Danube River - and the Erie Canal Note: Area residents may have seen Wil and Judy Hunter of Adams Basin “in training” for this bicycling adventure by riding the Erie Canal Towpath. In August 2003, Judy and I bicycled along the Danube River (known only as the Donau River throughout Europe) from Regensburg, Germany to Bratislava, Slovakia, eleven days of biking bliss. Why wouldn’t it be when we’re traveling on flat (slightly downhill, the river flows east) paved paths with the prevailing winds at our backs along some of the most beautiful scenery in the world. It claims to be the world’s most traveled bike path. It may just be. We began planning our trip in January, selecting lodging, writing letters and making our final reservations by May. We most often use Michelin tour maps and guide books for both the planning stage and the actual trip. We fly to Munich with our bikes, clothing and tools stashed in each of our bike bags, which are still holding up after eight out-of-country trips. We depart Munich by train on Monday, August 25 arriving Regensburg at 10:30 a.m. After too quick a walking/biking tour of Regensburg, a beautiful city in which we should spend more time, but with our adrenaline flowing, we jump on our bikes and head east following the “Donau-Radweg” (Donau Bike Path) signs. For the first few hours, we barely get a glimpse of the river as the bike path is on the north side of the levee, but the path eventually rises to the top of the levee and we are peddling beside huge barges traveling at approximately our speed (10-12 mph). The Donauweg takes us through villages as small as Adams Basin and through cities larger than Rochester. We travel through sunflower fields, wheat fields, corn fields and family gardens our first day and many days thereafter. Every 5 to 10 miles, we enter another village, many of which we detour off the designated path to visit the always present church(es) and the village squares. At lunch this first day we select an outside cafe and chat with an Indian priest from Rome who is substituting for a local priest who is on vacation. Our first night’s stay is on the main “platz” in Straubing, only 37 miles from Regensburg. It is a delightful old city about the size of Brockport, and delightfully German. We had decided early in the planning stage for this trip that we would use B&B’s (Pensions as they are called in Europe) as often as possible and small hotels as an alternative. There are typically three types of lodging; zimmers (1-2 rooms only), pensions and hotels. Tonight we were staying in a small hotel that has been run by the same family for over 100 years. The streets of the plaza are cobblestone with a large central tower dating back hundreds of years as its focal point. Day 2 is another delightfully sunny day, with morning temperatures in the mid-60s reaching 80 by midday. This is our typical weather during the eleven days. We meet a German couple who are biking the entire Danube (Holland through Hungary) two weeks at a time over a period of five years and a father/son team who are biking together for a final week before school begins. We spend the evening at Zimmer Zitzelsberger, a private home in a residential area of Niederalteich. I decide to bike around the village visiting the church in town square with a huge convent attached, a biergarten and a horse farm. We bike to the next town two miles north where we have dinner. A 39 mile day. ... Day 4. At this point the scenery changes dramatically. We leave Passau heading for the Austrian border, 10 miles ahead of us. What a disappointment when the bicycle path border crossing consists of a small metal sign, welcoming us to Austria and bidding us farewell to Germany, but the magnificent scenery makes up for it. Up until today, the terrain around us has been flat to gently rolling hills. Today, huge mountains climb immediately on both sides of the placid, winding river to our right. Our bike path is lined with trees keeping us cool and mesmerized. What a magnificent ride. We arrive early afternoon at our pension in Aschach, Austria and are greeted by the man of the house yelling to his wife ... “The Hunters are here” and from elsewhere in the house she yells back “The Hunters from America?” Apparently, not too many Americans bike this route or stay at this pension. After unpacking, we sit in the garden overlooking the river. A huge 200+ foot long tour boat paddles by with perhaps a hundred or so passengers waving to us. Geese and swans are idly swimming near the shore. Bikers of all ages ride by every minute or two. The sun is striking the mountain on the far side of the river creating an absolute magnificent picture. We say to each other, “This is what life is all about!” Yesterday’s three mile ride uphill has vanished from our memory. We visit with a Daimler Benz engineer and his wife who are tandem biking while commenting that there are many more bikers along this stretch than in Germany, some with suitcases strapped over their rear wheel. Our most memorable event of the day was a 5 minute ferry boat ride across the river. A 30 foot boat that could not hold more than 50 passengers and perhaps 20 bikes maximum motors us across the river where our bike path continues easterly. A 4 Euro ($4) fee per person is the toll. There is no other way across without back tracking many miles to a bridge. Our next day takes us around Linz, (we opted not to bike through the city) a major industrial city along a rather non-descript, somewhat boring bike path. The industries across the river emit a pungent odor that makes us want to bike faster to get away from it, but it seems to follow us for miles. The mountains are now behind us, as we ride through a valley with distant, gently sloping hills. Lunches have typically been some type of wurst and today is no different as we stop at a three table biergarten/café adjacent to the Donauweg. We finally reach our pension 54 miles later in Ardagger Markt, truly a one street town which takes us less than 10 minutes to tour and window shop by foot. We are delighted to find our pension has CNN. We are starting to have “news withdrawal” with no English newspapers or English speaking television along our route. ... We awake to our first day of rain on Sunday. The bike route switches between the actual roadway and a path, but being a Sunday, traffic is minimal. We are now biking through vineyards, apple orchards and fields of pears, apricots and plums. Around noon, the Donauweg directs us through a medium sized town away from the river’s edge. The aromas of fresh baked goods and hot lunches are irresistible. The rain persists albeit not real heavy and we finally arrive in Tulln, our next stop, 46 miles later. We stay in a beautiful hotel in the center of town where the hotel lobby is one city block deep and our second floor has it’s own “lobby” with a grand piano and chandelier. It was a building out of the past, magnificent in its day and still intriguing. ... We board a train in Bratislava headed for Budapest. We buy two adult tickets for approximately $20 each and two tickets for our bikes at $2 each. As we cross into Hungary, the train stops and we are asked three times for our documents. We comply. A few moments later the ticket taker returns and says our bikes will cost another $20. We have no choice, but to pay him. We are offered no receipt and when I ask, he hen scratches something on our ticket. One hour later as we chug toward Budapest, smoke billows past our starboard window and within minutes the train comes to halt where we sit for an hour. Looking outside there is a 20 foot embankment on either side of us and nothing but railroad tracks ahead and behind us. No signs of humanity whatsoever. One young female passenger departs the train, climbs the left embankment and disappears. All I could think of is “a perfect place for a great train robbery.” As the “recently rich” ticket taker walks by our car I ask what happened. His reply, “the electric is kaput.” A half hour later a new engine couples to our train and pushes us into Budapest. ... In closing, I ask you readers to substitute for the “Donauweg” bike path, the words Erie (Barge) Canal Towpath and for the villages, towns and cities mentioned herein, you substitute Brockport, Adams Basin, Spencerport, Bushnell’s Basin, Rochester, Syracuse and Albany and you will realize what a magnificent treasure we have here in New York. Biking the Canal path can be equally as exciting and enjoyable as biking the Danube. Try it. We have. Judy and Wil Hunter |
