Aaah, the relief of an airconditioned hotel!

We left camp at 7.30am this morning, a new record for us. We skipped breakfast and coffee, packed up and left. It was actually cold this morning, but it soon warmed up.

It was such a beautiful ride today with many castles up in the hills, and picturesque chocolate and strawberry ripple houses. We’re so glad we left this section for the morning as I don’t think we would have enjoyed it as much in the heat.

The only problem with skipping coffee was, there was nowhere to get a coffee that early! In France, there is always a Tabac or hotel serving coffee in every town you pass. In Germany, nein!

We stopped at the first hotel we saw. He was open but not serving coffee. The next place was an Italian place where I saw people outside drinking coffee. So I sent Mike in while I found a table overlooking the river. I waited for ages when he finally came out and said, they’re not doing coffee.

‘But there’s people drinking coffee here,’ I said in my I need coffee voice.

‘That’s only for the guests, it’s a hotel.’

‘Oh FFS,’ I said and rumbled off over the cobblestones on my bike.

Then we found a ‘cafe’. I went inside and almost walked back out again when I saw the decor and the 90 year old woman at the counter. It was so old fashioned I thought they probably don’t do espresso. But then I saw a massive espresso machine and thought, it should be okay. So I grabbed a table and sent Mike in to order.

Mike came back with a little book about the cafe, and a business card.

After quite some time, the old lady brought out two cups and asked if we wanted milk and sugar. ‘Yes,’ I said, and she left to go back inside, struggling to walk. Mike had offered to help but she insisted she was fine.

I went to take a drink of my coffee and almost screamed. Mike, who was busy thumbing through the book must have seen the look of horror on my face, asked, ‘What’s the matter?’

I picked up my cup, peered inside to double check, then showed it to Mike.

He peered inside, and then looked in his own cup. They were both empty.

After a longer wait, another, younger lady in her 80s who I think might have been a guest, brought out a little tray, and on it were two jugs of coffee, a mini jug of milk each and a jar of sugar. This really is like the olden days. In fact, the cafe has been in the same family since 1951, and the decor hasn’t changed since.

Anyway, the jug provided two cups of coffee, but it wan’t the best, but at this stage, coffee was functional, not to be enjoyed.

After that quirky little experience, we continued on, following the river, marvelling at castles in the hills. It really was an amazing day.

We arrived in Koblenz at 1pm and it was already very hot. Thankfully we were able to check into our hotel and the ice cold air-conditioning. After showers we fell asleep. At 6pm we ventured out for food, and the blast of hot air almost had us scurrying back to the hotel and ordering room service. But we braved the heat, ate a kebab, then scurried back to the hotel. It’s going to be hot again tomorrow and we are both exhausted from the heat so we’ve booked a second night here.

We’ll explore the town of Koblenz tomorrow, early to avoid the heat.