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Balkans Trip - Day 3 - Germany


Blogging at 22:15 on Thursday 25th July from N 49.04818°, E 08.30551° / http://maps.google.com/maps?q=loc:49.04818%2C08.30551

We set off at just after 6.00am this morning in an effort to do the day's drive before the heat built to people-and-truck debilitating level.

Today's route took us through Belgium, then Luxembourg; where we brimmed the tanks with the country's celebrated cheap diesel (€1.08 per litre), before crossing the border into Germany and through the spectacular scenery of the North Vosges mountains (more big hills, really) to the coordinates shown where we're going to overnight.

We've spent a lot of time in and around the North Vosges area before and it's well worth a visit. We'd have liked to have pootled around a bit this time, too, but the building heat and time lost this past two days saw us pressing on to the Rhine-side spot we're at. In spite of the heavy industry in the area this really is a cracking place.

Birdlife is pretty good with a good mixture of water, woodland and farmland birds, as well as pretty frequent common terns and a few oddities like black kite.

The Rhine was teeming this afternoon with a mixture of leisure craft and massive barges. It was about the only place that supported doing anything, really. It's just too hot to do anything 'normal'. I tried a spin on the bike but in place of the usual air-cooling effect was more of a cycling-through-a-hair-dryer scenario. I did half an hour and just packed in: it was no fun.

Sitting out on top of the truck to make the best of any moving air (precious little) and frequent dousings with Rhine water (pic) are about all we've been good for.

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