Schloss Surenburg

After testing my ankle to see if it could withstand a long ride, I decided to head out for Schloss Surenburg, which is an old moated castle that is still privately owned. The Schloss is between 12 and 15km from Emsdetten taking the direct route. I decided to chart a path that would take me past a few more interesting things as the "direct route" involved driving along a main road. The path that I charted and the path that I eventually took were, as usual, quite different.

The path I took can be found on the Bikely site here. I diverged from my charted course almost at the very beginning. Instead of heading toward the old Sinningen windmill using a path that runs along the main road between Emsdetten and Saerbeck, I decided to take the "back roads." Actually, the detour happens to be part of the main bike trail system. I just never bothered to take it before. I'm glad I did. Among the things on I found on this trail were a secluded park with great playground equipment for kids, a new part of Emsdetten that I had not seen before, and this great bike path that runs along the road from Emsdetten to Austum (a cluster of building just outside Emsdetten).



At this point I was in uncharted territory for me. It's hard to believe that I had never been on these trails, which are so close to my home. The goal of getting to the old windmill to snap a few pictures had to be abandoned. I was on the other side of a river from it, and according to the map there was no way of crossing the river anytime soon. So I kept heading toward the nearest bridge. After taking what must have been a wrong turn, I eventually started seeing things that looked familiar. I made my way toward what I believed was a direction that would put me back on my original course. Sure enough I found myself on a road that would put me back on course for Schloss Surenburg. Along the road, I came across this little abandoned barn:



Soon after passing this barn, I was back on a well traveled bike trail with which I was quite familiar. A few turns and about 10km later, I was in front of Schloss Surenburg, something I had stumbled across before but never bothered to stop and take a look at.



The castle is still privately owned, so I couldn't get any closer. There was a trail that went around the moat of the castle, allowing me to get this shot:



From there I decided to once again depart from my plotted course. I took a quick look at the map and decided that a few of the offroad paths would eventually lead me back to the main bike path. The paths were not marked for bikes, so there would be no little red arrow signs pointing me in the right direction. It was just me, my map and the forest. This was truly an offroad trail, making me glad I was on a mountain bike. I eventually emerged from the forest exactly where I thought I would (go figure) and started making my way back to Emsdetten. Along the way I passed a windmill park that I have been accustom to passing as it sits on one of the main trails leading out of Emsdetten.



I also took a quick video that I will post later. The video itself isn't all that interesting, but I was able to capture the sound these huge power generators make. It's like nothing I've heard out in the country before.

Zum Landhaus

There were no accidents involved in this short ride. That is if you don't count one of the main reasons for this ride. I was trying to see if I was healed from an accident I had while playing basketball. I strained ligaments in my ankle coming down from a rebound. I was on crutches for a few days and two weeks later I am still having to ice the ankle at least once a day. This ride was thus a test to see if my ankle could handle the stress of riding. I chose a known course. This is a short ride to a Landhaus (countryside restaurant) outside of town. I happened upon it a few weeks ago . . . by accident. I had just finished a ride where I got totally lost because part of the bike path was under repair and the "detour" signs led me astray. I was surprised to see this little gem out in the middle of nowhere. The (direct) route from Emsdetten is about 6.6km and can be viewed here. Half of the ride is through town. On the outskirts of town I came across this nice little canola field:



What this picture fails to show are the new houses that are slowly encroaching on the countryside around our little town. This ride was truly a leisure ride. I was dressed about as casual as could be: jeans, t-shirt, jacket and Chuck Taylors:



Once out of town, the ride is rather easy. There is only bike traffic and the occasional tractor on the road. At this time of year, the corn is high enough to form a wall along the road:



The final stretch is great. It's a pedestrian path through a small forest.



At the end is the reward . . . the Landhaus whose name I forget at the moment. The name, a picture and a quick review of the beer on tap and food on the menu may be subject of a future post.

Accidental Tourist

One of my all-time favorite movies is The Accidental Tourist, the 1988 film based on the Anne Tyler book. The novel is called "Accidental Tourist" because the main character, Macon Leary, is a writer of travel guides for people who don’t want to travel - for those on business trips, for example. He himself hates travelling, and he seeks out all of the places in his destinations where American food can be found, where American people and culture can be found, and where the "accidental" tourist does not have to interact with the people of the country he/she is visiting. The name of this blog was inspired by the movie. I am truly an accidental bike rider. I started going out for rides about eight months after moving here from the United States out of shear boredom. After my first ride, I realized that biking though the countryside was a great way to familiarize myself with my new surroundings. I am somewhat of an accidental tourist as I never intend to be a tourist while out biking, but because I am so new to the area, most of what I am riding past is new to me. So I often stop, look around and sometimes take pictures. The many Germans who are out on the bike routes do flash me stange looks at times when they see me taking pictures. Finally, while I don't intend to avoid interactions with the locals here, clearly spending hours biking does accidentally accomplish that. I almost always bike alone and rarely stop to talk with anyone. And even I did stop to talk, I'm not sure they would understand my broken German.

Biking in Berlin

A few weekends ago I had the opportunity, almost by accident, to take a bike ride through the heart of Berlin. I mentioned to our hosts that I was considering taking the train into downtown to do a little "sightseeing." It was then suggested that maybe we should bike into town (12k one-way). This was somewhat of an unusual bike ride for me as I was accompanied by other people--a four year old who rode with me in a child bike seat, a six year old who rode her own bike (quite a feat considering the distance we were to cover) and the father of the two girls.

The ride into town was tense at times, as we had to share some rather busy road space with cars due to construction on some of the bike paths (or a complete lack of paths). The map of our ride can be found on the Bikley website. As we got closer to mid-town, the pathes got better and sights became more interesting. We passed various embassies including the Scandinavian Embassy (all three Scandinavian countries share a building) and the still-under-construction Saudi Embassy.

After a short, but pleasant ride through the Tiergarten (the main public park in Berlin), we came upon the relatively new Bundeskanzleramt, which serves as the home of the Chancellor and main office building for the government leaders (similar to the White House):



Within view from the Kanzleramt is the Reichstag, which house the Bundestag (German Parliament) and is obviously a historically significant building. It got somewhat of face lift shortly before Berlin became the capital once again.



Berlin has undergone a massive transformation since the fall of the Berlin Wall. And the city continues to change with each passing year. Shortly before the beginning of the 2006 World Cup, Berlin opened its brand new main train station, which sits across the river Spree from the government building pictured above. As part of this construction effort, new pedestrian paths were built along the river:



After emerging from the river path, we took a short detour to find a rest room. Traveling with someone who knows Berlin inside out has its advantages. We found a bathroom in a building between one of the most famous hotels in Berlin and the soon-to-be United States Embassy, a stones throw away from the Brandenburg Gate. After the pit stop, we took a quick shortcut, which took us past the British Embassy and then the relatively new Jewish Holocaust Memorial:



From there we took a short break for lunch and then started our return journey. As as an aside, the website Radzeit.de has a bike route planner for biking in Berlin (in Enlgish no less).