Sunset Biking in West Germany

"Warum ist es am Rhein so schön?" -- Thus goes a famous song that rhymes, why the banks of Rhein so pretty?

This is sort of a bicycle diary of mine, during the years 2010-2012 when I use to live in solitude and solidarity in a German village excluded by Indian faces, Indian language as well as English. The name of the place was "Wahn" that means illusion. Well the name fits in totality, while I cannot compare such a nice European summer, double rainbows and fall colours with any known surprises. The place was midway to Bonn and Cologne in west Germany and not much distant to the river Rhein. A small and cute German speaking village to describe it accurately, 50 families, 6 supermarkets, 5 cloth stores and 10 restaurants to sum it up. The airport was nearby while the military base as well as the European Space Agency/German Aerospace Centre were located here. In summer days in Germany are long, so after returning from work, I used to take my SLR and bike to go out of Wahn. The biking route to Rhein (the place named Zündorf) was truly scenic with lush green Rye-fields, rolled hays (I dare not compare to Scotland). However the path gave me many beautiful sunsets to view during my journey. I also used to experiment with my directional senses by taking unknown routes to unknown destination to come back home from different direction. Later, I almost made it as a hobby where my challenge was in minimizing the number of queries to random strangers to reach home. I explored both Bonn and Koln like this, almost 15kms north/south of Zündorf. 

The banks of Rhein at Zündorf is what I'm particularly amazed about. Everytime I went there, a new sky waited for me with it's colours to gift me a lovely afternoon, be it in summer, be it in fall or even in snowy winter. The biking route by the side of Rhein is wall-marked and well-made so that one can do biking restlessly for many hours. The German breweries as well as small coffee shops were all gathered in small small villages by the banks of Rhein (like Zündorf itself and then Niederkassel, Lülsdorf, Porz etc). They are also places for family outing, so I used to watch a lot of kids and their parents biking around the route. The biking experiences used to be extremely pleasing during autumn weekend days, while coloured leafs were all laid down along the path. I liked the trees which all lined along the banks of Rhein, like people standing in queue. If you're around there, don't miss the biking opportunity to spend the time productively.