Our sincere apologies to our regular morning readers for the lack of a posting yesterday. This was due to internet problems at our remote, charming (useless wi-fi) last night.

(The next bit is another guest appearance by Chris)

It felt a bit sad to leave the lovely campsite of Passau but the heat was already oppressive, so we needed to just say goodbye to the ducks and get on with the trip. Soon-ish we reached Austria.

We bought a selfie stick in the one Euro shop! And now we’re in Austria!!

The problem in Austria is that there is a Donau cycle route on both sides of the river. We chose the path less travelled (the right bank in this case), which was lovely in places but also had stretches right next to roads.

In spite of the heat we continued apace and reached the Schloegener Schlinge in good time. Schloegener Schlinge?, you may ask (if you can pronounce it at all). This is a famous part of the Danube, where it runs as a hairpin bend with more tight bends to follow. We camped a few kilometres beyond this.

You can take the man out of the walker temporarily (and put him on a bike) but you can’t take the walker out of the man – or us in this case. So we decided to walk up the not insignificant hill, then along the ridge back towards the viewpoint above the Schloegener Schlinge. We were rewarded with some excellent views. Then speedily down to water level to make sure we were in time for the restaur\nant (they close early here). Food so so, then we were ready for bed (which was 4km away).

The view as we walked up and along the side of the very full and cloudy river

This was the goal of our long, hot walk.

(Back to Graham)

When we arrived at the campsite, we were tired and hot. Stupidly, I forgot that I had locked the bike and tried to move it. That broke one of the back spokes. That is the little back wheel that carries the weight of one passenger and almost all of luggage. I was mortified. The wheel had been specially built with extra spokes so we were in unknown territory as to what would happen when we started riding. We booked into a bike shop in Linz but that is 50 km distant.

The view as we set off early in the morning, wondering if the wheel would hold out. Luckily, the road surface was excellent.

We cycled many miles next to the Danube without passing a single house. I started to wonder what would happen if the wheel gave out there. Suddenly, seemingly in the middle of nowhere (and still a long way from Linz), we see this!

It was 9am and the proprietor had just opened the doors. He did a fantastic job. He found two further broken spokes and two more suspect ones. Made his own spokes to the right size. And then painstakingly trued the wheel. And charged only 45 euros!

I can see that working on IT projects nurtured my natural tendency to pessimism. Our in-house team was great, but there is so much that can go wrong and so much that is beyond you direct control.

Now that I’m not immersed in that environment, I’m rediscovering that wonderful feeling that good things do happen. Chris and I remind one another each time something goes well, or we have good luck.

This was the road to Linz with a rebuilt wheel 🙂

It’s an Austrian thing. (We just don’t know what thing).

Now we are sitting in the amazing Museum of the Future, the home of Ars Electronica in Linz. I’m looking forward to seeing the special exhibits about AI, Machine Learning, and a VR experience of skiing down the notorious Streif slope.