Suddenly Spring

A week ago Sunday it was windy and cold;  last Sunday it was 72° and sunny.  Actually it had been so for a couple of days, but Sunday was our chance to get out on the bikes for the first time in quite a while.

Between trips and winter and various ailments, I am terribly out of shape and if we're going to do our Bodensee tour in August, I have to get moving. And often.

We loaded up on carbs (pancakes for breakfast!!) and headed out.  I hesitated a bit since I'd woke up with a bit of a sniffle and a bit of a sore throat, but I couldn't let the day pass me by.  So, off we went.

First, the train to Farge, then the ferry to the other side.  Look!  Folks on the beach! They're not actually IN the water, but still...  

Here's what happened, though as usual, it wasn't exactly what we planned.  As most everyone knows, we tend to take a wrong turn now and again.

The blue line is the train to Farge from Vegesack.  Hard to go wrong there.  Then the red line is how we biked to Elsfleth.  You might notice a bit of a "detour" of some kilometers heading back south a ways before heading north again.  We missed a turn.  But, we saw some other stuff.

A cow barn, the roof completely covered with solar panels. This is not at all a rare sight around here, farm buildings with solar panels.

 And just a little further on, lambs on the dike!  There was an article about one of the local sheep raisers here who said this time of year there might be 20 births a night.  Usually it's one at a time, but sometimes two.  Not to say that these two are related, but maybe.

 We finally got back to where we were supposed to be by heading over the new bridge over the Hunte River.  The old one is in the back - when ships came by, the whole middle of the bridge was elevated!  Seems there was a bridge like that over the Aucilla?  The new one is like a gate and lifts from right to left (from this angle).

 Another sight along the way - a really fancy garden, about in the middle of nowhere.  Germans - lots of them - are crazy about their gardens.  This one it appears gets quite a lot of attention. Check out all those topiary! In another month, those rhododendron in the background will be gorgeous.

We finally made it to Elsfleth, had some coffee and cake and a whole liter of water and took the shorter, more direct route back to the ferry.  That was fast!

This is the coal-powered power plant in Farge, one of the most modern anywhere, but it's up for sale.  I'd like to think it's partly because of the afore-pictured solar panels, but more likely just a corporate sale/transfer to make money.  However, one of the interested parties proposes converting it to some other use.  The federal government stopped trying to save the coal industry some years ago, naturally with serious objection from the coal miners.  But they've been well compensated, as have we with clearer skies and air.

So, for my first outing in a   l o n g  time, 28.5K (17.8 miles) was good, and enough.

After we got home, my sniffles blossomed to the whole shebang - cough, fever, aches and pains.  Yuck.  The rest of the day on the sofa, the next day cancelled, the next day cancelled.

But that was incidental to the bike ride.  Now it's all better and I am so looking forward to the next ride.