a butcher's shop which boasts a take away Bratwurst machine outside, in case you have a yen for a midnight sausage.

PalenQ

Great job of writing and stringing us along - cheers!

bilboburgler

Thanks P

Day 7
Pirna to Dresden is basically on the flat, wide open areas with old and new sand workings and lakes and stuff. Dresden is slowly approached down the river with multiple bridges and some pretty good views of 1920s funiculars and train bridges, all very pleasant. Given that Germany has now instituted a 50cents “bathroom” visit we now have the chance to see the area where the Viking ships come in is also where the Chinese tourists line up for some relief in the open. All that shines yellow is not gold it would seem.

Now the other problem we have is that it is Monday so all the Museums are shut. Yes, Dresden on the day the museums are shut. Sorry Ann. Still we get to walk around the fake mosque (from the 20s) and a few gardens (light rain) and see the rebuilt buildings and finally the promenading area where the Jews were banned in the 1930s. I suspect the city is a great visit, just not on Mondays.

Old Dresden is on the left bank, while a fine modern city has developed on the right bank with pleasant non tourist restaurants, good shopping, plus a mooring for a ship-hotel. So off we go and find an old paddle wheeled ship (originally names the Engles or some such) turned into a hotel. Pretty cheap and across a stream from a beach/party area. Well the hotel was ok, we stored our bikes on board and apart from using a communal bathroom (never saw anyone) perfectly pleasant. Since I'd had no lunch we walked to the beach area and ordered a potato with mayo. Now I've never seen "mayo with a potato on top" before, pretty much a weird experience, what do you do with that much mayo?

We found supper in the new town (Tapas) and that Ann, was that. Rain forecast for the morning.

bilboburgler

Day 8

Dresden to Niederlommatzsch.

It rained a fair bit that morning, first your feet get wet, then your hat begins to let the water in and finally your waterproof clothing's seems start to fail. Luckily our clean clothes are all wrapped up inside nice Bradford council plastic bags inside their bike panniers. But you begin to look for any glimmer of sun, just a bit of blue in the sky and so it was, a little lady pointed out a bakery and we had 11s. The rain had stopped so riding out of this place my back cable snapped. An hour later (tell me about it) it was replaced and off we set. Next stop Meissen.

I mentioned Meissen earlier and the place left me cold, the main square's wifi did not work, the happy carillon (of porcelain bells) is out of tune, the guys running the bar in the square clearly did not see customer service as one of their skills and the factory visit was a little too perfect for me. But can they market that product? But at least tourist info were helpful.

For those who have ever enjoyed “the Producers” there is a moment (somewhere around the Marching Band sketch) where they use a complicated German town name as an expletive. It may well have been Niederlommatzsch, the humour of the name came to me that evening

The afternoon varied from thunderstorms to hot sun, we passed a fully automated nursery (for plants) and trudged up the hill to our B&B, washed and ran to the only restaurant in the light rain. I try the door, nothing. I peak around the corner and there are 40 happy people eating and drinking on a partially covered terrace. We order and then the heavens opened in one of those massive storms. Anywhere else we would have withdrawn to the restaurant. No, here the staff walked back and forward to the kitchen (through the restaurant) but kept us outside. Even the locals complained “hey, look there is rainwater in my beer” no, it continued in this farce like manner, until we all went to bed. Niederlommatzsch!

annhig

Now the other problem we have is that it is Monday so all the Museums are shut. Yes, Dresden on the day the museums are shut. Sorry Ann.>>

`<<We found supper in the new town (Tapas) and that Ann, was that. Rain forecast for the morning.>>

you clearly have a rather inaccurate view of me, bilbo, as some sort of pseudo-intellectual high-maintenance gourmand, whereas of course that is only partly true.

es tut mir leid, dass es auf deine Parade geregnet hat.

Ingo

> it is Monday so all the Museums are shut.

I appreciate and enjoy the lighthearted approach to this trip report, but wish you'd be at least a bit more accurate. The Royal Palace (Both Green Vaults, Armory, coins, the times around 1600s, Prints and drawings ...) is open, ditto the Military history museum e.g. Neither the funiculars or the "fake mosque" (Yenidze) are from the 1920s, they were built earlier.

Meissen: The Tourist info is right on Markt square. Understandable that you didn't bother going up to the stunning castle/cathedral on the hill with your bikes.

bilboburgler

Ann, I have an image of a svelte cosmopolitan lawyer.

ingo you are right aboiut castles on hills, Mrs Bilbos knees were not enjoying steps, we call it "step fear". We did find Dresden's tourist info, a bit hidden away in a shopping mall. The only town that charged for a map! Still we walked around and everything we found was shut. Maybe there were bits we should have found, but ... you know sometimes after 50km you just don't care.

I feel history should be treated as somewhere between "1066 and all that" and Santayana.

bilboburgler

bilboburgler

a bunch of days

Niederlommatzsch to Belgern

This allowed us to visit the RHS of the river and see where the Americans and Russians actually met for the first time, at Strehla (not a great target but interesting), the town is tiny, there is a cheap little museum and a stone. Belgern is another little town with pensions, a brewery/restaurant and the world's largest Roland statue park (song of Roland, rather than my cousin which would have been pretty weird). By 8pm we were fed and bored, so we let some nice “westie” pick us up and take us off drinking.

Belgern to Torgau

The small stone in Strehla was rather over shadowed by the massive monument at Torgau, where senior USA/Russian officers met formally for the first day. Torgau has another of these big empty town squares and an officer of the fire brigade getting married. The old town comes with a pretty nice castle (at a reasonable level above the river) and where some walls had been pulled they have developed a series of parks. Accomodation at the old brewery is ruined by the fact that the “old brewery” is now a white van man hotel just off the local motorway (but boy were the servings big). Come for the castle and then move on.

Torgau back step 1

We now need to move back to Prague, by bus or train? Train. So we toddle off to Riesa (the rail head), in a rain storm. The storm grows, and the bike path is being repaired.... No doubt about it the Elbe radweg is very badly sign posted and any replacement path is even more badly marked. After a few too many endings in farm yards we decide to take the main road. It gets worse and worse, every restaurant sign we see is “40km to the North”, what? It gets so bad we begin to monitor the clouds to get just the showers rather than the twisters coming through. Finally before Riesa it dries up. Good rooms in the Golden Lion and the Ratskeller is now a Greek restaurant.

In the morning we catch 4 trains all the way back to Litormerice, then a ride through storms back to Melnik, where we found a fantastic apartment right in the city centre and watch the only festival that Melnik has (running in skis around the town square).

annhig

Ann, I have an image of a svelte cosmopolitan lawyer.>>

I will not destroy your illusion, bilbo but sadly at least one of those descriptions of me is wrong.

annhig

Certainly your trip has not lacked excitement, and not always in a good way.

But those are the bits we remember and laugh about afterwards, aren't they?

BTW, this ski race in Melnik - had they had an unseasonal delivery of snow?

bilboburgler

"BTW, this ski race in Melnik - had they had an unseasonal delivery of snow?"

No but a lot of duct (duck?) tape to stop them sliding on the cobbles.