52 miles ridden – 184m climbed – temperature 27C average : 30C at the end.

Today’s was another lovely ride. Starting gently along the banks of the Moselle in cool humid air our peaceful start morphed itself into the relative chaos of Koblenz and the meeting of the Moselle with the Rhine.

Koblenz seems to retain all the grandeur and status that it would have enjoyed when the rivers were at the height of their trading dominance for trade and the various unplanned detours we made to avoid unsigned path closures meant we saw a lot more architecture than expected. The Kaiser Wilhelm memorial sits at the junction of the rivers – quite impressive.

There hasn’t been any dramatic changes in architecture so far but the Rhine is definately bigger with more commercial traffic.

We stopped for lunch in Loreley Blick and I had a very memorable bowl of pasta in an air-conditioned restaurant. One luxury after another!!

It was starting to warm up after lunch so we made it a gentle cruise along the cycle path into Bingen.

Our hotel tonight is very nice compared to yesterday’s but who would have thought that a relatively modern NH hotel wouldn’t have air-conditioning? Two fans and a cool breeze coming in the window. Here’s hoping for a good night’s sleep as tomorrow is the hardest day of the trip……