Today was a day of exploration! Taking full advantage of the free student travel in Hessen I hopped on a train to Limburg and back. The train route travels along the river Lahn, mirroring the bike route all the way back to Giessen. Its a beautiful stretch winding  along the river stopping at various villages with sweet old towns and a great many cafes with cake.

 

Walk up to the old church and castle in Limburg to enjoy a view over the surrounding area. The village contains lots of cute coffee shops, sweet shops, Italian restaurants and a short walk to the top of the hill that isn’t too steep to a big church. The stretch from Limburg to Runkel looked beautiful and most importantly not too long, I’m definitely planning on dragging my bike back here for a quick jaunt around!

 

Runkel is a much smaller village, with two notable cafes. One a konditorei with a nice outdoor terrace halfway up the far side of the hill up to the castle, the other located at the river where all the numerous bikers stop along the way. Run by Italians, the gelatos pretty good and it has the best espresso I’ve tasted in Germany so far! You can’t stop here without entering the castle. For a small fee you can wander around the quaint castle with historical artifacts, amazing views and friendly custodians. And a chance to sneak around the private accommodation on the grounds. Yup, someone was living in a part of the castle.

 

My favourite stop had to be Weilburg (above), again situated on a hill, but has a gorgeous orangerie, gardens, palace rooms, churches and a museum where you can go into the old tunnels used to blast out the rock. Unnervingly great, in particular the sneaky side rooms and the model miners hidden around the passages where you least expect them.

 

The above cake wasn’t quite as delicious as it looked (needed a little less cream and a little more nut) but the other cakes on display at the cafe just over the low bridge heading into town looked even better. A really nice town, but I may have become biased once I spotted a shell marker, the camino just seems to catch up with me wherever I go! The trip was rounded off with a stop in Wetzlar, still nice, but larger, more shops, a big church, but a worthwhile “green belt” circling the old center.

The stretch beside the Lahn is so deserving of the bicycle path, I’m going to have to take up its implied invitation at some point. Either that or take it up a notch and rent a canoe of some form from one of the many vendors to float downstream!