On the Sunday I spent some time in the tourist office. A very nice girl was interested in my trip. She told me that she was s cyclists and gave me a map of the cycle routes in the area.
The Eurovelo Route 5 that brought me into town along the canal, heads west after Colmar. The other option to stay on the canal. I decide to take the Route 5.
The route follows small farm roads through vineyards overlooking the river valley below.
Stop for dessert
I stopped for lunch at about 1.50 p.m. This was too late for a full meal. All I was able to order was dessert, a very large cheesecake.
I passed a WW1 on the Vieil Armand battlefield. This yet another place where thousands of lives were lost. This time all the soldiers that were killed were French and Germans.
Into Mulhouse
The route took me into a city called Mulhouse. It is a fairly drab place. As usual it was difficult to find the cycle route leaving the city.
I had to ask people a number of times how to get to the canal and the cycle path.
On the canal path
After leaving Mulhouse I was back on the cycle path that follows the canal. It was quite late and I had been in the saddle for over seven hours. I expected to find campsites on the canal. I knew that there was one in Huningue, however I was more than happy to stop if there was one before then.
As it turned out, there was no place to stay before Huningue.
Camping at Petite Port
My trip is vaguely following the route taken by an English bloke who rode from Canterbury to Rome. He stopped in Huningue and stayed at the Petite Port camping ground. He described it as “being a favourite place for cyclists and kayakers”. He was right, the place was full of cyclists – mainly Dutch as usual- people that kayak down the Rhine.
He also described the experience of having to cross the Rhine into Germany to buy anything. There is huge shopping centre just over the bridge in Germany. It would appear that the shops in France have given up.
I decided to stay in Huningue for the day. I took the opportunity to cross into Germany for a haircut. I was allocated a very young girl to do the cut. I am certain that I must have been one of her first, if not the first, paying customer she had. A number of customers came and went as she cut my hair. She also took the opportunity to practice her English, which she told me was “very important to be proficient at”.
As it turned out, I think she did a very good job. I am not sure if the owner on the shop would have made any money out of the cut.
Kayaking
In the afternoon I when for a walk on the canal that runs off the Rhine. Next to the canal there is stream that has very fast flowing water. There were a lot people kayaking and using small ‘body board’ type floating things. I looked like heaps of fun.
Train to Andermatt
I had done a bit of research into the cycling options in Switzerland. There are four main National Cycling Routes. One goes from Basel to Andermatt. This follows the Rhine.
The one which is generally thought to be the best route is the Route 1 that follows that Rhone from Andermatt to Geneva.
I decided to take the train to Andermatt. In the morning I packed up and headed across the Swiss border into Basle and the caught the first leg of the train journey to Andermatt.
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