2014-06-15 48 7

Location

In the forêt du Haguenau next to the D263.

Participants

Plans

To take the train to Germersheim at 9:32 and continue my travel from there by bike. After I've visited the hashpoint I'll ride on to Rastatt and take the train home from there.

Expedition

So, after the short expedition yesterday, todays trip was epic again. The way, my legs felt after the 70 KM trip yesterday, it was clear, that I wouldn't make a 100 + KM on my bike today. So first of all, I decided to ride my bull, and second, I expanded the train-part to Wörth.

Soon I reached the french border but didn't cross it immediately but stayed on the German side till Scheibenhardt(D)/Scheibenhard(F).Now followed a lot of little french villages, all even prettier but also more dozily than the palatine villages. I came along a former jewish cemetery where I had a little rest and took some photos. After a while I reached a former rail track, where I could ride really fast, but soon after that I reached the busy D263. First I tried to avoid the road by taking a path through the forest, but it ended after a while and so I had to take the road anyway. But only some minutes later I came near the hashpoint and had to try to get there. As the forest seemed very dense and there was a ditch between the road and the forest, it was clear that I couldn't take my bull with me. So I returned some 100 meters and put the bull in a forest path to walk on by foot. I found a way to enter the bushes, but after the first row the forest became quite light and easy passable.

To find the hashpoint, I had to do some dancing, as accuracy was bad in the forest. Anyway, I did it somehow. I had some food with me, fruits again, but also some french pastry and some water, and I even foud a place to arrange it and to sit down. I think, this time, it is good enough for a picnic. Before I left again, I left a marker, if in a far future geohashing will come famous in france.

Then I walked back to my bike and returned along the road and back to the rail track. This time I could stay even longer on it. I found a bunker of the ligne maginot but stayed only a short time to take some photos. It doesn't take long and I reached a bridge over the river rhine on which I returned to germany and continued to Rastatt. I knew that there was a train at 14:34 from Rastatt and so I hurried to the station, oon which I arrived at 14:37, but the train was still there. Nevertheless, I still had to buy a ticket, and just when I finished that the train started. But that was good luck for me, because so I had the occasion to ride to the city of Rastatt. At the castle there was a festival for the 300. anniversary of the Treaty of Rastatt, where I listened to some music and ate some Ochsenmaulsalat (ox-muzzle salad) and drank some beer.

Back to the station I was told, that the train from Graben-Neudorf wouldn't stop in Speyer today due to a building site. So I left the train in Graben-Neudorf and went to Germersheim by bike once again.