Wine on the Rhine

A resting couple of days in Koblenz was great, drinking too much coffee, reading and bike window shopping at Canyon's factory shop which happens to be there (which I really didn't know about in advance!).[Hero lives here: This tent and bike belongs to a Japanese guy I met who has spent the last two years cycling his way from Japan. His name is Hero :-)][This lovely guy belonged to an old tricyclist who adopted him from a dog home in Hungary and now tows him behind his tricycle in a special trailer][Koblenz skyline on the last night][I even managed a fresh egg for breakfast]Leaving Koblenz and heading south towards Mainz the river does get very pretty, although not a patch on much of Scotland. The edges of the valley got steeper, the castles got more frequent and there were many grapes! This is wine country and much of the area is covered in vineyards, both expanding out on the flat flood plains and squeezed in on the steeper valley sides.[A Rhineland castle][Impressive buildings][Vines squeezed onto the valley sides...][...and up closer]South of Mainz and heading towards Karlsruhe I again cycled through farmland, forests and more cities (more on those later...)[My first reaction as I rounded a corner to see this sign where it is was "what the f*ck...?"][Not much left in this field][And with the bike, to prove it's still with me!][These guys were strutting around like a little gang in the London riots, just taking what they wanted... Unfortunately by the time I'd got around to the top of the field they had wandered too far away to make this a much better photo][And the path keeps going on...]