I just wish I'd been hungrier at breakfast as this was the biggest selection of stuff seen yet, AND it included bacon for a bacon roll! Appetites sated, we free-wheeled back down to the river and rode off under threatening skies with quite a brisk breeze to contend with. This was a shock as we have become used to having no wind to slow progress, but I suppose compared with home this was tame stuff. This section of the Rhine is becoming much more built up and industrialised so we weaved round container ports, chemical plants, and oil refineries with bits of woodland and village perimeters thrown into the mix. Nowhere presented itself for a coffee stop so we found a bench and shared a banana. The kilometre markers are counting higher as we passed the devil's own milestone today. The clouds never did deliver the threatened rain, though the temperature fluctuated enough to keep us switching layer combinations. We reached the outskirts of Koln before stopping for a caffeine hit on the rather impressive dockside redevelopment area. Then we rolled into town to check in to the A&O hostel next to the cathedral just after lunchtime (today was an embarrassingly short ride). Now, even as cathedrals go, this one is big. Really big. Whilst again it lacks the elaborate wood carving inside that a British cathedral exhibits, the carved stonework outside is awesome. A big trudge around the shops followed as there's not much old town to see, having been remodelled by Lancasters 70 years ago. A traditional Kolsch beer hall was next on the agenda before an evening wander found somewhere to eat by the river. During the day the cathedral area was school-trip central, but in the evening we uneasily noted a heavy ethnic and police presence. Then we remembered that this is exactly the area where all those migrant sexual assault offences happened last New Year's Eve.
37.2 km; 16.1 kph avg; 2:18 moving time; 70m ascent
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