Sun, Aug 28, 2011 - 7.20 mi [Cycling] Newcastle to Jarrow

Sun, Aug 28, 2011 - 7.20 mi [Cycling]


7.20 mi in 00:27:58 hours at 15.45 mi/h on Pinnacle Hybrid. [Cycling] Very fast ride home from Newcastle - wind less gusty but still a bit tricky conditions.

Sun, Aug 28, 2011 - 8.93 mi Jarrow to Newcastle

Sun, Aug 28, 2011 - 8.93 mi [Cycling]


8.93 mi in 00:44:42 hours at 11.99 mi/h on Pinnacle Hybrid. [Cycling] Cycle up to the Spittal for a pree match drink then on to St James to see another good Toon performance and a well deserved win over Fulham. Very tough going into a strong headwind which I would guess was gusting up to 40 or 50 mph - Tricky Cycling

Day 11 : Wed, Aug 24, 2011 - 74.90 mi [Cycling] Finsterwalde to Berlin

Day 11 : Finsterwalde to Berlin

Day 11 Stats :
Distance = 70.02 Miles
Time = 05:50:29 hrs
Ave Speed = 11.99 mph
Elevation = 1567 ft
Calories = 3508 Calories
Max Speed = 22.3 mph
Max Height = 467 ft
Min Height = 112 ft

Tour Stats
Distance = 1005.85 miles
Time = 84:01:07 hrs
Ave Speed = 11.97 mph
Total Elevation = 33692 ft
Total Calories = 52431


I had 70 miles to complete to reach Berlin and I would also be completing 1000 miles for the tour. I had thoroughly enjoyed my extra day and I was really glad I stopped in Finsterwalde even if it did mean 1 less day in berlin.
The Town is called the Singing Town and it has a reputation for being really friendly and my Hotel was really good - I enjoyed a lovely meal in the garden and a few beers to celebrate - It's hard to put into words but tonight I knew I was going to make Berlin ... and that is the first time I could honestly say that !

I set off North along another Strassen Schaden (Uneven road) which was barriered off - fortunately it did go through and before long I was on the Bundestrasse 96 which was a straight road North to Berlin.The road was beautiful lined with large mature trees and I did have a laugh when I saw a sign showing a car crashing into a tree to presumably tell you not to drive into a tree !

The road lead to the first reasonably sized town which was Luckau and even though it was only 20 miles away I was pretty sore aand tired and started to wonder if I would make it to Berlin today after all - I bought some drinks at a garage and pressed on North.

I was now cycling through beautiful but quite thick forests and I passed through Zutzen, Baruth & Neuhof all of which were about 7 miles apart and separated by dead straight road on which the wagons were starting to build. Just after Neuhof a white van decided to overtake a Wagon heading towards me - Immediately I thought "This is going to be tight" so I braked and hopped my bike off the road onto the forest verge....

The van didn't make it back in in time & would have totalled me had I not seen it coming !!
The Wagon driver went mental and started blaring his horn at the van as the van tried to speed off from him into the distance - I suspect a chase was on :-)

I passed a monument to the war with two russian tanks sitting on plinths alongside the B96 road and stopped to take a picture. Shortly afterwards I was at Zossen which is pretty much the start of Berlin albeit 20 miles away. Another 7 Miles and I was crossing the Autobahn south of Berlin that is the Berliner Ring motorway.

I then picked my way via minor roads and cycle paths into the City centre and my route took me down Wilhelmstrasse and past Checkpoint Charlie from there I went straight through the non traffic section past the British Embassy which lead to Unter den Linden. A left turn and up to the top of the street and I was there 'THE BRANDENBURG GATES'  - my symbolic journey's end.

I cycled under the gate and decided a photo is required. The place was crowded and I saw an Italian family on a tandem who had cycled to Berlin - they were being swamped and had almost a press corp surrounding them taking pictures. I wandered looking for someone who could speak English but the place was surprisingly devoid of anyone I could ask. The Italian celebrations continued ... I felt well pretty deflated having 2 minutes ago been on such a high - the tiredness and cold was starting to cut in - I continued to look - I asked some Koreans but they didn't seem to understand - eventually I found two Japanese lads who did take my picture - I muttered Paris, Prague, Berlin, Bicycle and pointed to my bike but I think the significance of my achievement didn't register - I was to celebrate my achievement in solitude.

