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European Cycle Touring: Self-Guided Package or Fully Independent?
What I learned from a 200-mile bike trip along the Danube
I love the freedom of being on a bike, but I’m not a heroic kind of cyclist, pedalling thousands of miles across continents. I admire those who do that kind of epic trips, but I’m a plodding leisure cyclist, occasionally clumsy or a bit wobbly, and nervous in traffic. In the past, I’ve somehow managed to cycle over both the Himalayas and the Pyrenees, but these days I’m looking for more pleasure than challenge. My spirit rises the minute I’m on a bike, and in recent years I haven’t done enough of it.
This autumn I celebrated leaving my job as a lecturer. The job was flexible, but I felt obliged to always carry a laptop. As I purged 17 years of lecture and marking notes from my hard drives, I knew I should celebrate by doing something I now had the freedom to do.
I’ve long wanted to cycle down the Austrian stretch of the River Danube (Donau in German). I travelled up it during my days as a tour guide, gazing through the bus windows at the cyclists pedalling between the river and the steeply terraced vineyards of the Wachau Valley. That section now forms a very scenic part of the Donauweg long-distance cycling route, from the Black Forest in Germany to the Black Sea.
