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For the last few weeks before I returned to the US, I worked in Copenhagen (København). I flew there every Monday morning, and home to München every Friday afternoon.

A bicycle tour from København to München

Dave Hood
2004-02-19 20:21:47

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city, having to search for a place to stay, stupid with fatigue, hunger and cold. Maybe I’ll save Lübeck for the morrow.

As I passed Ratekau, I saw a hotel-restaurant. The restaurant was Korean – this is better and better! But the hotel, when I checked it out, was clearly out of business. Moomph.

However, a hundred meters down the bike path was a Zimmer Frei sign. Maybe I’m living right after all. I stopped. Clearly the wife’s business, Frau Hildegard Schließer – Herr Schließer, a perpetual do-it-yourselfer interrupted by the doorbell, handed me over to her and went back to his current project. I did the whole thing auf Deutsch – good for me!

A small basement room, pine panels. Just fine. And cheap, DM 42. The bathroom had a tile floor with embedded hot water pipes, pretty decadent! The hot and cold plumbing was backward – the bane of the do-it-yourselfer, worldwide. And I found that I’m expected to have my own soap. Well, today’s shower will have to be soapless. Rinse off the soluble part, towel off the gritty part. Adequate.

When I asked about dinner, my hostess pointed in both directions. So I walked on down the path where I hadn’t been before, just to see what there was to see. No doubt whether I’d come back: a Korean restaurant is a rare prize in Germany.

What I found was a rest stop with a Biergarten and Pizzeria. Deep, dark forest, open, very little vegetation at ground level, fallen yellow leaves everywhere. Beautiful. Also found microscopic trail signs marking bike route 4 to Alt Lübeck. Can I see them well enough to follow them tomorrow? [Answer: no. It sure is a shame to invest considerable time and money in route planning and marking, and blow the human factors so badly that the route is useless.]

The Korean restaurant was paneled with dark lacquered richly-grained hardwood. Heavy silk curtains complemented dusty-blue-gray ceramics at the ...