September 15, 2011
Another day of magic: We reach the wine growing region of the Wachau
The menu had a translation in English last night so it removed a bit of the mystery of life.
It was very foggy when we left this morning. We were astonished to see that the little town was bursting with life when we left, including a man in leterhousen with a feather in his hat accompaning a woman in national costume. It all came clear however when we rode down to the river and saw two very big passenger liners tied up with masses of people spilling out. There must be going to be some sort of presentation about Grein - just a pity they couldn't see the place.
We pushed over the bridge to the other side, the visibility was just too bad to ride on anything with other traffic. Then we were on a dedicated bike track and the magic had returned . The hills had crowded in again and we were once more in a gorge our track was on one side of the river and a busy road on the other. We were able to look across the river to the tiny villages on the other side and even though the river was between us we could hear the traffic. Gradually the fog cleared and the world came into focus. At Ybbs where once more the valley widens we stopped for a coffee and crossed the bridge to the other side. Again this was a lovely, ride through tiny settlements and small farms with the sort of small scale agriculture that Ken so enjoys looking at.
We had decided to go on to a village in the Wachau. This is the main wine growing area of Austria with the mainly white grapes growing on very steep slopes that have been terraced. It seems hard to imagine how spraying and other vineyard work is done as it is all so steep and the terraces are so narrow. The main varieties are Gruner Veltliner, Muller Thurgau and Neuburger, though we did notice a few vineyards with red grapes in them. Verasion is well over but we saw no evidence of picking having started.
Our zimmer in this little grape village is charming with a lovely woman in charge who allowed me to do the whole transaction in German!! Ken is off looking for evidence of viticultural work and no doubt old tractors.
I was wrong they have started picking though in a fairly small way. When we went for a walk latter we saw little narrow tractors scurrying along the road with their loads of grapes to the co operative that we now is in the next town.
A bit of a disaster as far as a meal is concerned. The only restaurant we could find is closed on thursdays - plenty of places open for wine tasting though! After a day's cycling we are hungry. Have managed to find a little shop with 4 bread rolls left, some cheese and salami and a piece of cake. Ken has bought a bottle of Veltliner from one of the cellars so we wont starve after all.
Today's ride: 72 km (45 miles)
Total: 2,405 km (1,494 miles)
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