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Monday, July 8th - Wertheim to Rothenberg-ob-der-Tauber, 6739 km
There is some confusion after breakfast as the American couple and I wait for a long time to get our hostel cards back. Apparently, we need to wash, dry and put away our breakfast dishes first, but the only signs are in German and no one is available at
this hour to tell this. We ask the manager repeatedly for our cards and he only says "wash", but we thought he meant the receptionist who speaks English was still showering. We all have a big laugh over this, once the manager mimes what we need to do.The second delay is that I need to repair the front fender. The rivets holding it to the rack have worn out and it is dragging on the front tire, which is both annoying and dangerous. I find a bike store in town and buy some screws, epoxy glue, a spare inner tube and new toe clips. I love that most European towns have bike shops. I repair the fender, pack the other goodies away and ride up to have a look at the castle. I don't pay to go into the castle, but I have a walk around outside, the parts that are accessible to the public without paying, and take a snapshot of the view. The climb up to see it is worth the view.
It is a bit of a late start with the unexpected delays, but at the bike store I learn that there is a bike path (radweg) the full length of the Tauber River from Wertheim to Rothenberg. The Tauber is another river that has cut a steep-sided, snaky canyon though the surrounding landscape. This canyon is about 120m (400 ft) deep. Only three
kilometres along, I lose the path in the first village in the canyon and spend several minutes looking for the place it starts again on the far side. This happens over and over again along today's route. It is frustrating. One time I find the wrong trail that leads out of 
the valley and I have to return to look again. By noon, I have only covered 20 of the 120 km I need to do today. I do better at keeping to the trail for the rest of the day, but still at one point I get lost with an old German couple from Darmstadt who are as confused as I am. The trail we found serves as a shortcut cutting off a bend in the river. It climbs over a 200m hill and drops us back into the Tauber Valley on the other side. Here I leave them behind as they putter along at a slower pace.
The gnatsies are especially bad today. I have to blow them out from behind my sunglasses every other minute. It is too hot to ride with my helmet on too, as the sweat runs into my eyes. I am sure many retarded gnats are drowning in the streams of my sweat. By the time I reach Rothenberg I feel unnaturally weak for the distance I have covered, with only one major hill involved. I put this down to the heat. There is a big hill into Rothenberg though, which is built on a ridge high above the river, and it almost knocks me out. Perhaps because of Rothenberg's extremely
touristy nature, I am able to find the tourist information office easily and they are very helpful in directing me to an inexpensive pension, the Pension Bercher, close by. The owner is a hunched over German woman who speaks no English. I cannot make sense of anything she says but this doesn't deter her from prattling on non-stop in German. Her tone is friendly and that counts. My room is nice too, a pleasant change from youth hostel dorms. I book for two nights. 
I am in Bavaria now, the only region of Germany, or Europe as far as I know, that takes the label 'youth' hostel seriously, setting an age limit of 26 years for its guests. They must have enough young visitors to make a go of it, so it is just as well to avoid such a concentration of them. I have also been warned last night that there are fewer hostels in formerly East Germany. Many of the hostels have closed in the past two years with the downturn in their economy, so my accommodation costs might be higher. It has been a longer ride today but I am not too hungry, probably another side effect of the heat. I walk the streets of the old town and shoot off a roll of film
before I have a beer and a pizza at an Italian restaurant. There are groups and pairs of youths seated all around me, so exuberant and full of life. I meet no one but it is fun to watch them. Back in my room in the pension it is very quiet. There is no sitting room where the guests can mingle and I am feeling quite isolated and lonely. I can't say I miss traveling with Mike as we rarely talked much, but after six nights in youth hostels this feels way too quiet. Watching others without meeting them doesn't satisfy me either. When I move away from English-speaking areas, where youth hostels are uncommon, this will happen more and more and I am beginning to wonder how I will handle it.
PHOTO 1: Wertheim Haus
PHOTO 2: the climb over the 200m hill
PHOTO 3: Castle Neuhaus
PHOTO 4: Tauberbischofsheim
PHOTO 5: bike path near Lauda
PHOTO 6: Weikersheim
PHOTO 7: Tauberzell
PHOTO 8: bike path near Rothenberg
PHOTO 9: Rothenberg ob der Tauber, the most photographed view
PHOTO 10: Rothenberg, centre of town
PHOTO 11: Rothenberg Town Hall
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