Time to high-tail it to get to the wedding in Amsterdam in time! We rode from Kassel north towards Detmold, following the Fulda River again, until it merges with the Werra River and they become the Weser. We camped at Bad Karlshafen and then made it all the way past Detmold. On the morning of Aug 8th we made it only as far as Rheda-Wiedenbruck, after tearing out 40km in the morning.
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Thursday, August 5, 2010
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Wolfberger
We had to wait until Kassel to have the best cremant d'alsace in the world. Thanks Eike.
:: rolling post. ride on.
:: rolling post. ride on.
The Best Playground
When we walked through the greenery, over bridges between lakes, through the Fulda River park that is almost like a wilderness, the last thing I expected to come across was the most wonderful playground I've ever seen. On the edge of Kassel, Germany, is the Fulda River, flowing south to north. And Germany seems to want their children to experience surfaces under their feet that move, shift, bounce, and roll, in ways that would make most American moms cringe. Honestly. It seems like almost everything in the playground was built so that your child could fall and hurt him/herself. But you don't hear screams from each corner. And the parents linger around the edges, letting the kids work things out on their own or with each other.
My first reaction was that I would never be able to capture it all in photographs, so forget blogging about it. But after about 15 minutes I decided that it was worth it to just take a photo of every cool challenge in the place.
First was the water play area, a partly man-made, but natural-looking stream with rocks as stairs into the stream, rope bridge over it all. There was also a series of pools and a crank-able silver water... thing. One kid had to rely on another kid, but done right they could make the water travel up the spinning silver thing to the next pool. What? I don't know, actually. But teach 'em early, right?
Nearby was a boat. With springs on the bottom of it. Did I mention that most of the playground structures were big enough, sturdy enough, for parents to play with their children?
A favorite for us to watch was the tightrope. Here, you can only play if you can climb up a rope or a pole. These provide a bit of a test, to ensure that kids that are too small don't get into trouble. If you can't get up the rope or pole, you can't attempt to tightrope walk five feet above the ground. There's also a zip line component, which the kids hold onto while cruising across. Or they just cruise across holding onto the silver rings - forget tightrope walking...
Another neat one was this rope tethered tire-swing situation. If you are on one tire, you effect the movements of the other, because you are both hanging from the same rope. Joshua and I tried this one ourselves.
And then there's the slide. Accessible also by a hillside, the way to get to the top of the slide for the bigger kids is a climbing wall. The slide itself was no joke, either.
This christmas tree spins. But there's a little platform at the top, so you can just sit up there and get sick if you're interested.
And I don't even know how to begin describing this one. All I know is that the kid is pulling ropes to get them swinging...
We actually saw quite a few of these in Germany. The kid on the right is about to get thrown into the air, as the kid on the left is landing on his side of the giant plastic tape. It is pulled taught on the left side right now, because that kid is in the air. Kind of a flexi-see-saw.
Speaking of see-saws...
Just for extra fun.
This might be hard to describe. The kids are on a thing, a half-sphere, that spins quite easily. The kid on the left is actually running at the speed that the half-sphere is spinning, so he is running in place. The other kid is close enough to the middle to avoid getting run over, I think.
And one of my favorites, the:
If two people of even similar weight get on, you can swing back and forth, and also spin round and round. Up to four fun people/kids can get on and get bumped against the pole in the middle or get dizzy spinning around it - but I was on it alone.
My first reaction was that I would never be able to capture it all in photographs, so forget blogging about it. But after about 15 minutes I decided that it was worth it to just take a photo of every cool challenge in the place.
First was the water play area, a partly man-made, but natural-looking stream with rocks as stairs into the stream, rope bridge over it all. There was also a series of pools and a crank-able silver water... thing. One kid had to rely on another kid, but done right they could make the water travel up the spinning silver thing to the next pool. What? I don't know, actually. But teach 'em early, right?
Nearby was a boat. With springs on the bottom of it. Did I mention that most of the playground structures were big enough, sturdy enough, for parents to play with their children?
A favorite for us to watch was the tightrope. Here, you can only play if you can climb up a rope or a pole. These provide a bit of a test, to ensure that kids that are too small don't get into trouble. If you can't get up the rope or pole, you can't attempt to tightrope walk five feet above the ground. There's also a zip line component, which the kids hold onto while cruising across. Or they just cruise across holding onto the silver rings - forget tightrope walking...
