Out of Prague

Day one of our bike trip to Dresden is complete. Linda and I are sitting on our hotel room, feet up, drinking tea, and sharing stories from the day. What a great ride it was. Thirty-six miles along the Vltava river from Prague to Milnik.

Getting out of Prague was fun – not really. Linda was learning how to use her e-bike, and I was trying to follow my GPS app while trying at the same time not to get run over. Once, I made a wrong turn onto a one-way street, into the path of a garbage truck. Except for a few more wrong turns, we made it to the river and the Troja Chateau. Once we started riding along the river, the ride became absolutely delightful.

The only difficult parts of the ride was when we had to climb a mountain. It was like the Mount Everest of Bohemia. It wasn’t too bad for Linda. She had an e-bike. All she had to do was press a button to zoom here and there, and there was the top of the hill.

I on the other hand do not have an e-bike because I’m 1) in good shape, 2) only 67 years young, and 3) stupid. Linda flew to the top of the mountain and waited for me to trudge my way up, sweat pouring out of my body while my heart raced faster than, well, Linda on her e-bike.

Part of the reason I was slow was the fact that I was carrying most of our gear in my pannier. I had both locks, Linda’s bike charger, repair tools, two six-packs of beer just in case we couldn’t find anywhere to quench our thirst (as it turns out, that was not a problem), extra clothes I didn’t need, and two bottle of water, which I did need.

To my credit, I made it to the top and only stopped twice (to make photographs, of course). On top of that, I was only passed once. I heard a squeaky voice say “On your left”. I looked over to see a turtle whiz by.

A beer was in order after the climb, and we found a place along the river. While there, the wind started to pick up (it picked up everything on the table that wasn’t weighted down). The strong wind followed us, mostly in our face, for the rest of the ride.