Engen, 2 Mai, to Donaueschingen, 3 Mai

Leaving Konstanz Saturday morning, 2 Mai.

The 6am Sunday morning bell toll in Engen, Germany, just sounded. I don't think there was a   5am one. Many towns, it seems 7 am is when the long ringing occurs. Maybe I'm just sleeping through all the other bells through the night? Or do they only begin in the morning. The birds have been making their calls for a couple hours, backgrounded by falling rain and rain flowing over the pavers on the street below. There has been a cat mrowing on an off...  All good sounds. Oh! And now (a half hour later) a chicken crawing... And now (an hour later) the first train of the day ...! 

The day's ride from wet Konstanz (yes, it had rained all night and morning, but was mostly not raining once we'd started) was chopped up a bit, but overall relaxing in pace as we made our way along and away from the Bodensee and the Rhine River. First as we stopped and started trying to find a place with internet (we've learned since that Germany might be more difficult with open wifi at cafes). Then Paul discovered his crank arm had come loose, so we looked for (and quite easily found--thank you maps.me!) a bike rental place hoping it'd have a shop and the right sized allen wrench. The Radweg Reisen had more than that! Immediately a man greeting us, seemingly appreciating seeing touring cyclists vs. the usual day-renters. He ushered Paul and his bike into the huge garage, then called over one of his mechanics who promptly started taking the part out ("see...? bad plastic") and replaced both bolts.  And I got a little tour of the place as the owner brought me to the back to show me a cool old bike from India, and his "MasaRADi" . 

Others came and looked at our bikes, how we were set up. As usual, Paul's Bianchi got lots of nods of approval, and even my bike got some. Cool moments like these make for a great day.

It was followed at a corner a couple blocks away by a French couple who saw us and called us over to ask for directions. Fortunately, Paul and his gps as well as the German maps.me download he was able to do back in Switzerland, was able to know where they needed to go. And fortunately, my little French came back enough so I was able to help communicate.

 And then we rode on, making our way through some road construction that blocked our trail/bike path, then back to the trail through towns and alongside highway and through farmland later in the day.

We we stopped for a lunch break at a corner picnic bench in some town, and we were surprised by some loud clanking sound up above. We walked out to the street and saw that there was this huge nest up there and then walked a little further out and saw the local stork poking up out of the nest. Not great photos but pretty cool to see anyway.

Lovely rape plant roadside

A fortification of some sort, and some other cyclist down below it. It might be related to Napoleon when he came and took over the area and demanded money and then burnt cities anyways.

We arrived at Joshua and Ramona's place (the white house with blue shutters) to a huge greeting from Josh (Ramona is out of town). They are both from the states but have been traveling on and off for years, having only last fall settled in Engen after getting lucky to find a house to rent here. It's interesting how the houses in the old towns (this one, evidently, was rebulit after Napolean burned it) look hundreds of years old from the outside, but the modern insides make for a cool surprise. So many interesting designs.

Josh treated us to a fabulous meal after a walk to the grocery, lots of conversation about work, travel, decisions about how to live (while working and traveling), sailing... and then he and Paul got going on a version of Dungeons and Dragons while I went to bed.

The next day started dry-ish as we left Josh and the village  of Engen -- not til middayto reach, anice long boarding chatting about many more things --to get to Donaueschingen 

Engen

Heavy rains soon came but we kept on and that's just how it goes. Makes for brighter landscape maybe?

Paul wrote a wonderful message to Finnian about this flat experience. Maybe we will put that in as another post all on its own sometime when we have time. Needless to say, this one flat cost us a full hour!

!:-)

Donaueschingen off in the distance

We reachedJulias'  place around 6 o'clock, just at the same time as he was returning from a weekend away. His apartment is smack in the middle of old town. Very cool and very lucky for us. We settled in a little bit then went and enjoyed a couple varieties from the local Fürstenberg brewery. 

And then we returned to help make a pasta dinner and learn about Julius and his work and his travels, and then got a good rest. 

And now we're going to finish packing up after loading this post and go find the source of the Donau /Danube River and begin following it east!