Safe Return Doubtful

80 miles (128 km) – Total so far: 2,190 miles (3,524 km)

Good entrainment last night in a sports bar in Coesfeld watching Germany lose to France in the Handball semi final by 1 goal in the last second.

It was a stormy night also, though cloudy this morning. One of the difficulties fellow cyclists will sympathise with after rain at this time of year in Northern Europe, is peeling the corpses of mutilated slugs from the wheel arch and underside of the frame. Simply unpleasant. I was away quite early for me though, and rode on a mixture of the EuroRadweg 1 and other bike routes to the border through Gesher, Stadlohn and Vreden. I made good time.

Biking in Germany was fine, but by far the best sections were in the Harz mountains. I knew the flatter parts would be of much less interest, but this year for one, have been keen to bike home. 535 miles in Germany in 9 days. So onto the Netherlands, even if only briefly. I was 24 metres above sea level when I entered the country, and doubt I will get higher than that. The riding was easy though, except that the wind had got up and it was from the west, so I was riding into it. I was keen to arrive for the second half of the football matches from England, and was just about on time.

Distance 75.8 miles Time left 9:50 am Time arrived 4:50 pm Time riding 6 hours 6 minutes Height gained 148 metres

Vreden town centre on a Saturday morning

Leaving Germany, 560 miles in 7 full days and 2 part days

…and into the Netherlands

Typical Netherlands riding of today, with bike lanes all the time

Crossing the IJssel at Zutphen

Germany and Netherlands look after their cyclists very well. Despite the excellent performance of our cyclists in the Rio Olympics our country does not compete with mainland Europe in infrastructure for ordinary cyclists, and consequently we don’t have anywhere near as many.