2 days on the Elbe

After the end of our "cruise" we made our way through the town of Wittenberg. Martin Luther is big here and 2017 is an important anniversary year, so the town was buzzing with tourists, at least 10 tour buses were parked just outside the old town. The town recently changed its name to Lutherstadt-Wittenberg.

It was a long day to Torbau, about 74K, but we got to know the character of the river. It meanders through the valley, lots of billabong and side streams. It is very prone to flooding and there are flood levees all over the valley. Towns don't have river fronts, they're behind the levees. Consequently our path meanders and we only see the river occasionally. Many of the towns favour cobble stones, very hard to ride on.
Our host in a small Pension liked to chat so we heard a lot about how life had changed since the "change", reunification.
Torbau is an important renaissance town, as well as another important Luther town, apparently he visited 40 times.
Our afternoon tea stop on the way to Torbau was at a Schloss cafe, obviously the only cafe in this little town.

After Torbau we headed off to Reisa. Nothing special about it, just the right distance before Dresden.
Thunderstorms were forecast, but just as the downpour started Jan spotted a restaurant that had been advertising along the route. It proved to be a huge dark empty venue, however they were happy to get us a drink. We were the only ones there until another cyclist came in to shelter from the rain so we had a fine chat over tea and beer, then headed off after the rain cleared. Another storm came about 10k from our destination, this time we found a picnic shelter.

We found the Irish Pub in Reisa for dinner tonight, very nice, rated the best restaurant in town.
We are used to seeing cigarette vending machines but outside the bike shop here is vending machine for tubes. I'm not sure what that says about the paths around here. Lots of empty shops in the Hauptstrasse, the town has seen better days.Read more