YEAH, we made it!!

First of all, thanks to everyone for the support and encouragement during our travel frustrations! Things started turning around when the absolutely wonderful and cheerful angel at Velociped (the Germany company that actually coordinated our bike rental & reservations) arranged to get our bikes moved to Monday night's lodging. She even called me back in the U.S. to confirm details. Now that's great service!! Thanks, Veronica at Velociped.

Amie & Sue at Frankfurt train station

So with the bike transfer arrangements made, we set out again from Oshkosh on Sunday morning and finally arrived in Frankfurt on Monday morning about 6 AM. Had a great flight on Lufthansa - only 6.5 hours. Then travelled by train to Trier, where we stored our luggage in a locker at the train station and set out to explore the city. As we were heading into the beautiful heart of old town Trier, who did we run into but the rest of our travel group - Jeff, Leigh, Pat & Ken. Things were looking up! So we grabbed a quick lunch together and caught up on our travel experiences. Then the four bikers rode on to the first overnight destination, and Kathleen, Amie and I took the bus with all of our luggage - and all the high school kids - to Trittenheim. The local bus was actually a great choice as it was an hour-long ride through all of the pretty little towns in the region.

Trittenheim church & cemetery

Since Amie is nursing a cold, she rested a bit while Kathleen & I went for a short bike ride along the river. When the others arrived at the hotel, we all went out for a walk around the town and a fun night of dinner & refreshments at a cute little restaurant with one item on the menu - pork schnitzel with fried potatoes. It was delicious! Slept like a baby last night.



Starting out from Trittenheim on Day 2



Unfortunately, it looks like Kathleen caught Amie's cold overnight. That's what happens with major stress and lack of sleep. But they're both hanging in there and you'd never know it by their energy or attitude. You go, girls.

So this morning I was awakened at 7:00 by the beautiful church bells ringing right outside my window. Lovely! We all had breakfast on the patio at our hotel, then headed out for a great day of riding.



Riding through the vineyards

 Following the beautiful Moselle River, we rode through mile after mile of vineyards. We even saw an ancient outdoor Roman wine press that dates back hundreds of years. Thanks to the nice Dutch man who translated for us - in addition to Dutch, he spoke German, English & French. Wow!

Check out the picture of our trek up the 400 steps into the vineyard. They're really steep! Definitely burned off our breakfast there! Then at Bernkastel-Kues, four of us rode up another VERY steep hill to visit the Burg Landshut, which was surprisingly a castle ruins turned restaurant. We rewarded ourselves with a beer, and made it back down the hill in two minutes flat. Literally. It was fun.

Tonight we're in Zeltingen. A very pretty, but quiet, town with lots of narrow, winding streets. We had dinner at a nice restaurant that had a few more menu options than last night.

Our group has been very happy with the lodging arrangements from Velociped, however it appears that the double rooms are significantly nicer than the singles (in other words, my room). So much for any perks for the trip organizer!!

Thanks to Pat for loaning me her netbook. On top of everything else, I'm having computer problems and we've had limited internet access, so it won't be as convenient as I had hoped to blog. I'll try to post every few days.

So far the weather has been decent. A little cool and breezy with mixed clouds and sun. Tomorrow's weather prediction is for heavy morning rain and highs only in the mid 50s. Brrrr! I'm hoping the group decides to wait until the rain lets up before we head out. We'll see how that works out. We're hoping to arrive in Zell by 4:00 or so as we're meeting my Bast relatives, Guenther & Karin, for dinner. Can't wait to see them again!

Hope you're all having a good week. We're having a blast. Here are a few more pics from the last two days. I look forward to your comments.

Burg Landshut - we rode all the way up on our bikes!



Lovely flowers




Ready for picking




Dinner on Tuesday night




The "Bitchen" Restaurant - really! And it actually leans like that!




Too much wine for this guy




Beautiful flowers everywhere