Düsseldorf, finally :-)

 My camp this morning in Datteln.

Well, my Friends. I am happy to report that after another lovely day with brilliant suhshine and more than my fair share of benevolent tail winds (;-), tonight at around 6 pm I finally reached Düsseldorf. As is so often the case, the final day proved the most trying; for some reason, even the first leg to Essen seemed impossibly long and winding. One reason of course being that once again I was too lazy to look at the map properly, instead decided to follow the signposted bicycle route... You can guess the rest!

Indeed, the approach to Essen seemed to take me through every possible twist and turn in the road, not infrequently making me go round in circles in the suburbs that merged into one another. In particular, getting through the town of Herne (which incidentally stands for "pea" in Finnish) was to be a real challenge, as what should have been an easy 20 minute ride turned into almost an hour of winding my way all over the place. Now for sure, I can see one more reason for the expression we Finns sometimes use for being irritated: "meni herne nenään", which translates roughly into sucking a pea up your nose! :-))


As the campsite was also a kind of a holiday camp, there were all kinds of animals. I woke up to the sound of donkeys, something that reminded me of my time with the maasai. 

Another funny coincidence was the city of Essen itself. For some reason, probably the connotation of its name ("Essen" in German stands for "eating") I had concocted an idea that it was a really nice town with plenty of good food. It turned out to be a truly annoying maze of winding roads and pretty steep uphills, where just getting to the centre was a huge effort. And, you will  not believe this, it was almost impossible to find something to eat there! Obviously, there were a million cafe´s on the pedestrian streets, but all seemed to serve either just cakes / ice cream, or then full-blown menus. The only place I found that had just what I wanted (huge sandwiches ready to grab and tables by the pedestrian street full of people)  did not have a loo that I urgently needed!

In the end, I realised I was getting so annoyed I better eat at next place I could find. Which, obviously turned out to be an overpriced, fancy cafe by one of the squares. There I had what must have been the worst sandwhich of my life and a terribly expensive soda, but at that point, it was all the same to me.

The bike path along the Ruhr.

The final approach to Düsseldorf somewhat made up for the trying morning, as I managed to find (and stay on!) a lovely bicycle path just next to the Ruhr river for a some peaceful kilometres, before climbing out of the river valley in the only real uphill of the whole trip from Hamburg! The last 10 km or so seemed to take forever, but this was probably more due to being slightly dehydrated (I drank about 4 l of water so far today and am still thirsty!) than any overwhelming problems.

Come to think of it, based on what I saw on my way in, I cannot see why several people (Germans) had told me they saw no reason to come to Düsseldorf. To me, it seems like a pretty manageable, easy-going place with some lovely parks and plenty of happy-looking people. And of course, knowing that there will be (a lot of!) tango also helps. :-)

As I am writing this, I have just checked into my hotel (the friendly and neat, although basic Hotel Diana), had a shower and got changed. The milonga will only start in 3 hours time, so I still have time to go look at the city that is bathing in a wonderful, gentle evening sun.

Comments

  1. Anonymous07/06/2010, 14:14

    Olet edennyt taasen pitkän taipaleen sitten viime lukeman. Nauti kaupungista! Tänään sain käsiini Retki lehden 05/2010. Artikkelisi viime vuoden pyöräilyseikkalusta upeine kuvineen oli hienoa, mielenkiintoista luettavaa. Nähdäänkö tästäkin seikkaulusta samantapainen kenties ;) Seikkailen itse loppuviikon, joten turvallista matkaa ja hienoja elämyksiä kaupungissa!

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  2. Mari08/06/2010, 10:32

    Kiitos Anne!
    Kiva kuulla, että juttu tuntui kiinnostavalta, väsäsin sitä täällä matkalla aina tilaisuuden tullen joten aika viime tippaan jäi.Nyt on Düsseldorf nähty, kivaa oli! Kolmen päivän jälkeen olen juuri suuntaamassa eteenpäin kohti uusia tangoseikkailuita. t. mari

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