In our quest to stay as cool as we can we sweated an awful lot today. To cut across as northerly as possible in the given time we ended up in the middle of the Westerwald and climbed over 1000m in the 52km we rode – the Westerwald is very hilly. We did not see many cyclists, and only one other without electrical assistance.
The views from the tops were rewarding.
We did not see a single café, shop or (open) restaurant all day, so used up some of our supplies during our breaks.
We also saw a lot of damage to the woods, apparently many spruces died in 2019 after many dry summers/droughts, and the damage the bark beetles then did. The Westerwald, which used to be spruce-dominated, now has a lot of mixed forest.
We happened upon the monastery of Mariastatt after one of the nicest bits of cycling, just in time for lunch. Unfortunately their brewery restaurant was closed, due to lack of staff. So we had our bread and cheese along with some biscuits from the monastery shop, some of their water, and a coffee for Phil, while sitting in the gardens – very relaxing.
After more climbing (it reminded me of arriving at youth hostels, they were always on a hill) we had a refreshing swim in the hotel pool. We were lucky, Tuesdays their revolving restaurant is open, so we had an excellent dinner while enjoying the Westerwald without effort.