I cycled back down Unter den Linden, down Wilhelmstrasse to Checkpoint Charlie where I turned left onto Zimmerstrasse where my Hotel for the next 2 nights was - As it turned out Zimmerstrasse is actually the route of the former Berlin wall and my Hotel was actually on a corner of the wall - the building itself forming the boundary with East Berlin

Route :
<
Photograph :

10 Miles : Near Pahlsdorf these goats got really friendly and
came across to me to let me take their photograph.

12 Miles : Don't you just love German Road Signs

12 Miles : A close up - this sign had me in stitches :-)

12 Miles : Oh No Disaster I should have heeded the
warnings - I've gone & crashed my bike into a Tree
Shame they didn't have a sign to warn me !!!

38 Miles : Just near Muckendorf still on the Bundestrasse 96
 came across this monument with 2 soviet tanks on plinths
by the roadside.

46 Miles : Just before Zossen on the outskirts of Berlin I stopped
in the forest to take a closer look and as you can see it's pretty
dense in there.

46 Miles : In the forest still - Looking Up & thise trees are high
perfect to wrap in ribbon & hang hoops from !

18 miles : This is the first sign for Berlin that I had seen
that wasn't via a Motorway so I had to stop & take a
picture - I was 3 miles south of Luckau & about 45 miles
south of Berlin - It almost brought a smile to my face :-)

52 Miles : I reached the A10 which is the Berlinerring -
The Berlin Ring Road - well it does bypass Berlin but it was
still 18 miles south of the City Centre.

55 Miles : Double Take
Och Aye I see it now - not quite in Scotland ! 

70 Miles : Journey's End - 1007 Miles from the Eifel Tower to
the Brandenburg Gates (via Prague !) 

Berlin : this is just behind the Reichstag on the River Spree

Berlin : The Reichstag

Berlin :  I found Martin Luther just near the Tower at the
Alexanderplatz

Berlin : A close up of the dome on the Reichstag

Berlin : The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe
also known as the Holocaust Memorialis a memorial in Berlin to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust,
designed by architect Peter Eisenman and engineer Buro Happold.
It consists of a 19,000 square metres (4.7 acres) site
 covered with 2,711 concrete slabs or "stelae",
arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping field.
The stelae are 2.38 m (7 ft 10 in) long, 0.95 m (3 ft 1 in) wide
and vary in height from 0.2 to 4.8 m (8 in to 15 ft 9 in).
 According to Eisenman's project text, the stelae are designed to produce
an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and the whole sculpture aims to
represent a supposedly ordered system that has lost touch with human reason.

Berlin : A clock in Alexanderplatz which shows the time
in every Time Zone in the world 

Berlin : A piece of the Berlin Wall outside the
Checkpoint Charlie museum 

Berlin : Checkpoint Charlie

Berlin : The Brandenburg Gates

Berlin : A colourful wall on a building near the Alexanderplatz.

Berlin : Berlin TV studios and 3 very famous world leaders :-
George Bush, Helmut Cole & Mikael Gorbachev who were in
power when the wall came down in 1989

Berlin : The Alexanderplatz looking towards the TV tower

Berlin : The Ferneshturm from pretty much underneath it.
It was built between 1965 - 1969 and at 368 metres is the tallest
building in Germany.

Berlin : An unorthodox view of the Fernsehturm
taken from Karl Liebknecht-Strasse looking at
St mary's church with the tower directly behind.

Day 10 : Tue, Aug 23, 2011 - 57.22 mi [Cycling] Dresden to Finsterwalde

Day 10 : Dresden to Finsterwalde

Day 10 Stats
Distance = 57.22
Time = 05:32:29 hrs
Ave Speed = 10.32 mph
Elevation = 1421 ft
Calories = 2450
Max Speed = 20.0 mph
Max Elevation = 707 ft
Min Elevation = 306 ft

Tour Stats
Distance = 935.83 Miles
Total Time = 78:10:38 hrs
Ave Speed = 11.07 mph
Total Elevation = 32125 fett
Total Calories = 48923

Day 10 :

Quite a slow start as I had not got the Internet key before I went out last night and the desk was closed when i returned so i had to book my Hotel in Finsterwalde and check my route in the Garmin before setting off.
Yesterday was my longest ride and my body was feeling the effects today - I had realised that I was incapable of doing the remaining 140 miles in 1 day so I had decided Finsterwalde was a good half way point.

