It's been a while

 A series of events including heart surgery and  a bit of rehab along with the ennui of Corona kept me from writing. Now, after corrective surgery, the heart's back doing its thing, thumping along better than before, and here I am again, writing. Whether that is better than before is up for grabs.

Rehab continues in that I am still getting fully back into shape and continuing with programmed exercises and such. Of course we're riding our bikes as part of the program. It was medium warm last Sunday - in the low 70s - and reasonably sunny, so we headed north. And of course, back again.

But north first. We seem to take the train to Farge fairly often.  That really gets us out of town and into the bushes fairly quickly, but this time we headed up to Harriersand. You can see from the map that it's a long spit of land into the Weser and a dead end, land wise. Once you're at the tip, you either turn around and go back or, if it's summer and you're on a bike, you can take the little ferry across the river to Brake and then continue your trip.

We're so close to the river much of the way, but sometimes you wouldn't know it. One side,

the other side. 

But we are reminded we live so near the water and that we are so near zero regarding the water level.  Dikes keep us safe and the powers that be have been working at raising the dikes for some years now.

There's color along the way, too. Besides these lovelies, there are rosehips and elderberries and others I don't know.  Regardless, there is always something lovely to look at.

We biked through Harriersand with the dairy farms and organic farms and reached the ferry to take us across to Brake.  It looks so industrial with all the silos for all the grain that is raised in this region.

But that's only part of Brake. But sorry, no pics for you!  We headed quickly to Elsfleth for Kaffee und Kuchen.

We were lucky to get a table outside at our favorite restaurant as another couple was just leaving. Then we watched the weekend warriors leaving the ship after a weekend stroll on the North Sea. 

Wow. This three-master, built in 1903, has been repurposed for the 5th (?) time and takes trainees and weekend sailors out for a round on the North Sea. What fun!  (But not for me!!!!)

Heading home. It was supposed to be about 30-40K, but it got longer somehow.  Usually, Werner is pretty good with numbers, but he was off a bit this time.  After Elsfleth we thought we'd grab the train again in Farge, but the timing was off. So we kept cycling. And cycling. And...

...we got home and the bike computer said 52.8K.  BUT... we beat the train we would have taken if we had been there in time to take it which we weren't. 

And we survived.