Another neat one was this rope tethered tire-swing situation. If you are on one tire, you effect the movements of the other, because you are both hanging from the same rope. Joshua and I tried this one ourselves.
And then there's the slide. Accessible also by a hillside, the way to get to the top of the slide for the bigger kids is a climbing wall. The slide itself was no joke, either.
This christmas tree spins. But there's a little platform at the top, so you can just sit up there and get sick if you're interested.
And I don't even know how to begin describing this one. All I know is that the kid is pulling ropes to get them swinging...
We actually saw quite a few of these in Germany. The kid on the right is about to get thrown into the air, as the kid on the left is landing on his side of the giant plastic tape. It is pulled taught on the left side right now, because that kid is in the air. Kind of a flexi-see-saw.
Speaking of see-saws...
Just for extra fun.
This might be hard to describe. The kids are on a thing, a half-sphere, that spins quite easily. The kid on the left is actually running at the speed that the half-sphere is spinning, so he is running in place. The other kid is close enough to the middle to avoid getting run over, I think.
And one of my favorites, the:
If two people of even similar weight get on, you can swing back and forth, and also spin round and round. Up to four fun people/kids can get on and get bumped against the pole in the middle or get dizzy spinning around it - but I was on it alone.
Running Sushi
Raimund introduced us to Running Sushi, an all-you-can-eat sushi restaurant. The novelty here is that there is a conveyer belt that loops sushi around the restaurant (which is quite large) and you pull little plates off it through a window at your table. Super cool and super yummy. We went twice.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
A dinner that fed our souls
Back in Kassel, Stefania made us a dinner that satistified a hunger that we were not conscious of. Mmm. Thanks Stefania!!!
I'm bummed that I didn't get more photos - I was too engrossed by the yummies on my plate.
At some point Nathalia got a hold of a camera.
Ramona: Brazilian food, fish and rice with some kind of coconut magic curry-ish goodness to pour over it all. mmmmmm.
:: rolling post. ride on.
I'm bummed that I didn't get more photos - I was too engrossed by the yummies on my plate.
At some point Nathalia got a hold of a camera.
Ramona: Brazilian food, fish and rice with some kind of coconut magic curry-ish goodness to pour over it all. mmmmmm.
:: rolling post. ride on.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Werra from Hilgershausen to Kassel
To get from Hilgershausen back to Kassel, we chose a slightly longer route that followed the Werra River to Hann. Munden to where the Werra empties into the Fulda. This turned out to be a fantasy route. It was so amazing we couldn't stop to take pictures. And, since Ray had been to Hilgershausen the day before, we had packed all our stuff in his car to take back with him. We had as little stuff as we've had all trip. After a short climb out of Hilgershausen, we found ourselves in a national forest of beach wood trees. It was dark, cool, and damp. The road soon started to descend, plunging us down, down, and still further down past awesome glens, interrupted only by a small village (just a farm really) with a few fields. Down until we reached the Werra. We've come to appreciate the river routes in Germany, especially if we are travelling in the direction the river is following. The Werra route twisted and turned us upside down a few times as we sped through corn and wheat fields. All the way to Hann. Munden we blissed out. Our only regret was not eating a big lunch in Hann. Munden because the pickings were slim as we heading back to Kassel along the Fulda.
This part of the day was super cool too. It was raining a little and the path took us through fields of flowers and as we got closer to Kassel, the trail got narrower and closer to the river until finally the water was mere meters from the path and the trail was a single track through dense trees, flowers, black berry brambles, and (inevitably) stinging nettles. And there was a lot of bike traffic! Families, tour groups, soloists - everyone was on the bike path, smiling and checking each other out. Ramona and I were like huge lorries running everyone down with our blazing (comparatively) speed. Cool as. We sang ourselves all the way to Kassel in record time.
This part of the day was super cool too. It was raining a little and the path took us through fields of flowers and as we got closer to Kassel, the trail got narrower and closer to the river until finally the water was mere meters from the path and the trail was a single track through dense trees, flowers, black berry brambles, and (inevitably) stinging nettles. And there was a lot of bike traffic! Families, tour groups, soloists - everyone was on the bike path, smiling and checking each other out. Ramona and I were like huge lorries running everyone down with our blazing (comparatively) speed. Cool as. We sang ourselves all the way to Kassel in record time.
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