After riding 2 months through Japan in autumn of 2017, I am now back in Europe, working... but still riding on my brompton whenever possible. Currently this is mainly in the Netherlands, close to home. But hopefully other countries will join the list.

Tuesday 7 September 2021

TdE - Day 25 Ulm - Heiligkreuztal

Route: Ulm - Donau - Obermarchtal - Heiligkreuztal 
Distance: 84 km
Elevation: 465 m
Duration: 4:42 h
Weather: Sunny but a few high clouds, warm but not too hot, 8 - 28 C 


Today I departed again on my general way back to the Netherlands. Still following the Danube upstream. I started in the busy city of Ulm where I stayed the last two nights in a hotel close to the station (but thanks to a strike of the conductors it was very quiet) and ended my day in a Cistercian monastery in the country side. A VERY relaxing place. 

My room (top left) is in the old monastery one of the cells of the nuns. The room behind the opened door. They have simplified a bit the furnishing compared to how it looked like back in the days where here Cistercian nuns where living, but not much. 

Even to get to the communal dinner I had to walk along the closer to get to the refectory: 


An extremely relaxing place in the middle of some nice rolling landscape. 



And it wasn’t the only abbey today. My extended lunch break was at Obermarchtal and its abbey:



I first had lunch in a restaurant right outside of the abbey, and then went for a visit. I even had the chance to hear a part of a guided tour that came through while I was visiting the church. It was a guided tour for religion teachers that were there to have some training. 

Also the monastery where I am now is still very much used for religious purposes, although there are no more nuns. Now they hold seminars and they seem to be quite religious, judging from the conversations I overheard from some neighboring tables. But they also accept tourists (mainly cyclists and hikers). 

During the day there were some other nice churches on the way as well:

As well as some reasonably nice villages…

Again today I started quite early (shortly after 8:00) to enjoy the cold (and yes it is actually cold in the morning). This seems to be a tactic that works fine with this current heatwave. 

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