I thought I might as well do it the easy way today. To cycle from Düsseldorf along the Rhein to the South would've bored me I think. I've noticed now what it's like cycling by the river, through industrial areas and through nice cities. Cologne and Bonn might be interesting, but I'd want to get further down South, so I wouldn't have time to enjoy it there anyway. Instead of cycling then, I went to the train station, got my bike aboard a train, went to Koblenz, offloaded my bike, checked into a hostel and relaxed a bit more. Or not quite, actually. When I got to Koblenz, the IYHF youth hostel guidebook didn't really shed much light on where to find the actual hostel. That is, it showed the route, but the distances were vague, so that I must've looked very puzzled during my cycling round trip of Koblenz. When at a certain moment I thought "al right let's just follow this road then, see where it leads" I did eventually find a few road signs leading to the hostel. And to my worst enemy: a long 18 percent incline up towards an old fort, in which the hostel is situated. I didn’t stand a chance, especially with the panniers weighing me down. It proved a long, tiring hike before check-in. When I had unpacked, I grabbed my bike again to go shopping in the town centre, and bought a Nokia 6100 phone with infra-red. All I need now is a Psion mini-computer to satisfy my tech-savvy needs (and write my novel) but I might buy that in Nijmegen. Back to the hostel, I this time declared I'd conquer that mountain and thankfully.. I did.

Labels: travel