Rolling at last

 At last, a day on the bikes! It was started somewhat earlier than desired by some very noisy young men in the room next door who seemed not to care if everyone else in the building was woken by their very loud discussion. Such is life - I hope we were not that irritating when we were that age. 

We packed our bikes after breakfast and bought some last minute bread rolls and notebooks before we started riding. As usual the escape from a town is navigationally fraught with- irregularly signposted and a sometimes tricky dive with the local traffic who have better things to do than watch out for trains of laden cyclists who are not quite sure of where they are going. To add to this the heavens opened and we took shelter first under a tree - till that wasn’t good enough and then under the entrance to someone’s courtyard. Somewhat damp we continued. 

A nice ride through a forest and on towards the beach, we settled in a bit to finding our way. Emil is in charge of the map as he has the only bar bag that fits the map book, and doesn’t need reading glasses to see the small print. 

Some of the route got cut off as we took a wrong turn, but found ourselves again soon and got back on track. We lunched in a bus stop as the rain was still heavy when it came and we didn’t want to get caught out. Obviously it was lovely during our lunch stop. Swallows were nesting there and I think we’re not very happy to have company. The parents would come as close as they dared, hovering by the nest before deciding it was too risky to go in and flying off again. I think they were happy when we left. 

We rode on to the little harbour at Langballigholz where we had and ice cream stop and watched a ferocious looking squall approaching. We sheltered under a convenient roof while the wind and rain came through - but it was never quite as bad as we thought it might be so set off for the last 10km or so to our camp site at Nordstern. This was idyllic riding - especially once we realised we were not going to get rained on. A friendly camp site and nice spot for the tents in a corner in the Lee of a large horse chestnut tree and a thick hawthorn hedge. 

The fancy lightweight tent had a slightly broken pole that gave up completely - fortunately there was one replacement section in the bag - so we were able to fix it, but a bit rubbish as we have hardly used it. Sonja’s old Wechsel - must be at least 25 years old is still going strong after many summers of use. 

Sonja and the twins have gone to the beach for a swim. I am writing here and we will go to the local Greek restaurant for supper later.