Day 37: Thu 24 Jul - Dresden to Riesa, 61km

15-24 deg C, overcast day, kept the temp down, wind came up about 10km from the hotel, right down our throats!

Ride: 61km (est 55km); ride time: 3h:53; total time: 6h:12

Total G: 1,047km

Total W: 1,031km

Walk G: 6km; total: 297km

Walk W: 5km; total: 269km

We were ready to leave about 7:30am, but still had to retrieve the bikes from garage storage, load them up, then get them out of the garage and then check out. So, we were only riding away at 8:35am. And that was OK, as we only had about 55km to ride today. We decided to break the next section between Dresden and Berlin into more days, meaning less km. Day one worked good! Another four to go until we have a two day stopover in Potsdam before moving on to Berlin. 

We had mornos at Meissen, then decided we should ride up to the top of the hill to see the castle as it looked pretty good from below. The roads were very narrow with a hump in the middle, and made of really smooth, shiny cobblestones, laid very haphazardly and unevenly. Going up was not much of an issue, but coming down was more of a challenge, well it was for Wendy. Anyway, we made it up, saw nothing, and made it down in one piece.

On wards we rode on some quite nice paths, found a bench under a tree and stopped for lunch, a rest, and to kill a bit of time (3pm check in). Little did we know that we would be camped on the side of a very busy highway for bikes, of all shapes and sizes, including the riders!

The paths from then on became a bit more rustic shall we say; some single-width very uneven cobblestones were the worst. We also encountered our first set of steps with a bike ramp for this trip. (a metal bit just big enough to fit a bike wheel in). Fortunately, we were going down the ramp, but we have encountered them going up when we were in Bavaria/Southern Germany in 2015. They have similar things in a lot of train stations. We also had another ride on a ‘ferry path’ only because we were there at the right time and meant we didn’t have to negotiate the big bridge coming into Riesa. Our hotel was not too far away from the ferry terminal. We were checked in and in our room just before 3pm. One of the nicest rides so on this tour. Just the cows, horses, sheep and goats grazing peacefully away on lush green pastures beside the river made for a very relaxing day.  

After unpacking, a wash and a rest, we went out on the town on foot to source dinner. Almost 4km later we were back in the room, ready for the night time routine.

Riding out of Dresden

Our first stop

Mornos stop at Meissen

Albrechtsburg Castle and Cathedral at Meissen

A funicular elevator, we rode up and were considering paying the €1 each to get us and the bikes back down, but decided to ride

This is about all you can see of the Castle from the top. You can take a tour inside.

One of the sections of the road up to the Castle

Lunch and 40zzzz stop. Not very relaxing as there was a lot of bike traffic today

Mercure Hotel Reina, room #207

Our views from the room, at least we have river views out one corner of the window!

The apartment block next to the hotel 

Front of the hotel

Back of the hotel our room is on the 2nd floor, 5 windows to the right of the elevator/stair section with the blue glass inserts

Some of the paths we rode today, not all of them nice at all; the ferry was the best!

Got to ride through suburbia today 

Elbe River scenery

Ride route and stats

A BIG boot in the foyer of the hotel

This was very hard to photograph 

A pub near the hotel

The ride routes are very well signed, even on the paths 

Not sure what this is

Not sure what kind of car this is, but it is very old and very cute

Riesa Trinity Church, an evangelical church

Random sculpture in the park pic

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