I honestly do not have much to say about this section of this trip. However, if you made it this far, you clicked the link and (if you stick around) will be subject to some brief ramblings on the Duchy of Luxembourg and the steel manufacturing hotspots of Germany (lucky you!). Clearly these are travel highlights not to be missed.
In order to continue on the EuroVelo route south, our next stop was Luxembourg City. Neither of us had been, and, admittedly, reports from various friends on this small European kingdom had not been exceedingly encouraging (including from my one Luxembourgish friend that had actually grown up there). No one had much to say about it at all really, other than the somewhat resounding feedback that it was very boring. Perhaps, if you are looking for clubbing opportunities or live there for an extended period, this is true, but we actually found the city quite charming and very much enjoyed our time in Luxembourg.
This was likely assisted by our luck at being hosted by the amazing Stephane Julien who took us around the city, for drinks and dinner and for an outing through the Petit Suisse up to Viaden and to Echternach. We were also introduced to his very chatty cat Titou, who seemed to take this hosting business at least as seriously as any of our hosts of a non-feline persuasion. Titou meant business.
Luxembourg City itself is built through a valley and has historic buildings all over the place, stunning views and cute cafes and bars peppering the streets. Further evidence that Luxembourg was not, in fact, that boring, can be found in our stumbling upon an impromptu drinks and barbeque invite at 10.30pm on our first night in the country. On wandering past the park outside our host’s apartment on the way home, a delightfully enthusiastic Siberian man insisted on preparing us some (very excellent) sausage and plying us with a prosecco and violet drink combination that was (no surprises) bright purple, but was (surprises) actually quite good. We are not entirely sure to what we owed this spontaneous hospitality, but it would have been rude to say no.
On leaving Luxembourg City, we cycled south-east to Schengen and hit the Moselle valley and our first sighting of wine country. Short lived, but a good foreshadowing of things to come. We then proceeded to briefly enter Germany before cycling for a few hours in France – including some disgusting hills with which Thomas was decidedly unimpressed (“You see, the thing about me, Anthea, is that I don’t like hills, I like flat cycling…”, etc, for the next 40km). He was only somewhat placated by the discovery of a farm selling home made ice cream at the top of one particular hill and deciding that consumption of a litre of this delicious product between us was an appropriate way to spend some of the afternoon. I am pretty sure the farmer found our unbridled enthusiasm for his ice cream somewhat amusing, but he gamely set up a bench for us, filled our water bottles and left us to our relatively embarrassing (thankfully there really was no one around) and very excitable selfie-taking.
We did finally make it to the top of the hills and enjoyed a quick descent to the Saar river in Germany. At this point, things flattened out and we spent our singular night in Germany wild camping next to a tributary near to Saarlouis.
I did not find the German section of the route particularly impressive as the river was nice, but it seemed to be a big steel production/industrial area and it was not really very charming at all. I would also note that we failed to find any of the famed German bread that every German we come across universally assures us is sensational. Further, my one day in Germany did nothing to change my enduring opinion that German sausage and pils really are not much to write home about. Blasphemy, I know. But, there you have it – far be it for me to not to be entirely honest about such important things as the quality of a country’s sausage production. Nevertheless, the cycling was flat, the weather was good and the people were really quite lovely – so, in this regard, Germany gets a big plus.
July 2020