Thunder again during the night with quite a spectacular lightening show. Despite the noise I slept better but was awake at 6.30 again.  Breakfasted and was out on the road by 9, destination Passau. The sun was shining and I only had 97km to do before finishing stage one of the route. 

The route has gotten so much better as I have been moving downstream, take for example that my first day on the route, also 97km, took me a good 9 if not 10 hours. The route was through fields and up hills. Today I was spoilt cos with the route being pretty much paved all the way down I managed to do the distance in about 6hours. On my arrival in Passau I pretty much resembled a car windscreen as both my arms and face were covered in tiny black flies. I tell you it's not a good idea to cycle with your mouth open either.  I decided to make my life easier by getting lost and making my way up a hill, wonderful.  Could I find the centre? Finally, I found my way to the Tourist Info only to be told that everything was fully booked in the centre and that I would have to pedal another  3km out of town, fine. Passau is full of OAP's who are doing one of the river cruises, there are barge looking boats coming in and out all the time.

I headed to my bed for the night, showered, unloaded my bike and the headed back into Passau.  The city is also where three rivers meet, so there's a lot of water! The Old Town is very pretty and happening. 

Anyway, so the first stage of my trip is over, in theory there are three to go but I am beginning to doubt that I'm gonna make it all the way to the end in one go. My knees are really beginning to give me hassle and I know that I only have myself to blame for getting a trailer. My aim now and one which I would be very content with is to make it through Austria, Slovakia and Hungary. It also seems that once through Hungary that the route deteriorates somewhat and you find yourself climbing hills on roads with heavy traffic.... Sound appealing?

So off to Linz I go tomorrow. Auf wiedersehen Deutschland, gruß gott  Osterreich!