Day 3 Linz to Grein

The day started hot and just got hotter. By mid afternoon it was 33 degrees and very humid. The sun shone from a cloudless blue sky and started to fry our peloton the moment we left Linz.

For those of us of a fair skin disposition and a life based in the west of Scotland this intense sun poses some serious challenges. Despite the fact that you have slathered yourself from head to toe in factor 50 you are still convinced your pale skin is beginning to turn pink and you are starting to burn. You become so paranoid about this that you ignore the fabulous Danubian scenery that surrounds you and you start to figure out ways to avoid being burned to a crisp during the course of todays 60km ride through scorched fields of sweetcorn, rows of parched beans and hot apple trees. We had opted to take the left bank all the way from Linz to Grein which turned out to have absolutely no shade from trees whatsoever so by the time we reach the first beer stop after 20km I have decided that my factor 50 application on my arms has been poorly applied and now I’m burning. So off with my short sleeved cycling shirt and on with Carol’s fluorescent yellow one with long sleeves. The half litre of beer shandy didn’t hit the sides but suitably refreshed and protected we set off again into the blinding sun.

We bowled along for the next 20km mostly on a raised flood embankment alongside the Danube. Sadly not a tree in sight to offer that all important shade. Another cyclist watering hole appeared shimmering like a mirage in the desert. We stopped. Heads were stuck under fountains, copious amounts of water and ice cream were consumed and a further 6 inch coating of factor 50 was applied to the applied to the increasingly hot legs.

We eventually arrived in Grein in mid afternoon and found the hotel. I was in a stated of absolute overheated clarty stickiness for which an urgent cold shower was the only answer. The steam could be seen rising as far away as Vienna!

There we’re some interesting things to see along the way.

We are staying in a hotel right next door the the Stadttheatre who’s is reputedly the oldest town theatre in Austria and been in constant use since 1791. One of its most charming features is a toilet which is separated from the main auditorium merely by a curtain! Oooeerrrr.

Please let it be cooler tomorrow.