A marvellous day on the tour - but with an unexpected sting in the tail! The day started off at a leisurely pace along the river from last nights quirky campspot.
We passed by Ludenhausen and it’s church and managed to avoid the early lure of a cafe stop.
Instead we carried on to Selm, where a very nice Kaffe mit Crème provided a welcome break, after some local ladies gave us directions.
It was hard to get going again, but knowing we didn’t have too far to go was reassuring. Plenty of things to see as we made our way south to Dortmund.
We wove through the city and the industrial outskirts at a good pace and it was fun making the green lights and dodging through the city traffic.
We opted to push on to Westfalen Park, which looked good as a lunch stop, but when we arrived at 2pm, we found that you had to pay to get in! We found a shady area nearby, collapsed onto the tarp and ate like savages! I was hungry and tired. A short snooze followed!
As we left Dortmund it soon became clear that the topography and geography of the area was changing. For the last week we’ve been zipping through the flat lands. It was a shock to find a rather large hill between us and the campsite!
Slowly and in the lowest gears, we sweated our way uphill and were more than relieved to find that the campsite had space for us - and a nice area for little tents like ours.
After a much needed shower, a prolonged mapping session ensued in order to change our current route to avoid any further uphill grinds!
It took (Clare!) a while, but eventually we had a new cycle route to Köln that avoids the hills and seems to follow a much longer, but ultimately more pleasant river route.
A massive feed and a early night should set us up…
Total Ride: 56km (and a shockingly steep final few kilometres!)
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