Once sorted I cycled into town for a quick look around Dresden and to take a few photographs before setting off for the day. I was heading pretty much due North and as I left Dresden my poor sore body was not enjoying the first 5 miles which were pretty much all cobbles and between 4 to 8 miles I climbed another 400feet - Once I went under the E40 autobahn the I turned off main road I had been following and I picked up samller roads which were perfect for cycling.

I made steady progress if not fast and I reached the town of Barnsdorf which .. surprise surprise was cobbled.In the small village of Weissig am Rassutz I stopped as I passed a house with a garden that had been decorated with wood carvings - I think it was snow white and the seven dwarves that had been carved and were forming the garden fence.

At Tetten there was sign post saying Strassen Schaden and I wasn't sure if the road was open or not as half had been barriered off.- I cycled on and the road remained open & Ok but the landscape changed dramatically - the fields were suddenly barren and flat and white, there were no trees and the road was sitting on the landscape with a unnatural ditch between.

Then after a couple of mile I saw a high structure come into view on the horizon - It was industrial, It was massive. It was .... obviously chewing up the landscape and turning the earth into what looked like the moon.
When I reached the machine it was a very large metal framework with conveyors - it must have been 100fett high and 500 feet long.

Once past it the landscape quickly greened up and I was in no time at Licherfeld and a short ride down the road into Finsterwalde.

Route :


Photographs :

1 Mile : I stopped on the bridge across the Elbe to photograph
this wave and my bike !

2 Miles : This is a small part of a wall which remained in the Old Town
of Dresden after the bombing raids in 1945. 

2 Miles : Another view of the section of wall that
wasn't bombed in 1945.

2 Miles : Dresden Old Town

1 Miles : A fountain in Dresden near the Bridge over the Elbe

1 Mile : This is a gold statue which faces the bridge over the Elbe

2 miles : A large stone gothic figure carved into the wall
guards two large doorways in the Old Town. 

2 Miles ; I looked up and saw this view - a dome topped with
a gold winged messenger watched over by two black carved
figures.

2 Miles : A statue in the square of Martin Luther.

2 Miles : On top of an old building in Dresden - the inscription
The Fatherland - To fuss and Honour.

2 Miles : A horse and Carriage in Dresden Old Town

2 miles : The massive Porcelain Wall in Dresden Old Town which
was made by the famous Meissen Potters which is only about 10
miles west of Dresden.

27 Miles : A garden in Weissig am Raschutz with wooden
carved figures

27 Miles : A closer inspection of the figures show that the they
are in fact Snow White and the seven dwarves. 

45 Miles : Just leaving Lauchhammer this sign
warned the road may not be too level - shortly
afterwards there was a barrier across half the road
and I wondered if i was venturing down a dead End.

47 miles : The landscape began to change - the vegetation seemed
to be dying and looking ahead I could see what looked like the Moon 

49 Miles : I approached the enormous Orwellian looking
machine that had obviously changed the countryside over
which I had been cycling for the last 4 miles.

57 Miles : A pretty rooftop in the Town Square in Finsterwalde

57 Miles : Finsterwalde is called Die Sangsterstadt
The Singers Town and this statue is in the town square
The statue depicts the 3 singers from Town who
won a national singing contest in the 1930s

57 Miles : The own Square in Finsterwalde

57 Miles : I wandered around town ans found this very
large and very very odd, derelict looking clock tower.
It almost looked sinister.

57 Miles : A better view of the clock tower ...
but there wasn't a clock on this side of the tower

57 Miles : This is the Town Hall - the Rathaus in Finsterwalde

57 Miles : This painting was on the side of  a building wall close
by to the clock tower - It was massive - about 20 to 30 feet high.
The incomplete part seems to me to look like a hammer & sickle
and I suspect the image is intended to suggest that communism
is being painted away. I also suspect the clock tower was something
to do with the former communist state.

57 Miles : Again just near to the clock tower there
was a soviet cemetery with red stars on the gravestones.

57 miles : When I got back to my Hotel I had a meal
I ordered a nice starter of tomato soup with a brown
roll - or  so I thought - Boy was this a BIG starter and
boy was the bread heavy - I managed to eat the lid and
half of the bun in which the soup was served