Rain, Rain, Rain!

Znojmo, Czechia to Vienna, Austria — 58.2 mi, 22.4 mph, 1900 ft

The day started with rain, continued with more rain before lunch, and ended with an hour and a half drenching! Meg loved it.

We left our nice little penzion a little before 9:00. Not having a tent and camping gear to pack up every day, has definitely improved our start time. The early rain didn't last too long and before we knew it, we were nearing the border with Austria. This became clear because of the appearance of cabaret and massage parlors. Eventually, we passed a huge duty-free shopping center, with a giant globe and a replica of a 747 in the parking lot. I told everyone I had 200 crowns burning a hole in my pocket so we’d have to stop before crossing the border. We successfully spent our last Czech money (~$9) on junk food -- candy and sodas!

Early morning tickling session

Tax free candy!

Haribo,  one of the kid's favorite

It was raining as we were routed onto a small farm road at the border, but it wasn’t bad. The process turned out to be a little like the proverbial frog in the boiling pot. The rain wasn’t so bad that we wanted to stop and put on rain jackets. As it continued, we got a little wetter, but we hardly noticed. Eventually, we realized that we were so wet that putting on jackets would just hold in the water!  There you go, boiled frog! One problem with our bikes is the lack of fenders.  The racks kind of serve that purpose, but what really help Meg and me are Kylie and Dex!  The are wonderful fenders for us capturing the bulk of water, grit, and mud, especially considering we're still periodically on dirt trails!

At the halfway point, we stopped in a small town and started scanning our phones for somewhere to get food. It being Sunday, supermarkets were closed. We did, however, find a small restaurant just a hundred feet from where we’d stopped. We brushed off, put on dry shirts, and tidied up as best we could.   Though I didn't feel too cold, my fingers were wrinkled and a bit numb.  We once again had an extremely nice waitress.  Once we heard the words schnitzel, we were in.  She suggested Dex and Kylie split one, but we rejected that idea out of hand.  Little did we know each plate came with three slabs of breaded chicken... or maybe it was pork.

Just inside Austria and before the rain

New problem, warped rear wheel

Wow, that's a lot of schnitzel and fries

After lunch it was dry until we met up with the Danube 15 miles or so outside of Vienna.  Today, we knew, would have a lot less climbing than the previous four days, and we would now be going down river into town.  Yippee!  Somehow, though, I missed the darkening skies, and in an instant, the skies opened up.  Everyone but Meg threw on a rain jacket and away we sped -- no point standing around.  We were soon drenched, shoes and socks sopping, water running down helmets and into jackets.  On the plus side, it was not terribly cold, so we sloshed through puddles, enjoying the suddenly empty bike path, and the swans swimming in the river.

For some reason, the closer we got to our Air B&B, the worse the wobble of Kylie's and my rear wheel got.  Two miles from the end, it exploded.  Yeah. I installed a new tube just to have it burst as I was pumping it up.  It was then I noticed a rip in the side wall of the tire that was letting the tube bulge.  Arrgh.  We weren't far, so we "limped" our way zig-zagging through town to our home-away-from-home at Rotenkruezegasse 3.  Unfortunately, we'd been unable to call or text our host for the last few hours.  We sat on the sidewalk, cold and not in the best of moods, until an hour later our host arrived. By then, my fingertips were just about feeling normal again.

After four showers and a light dinner in a nearby Asian Bistro, and we were feeling all kinds of better again.