We really thought our tour last year would be our last but here we are ready to try again.  To me cycle touring is like respite from everyday life and an escape from the horrors that seem to dominate the news.  I get on a bike and just as Clark Kent got in a phone booth and changed to Superman I suddenly change from an old woman hobbling along on two sticks to  a young woman wizzing along with the wind in her hair and not a hint of an ache or pain. The world looks a better place from a bicycle seat.  Never in all the 35,000km we have ridden  in Europe have we ever encountered anything but kindness, it makes you realise the majority of people are good at heart.

So what are we up to this year?  On 2nd August we leave for Paris.  We have a couple of days there to recover from the horrors of jet lag and I am particularly excited that we are going to meet up with Susan Carpenter.  I have really enjoyed her journals on Cyclebaze over the years and admire the way she travels so it will be great to actually meet the real person. We then indulge ourselves with a two week river cruise as we float along the Seine, the Dordogne and the Garonne watching cyclists pedalling along beside us.

It is at the end of this however that the cycling starts. On 20th August we go to Frankfurt and pick up hire bikes. The intention is to ride along the Rhine and Mosel to meet the Voie Bleu that links Luxembourg and Lyon and ride along this mindful that we have to ride the bikes back to Frankfurt by the beginning of October to fly home.  This is an area rich in well kept ancient tractors so Ken is happy

As you can see there are no mountains and barely a rise in it.  I am afraid that that is now what we have to be content with, even then we are pretty marginal and we need to keep days short.  But it is still cycle touring and we can dream of mountain vistas