Here is a link to today's photos.
See today's route in a web browser.
Here is a link to today's KML file (e.g., for use with Google Earth).
Here is a link to tomorrow's diary.
Here is a link to yesterday's diary.
Here is a link to the index of the days of this holiday.
Day 2 of walking involves getting the train to Duernstein, using the ferry to cross to the south bank to a hamlet called Rossatzbach, choosing a path through the woods to get to St Lorenz, using the ferry to cross from there to Weissenkirchen, and getting the replacement bus service from there to Duernstein, and the train back to Krems.
The Rother book has a route from Duernstein to Weissenkirchen inland along the north side of the river. It seems to stay to the contour after climbing but it looks long. Instead, I doing what most of the companies doing hotel-to-hotel treks do but there is no walk in the Rother book that does this route. So we will have to make up a route. The big thing I want to avoid is the ladder at Hirschwand and I have a route that will do this.
After taking some photos of engines at Krems, I get on the 0845 departure for Duernstein. At the first stop a lot of students get off as this is the stop for the campus. I get off at the next stop. I need to find the ferry. So I aim for the river and work upstream but fail to find it. I return back to where there is a car park next to the river where there is a grengrocers. I ask there about a ferry but she says you should use the bridge. I've been puzzled by this bridge which is about 1K downstream as it's not shown on either of my two maps. I walk towards the bridge and start to use it to walk to the south bank. About a third of the way across I look behind and discover there is no Ruine Duernstein perched on the hillside. It dwans on me that I'm not in the right place. This is not Duernstein but instead it is just east of Foerthof.
What to do? I return to thr railway station where I got off aiming for a later train, but I get to the station a few minutes after the train should have left. Either I'm too late or the whole service from Krems has been replaced by a bus. Anyway after hanging around for a bit, I decide the only thing to do is to walk the cycle path on the north bank to Duernstein. It'll be about 4K. For some way the cycle path is alongside the road which I ran as part of the half marathon, and then the cycle path goes away from the road to visit the hamlets of Unterloiben and Oberloiben. I avoid some of the boredom of this tarmac-walking by listening to a few choral evensongs from Merton College on an MP3 player. The walk takes me through many vineyards. Eventually I see Ruine Duernstein on the hillside behind Duernstein and then the church in Duernstein that has the distinctive blue tower.
I do not have to wait long for the ferry. I see it coming across the river towards me. It's a really small boat. When everyone and their cycles have got off, I get on board and find that I'm the only passenger for the trip to Rossantzbach. There is a big cruise ship and two long tankers passing us going upstream. The owner says that we have to wait for a few minutes for these to pass before we can start the trip to the other side of the river. When we start, he asks me to sit on the other side of the boat so as to even the ballast (presumably with himself). Because these boats have recently passed, the waves are quite choppy. I try to ignore my fears by taking photos.
Because of the pratting around caused by getting off the train too early, I decide not to walk as far as I had planned which was to visit Seekopf avoiding the ladder at Hirschwand. Instead, I decide to take a route that's still in the forests but is closer to the river. It starts by taking the B20 route into the forests. To find the start of this, I walk through the hamlet of Rossatzbach eastwards joining the 33 road until the 26.6 kilometre marker. Here quite unexpectedly a cart track goes upwards into the woods. Unhelpfully, I found no signposts or waymarks at this point. I looked at my two maps several times and convinced myslef this was the right point. Several metres along the path, there were some paint announcing this was the B20.
At some point, I leave the B20 and instead go along the path that is for Seekopf. This is along a blue waymarked route. At another junction, it's not obvious which way to go, but looking more carefully there is a blue paint on a tree.
At another junction, I leave the blue waymarked route that is bound for Seekopf and bear right. This is at a point near the first letter e of the word Seegraben on both of the maps I'm using. According to the maps, this footpath takes me around three sides of a hill called Mugler (515m) but I do not see it because the route is through forests.
As I near St Lorenz, I see Weissenkirchen across the water. Instead of walking the 33 main road to St Lorenz, when I reach the road, I decide to go right and then left into Ruehrsdorf and take the cycle path to St Lorenze. On the way, I see a road sign saying that I' one third of the way to Melk.
I arrive at the ferry at St Lorenz just as it's about to leave. This ferry is a bit more sophisticated than the previous one in that has room for cars.
There are not too many places open for lunch in Weissenkirchen. I choose one that is not far from the railway station. Even though there is no train, I assume that the bus-replacement service will leave from the railway station. My lunch is accompanied by some sparrow-like birds searching for crumbs. Although I try to do all my ordering at restaurants in a crude approximation to German, after getting the Rechnung paid, I ask the waiter about the bus-replacement service in an outburst of English and he tells me it's on the main road next to the river. The Haltestelle is easy to find and it has the timetable of the bus-replacement service attached to it. So I just have to wait for the 1500 bus.
I take some sillohette of some people playing on a small beach by the river whilst I wait.
Just to confuse me, although this bus stops in the main part of Duernstein, it does not go into the railway station at Duernstein: for a few moments I panic as we drive pass but eventually it goes all the way to Krems and later I see the timetable says it will do this. It's unclear as to how you get tickets for the bus-replacement service as the bus driver does not seem to have facilities to issue tickets. So I get a free trip back to Krems.