Day 8: If You Like a Good Cliffhanger, You're in Luck ... and Why 'Bad' Can Be Good 

(And By the Way, Napoleon Bonaparte Slept Here)

Day 8, Dresden to the Spa Resort of Bad Schandau


   As the group assembled on the tiled drive outside the Hotel Elbflorenz in Dresden, there was

It's time to saddle up and bid Dresden a hearty goodbye.

excitement in the air. That's because we'd been hearing from Dirk Broeren, our Group Leader, and Carl Heinz Schneider, his wingman, for several days about that night's lodging. Every hotel we stayed at had its own signature; all comfortable and very clean, the beds a homey respite to lay our weary bodies after a day full of education, exercise and camaraderie.

    But as nice as the hotels had been, Dirk and Carl hinted that we were in for a special treat that night. So off we went, unaware at just how spectacular the ride would be, not so much for what we saw on the ground, but what we saw above it: the Alps ... or a version of them.  

    Along our route that morning, we noticed a bit more traffic on the Elbe River Bike Path. No surprise. It was Sunday and Dirk explained the Germans love to climb on their bikes on the weekends. So, too, they

Paul Walker "sweeps up" as the group rides south.

love to picnic, go boating, swimming and just relax, and there's no prettier place to do that than along the Elbe. Like many rivers, industrialization along riverbanks has caused pollution and endangered wildlife. Indeed, before industrialization, Atlantic salmon swam freely in the Elbe. But in the 1950s, toxins spewed from factories polluted the spawning grounds of the salmon and they soon disappeared from the river.

     Until German reunification in 1989, the river was a wasteland. But when the Wall fell and German reunification began, the cleanup began. In the late 1990s, the Czech Republic came on board and water has since been cleaned, fish ladders have been built and salmon again spawn in the Elbe and its tributaries. A few years later they swim to the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean to answer the mysterious call to end their life cycle in the spawning grounds where it began.

     We rode steadily toward our destination, stopping for lunch in the village of Pirna, which has a plaque

on a building (right) claiming Napoleon Bonaparte slept there. I decided that if I had a dollar, or rather a Euro, for every village that claimed it had housed Napoleon overnight, I'd soon be wealthy.

Food for thought: Dirk and Charlotte chat at lunch.

Regardless, in that village, we had a great lunch and then put the bikes in overdrive as we began to experience "Saxon Switzerland," where the scenery was dramatic. This area of rugged cliffs and bizarre sandstone rock formations extends along the Elbe River between Pirna, Germany and the city of Děčín in the Czech Republic. The stone formations are at least 100 million years old and the soft stone has been sculpted over time by water and wind into dramatic columns of stone. There was no worry about cycling up the mountains. Our route followed the flat bicycle path along the Elbe.

Charlotte Sutton (left) and Kay Lazar look to the cliff-side vantage point where they will stand the next morning. 

     As we neared our night's stop at the hotel Dirk and Carl raved about, we digested what we knew

Larry and Nancy Embree are a pair of well-red bicyclists.

about the Bad Schandau area. The most central holiday resort town in Saxon Switzerland, it has a Medieval center and small shops, along with spa, wellness and sports facilities. With a population of 2,927, the hamlet is on the right bank of the Elbe, at the mouth of the little vally of the Kirnitzsch. In German, "bad" means "bath," and people come from far and wide to enjoy the spa facilities. My wife, Kay, and I would later stroll its charming streets, then sit down in a little park and watch the locals before sitting down to a delicious dinner.

Glorious weather abounding, we hopped off our bikes and walked to our nearby hotel in the spa town of Bad Schandau.

The Park Hotel in Bad Schandau was all that Dirk Broeren and Carl Heinz Schneider said it would be ... elegant.

Carl Heinz Schneider speaks softly and carries a big fork, and spoon, and knife.

Nearly every German hotel steps up to the plate at breakfast. This is what awaited the Road Scholar adventurers after a good night's sleep at the Park Hotel in Bad Schandau: a selection of meats, cheeses and, top right, a type of trout.

Elliot's Day's Biking Total: 30 miles.