03.22.26: Biking along the river

‍As an American who has visited a number of European cities through the years, I’ve found a couple of things that make me envious in a “why can’t we have something like this at home?” way.

‍The first and likely the most obvious is the rail network that connects pretty much any European location with any other European location with convenient, affordable trains — a growing number that are high speed — that run on time. Getting from location to location within a country is easy. Getting from location to location across borders may require a connection and booking a sleeper car for overnight travel, but it’s still a viable travel option.

‍In the United States, getting from location to location by train is easy as long as the locations are in what’s known as the Amtrak Corridor between Washington, D.C., and Boston. I’ve made many train trips between Washington and New York. It’s a relaxing way to travel, and when you factor in the required early arrival times at airports, it’s time-competitive with air travel between the two cities.

‍Outside of the Amtrak Corridor, passenger train service in the U.S. is sparse, departure and arrival times are unpredictable, and the system isn’t suitable for inclusion in routine travel plans.

‍I’ll end that rant and move on to the subject of this photo.

‍I captured this scene when my wife and I were on a Viking River Cruise along the Elbe River in Germany. Each river cruise usually has at least one day where the boat moves from location to location during daylight hours instead of overnight while the guests sleep. We enjoy these transit days because it’s an opportunity to relax and watch the scenery pass.

‍I was on the boat’s rooftop deck looking for things to photograph from the river when I saw an area with colorful blooming trees up ahead. As I focused on the area and waited for an interesting composition to appear in my camera’s viewfinder, two bicyclists rolled into the shot. Their presence turned what would have been a nice but boring landscape photo into a keeper.

‍But I was intrigued by the cyclists. They seemed to be in the midst of a long trip and not just getting an hour of exercise. We had seen something similar during a river cruise in France along the Seine.

‍So I did some research.

‍This bike path is part of the 750-mile Elbe Cycle Route, one of the 37 integrated river cycling routes in Germany. The Elbe route is part of the EuroVelo, a network of bicycle routes that covers approximately 40,000 miles throughout Europe and connects almost everything on the continent. EuroVelo, a project of the European Cyclists Federation, is designed to be used by long-distance cycle tourists as well as by local people making daily journeys.

‍It’s a very interesting concept, but with U.S. communities struggling to create and maintain short bike paths for exercise purposes, a national, integrated network of bike routes in this car-centric nation is an impossibility.