2nd July 2012

Steve: Tonight we’re staying with Pat, a friend of Debs who lives at at Linz, but whom she has only  known through an internet forum but never met..

But first things first.

Again we dawdled on our departure, enjoying a huge breakfast so it wasn't entirely unexpected that it became necessary to do the rest of the trip on the motorway, but after a few hours we arrived in Linz where I hit a snag immediately in that Sat-navs don’t like tunnels 'cos they get no satellite signals and immediately freeze.   I could see the damn tunnel coming up but didn’t realise how long it was, and on emerging found that I should have taken a slip road about half way through, but of course had no way of knowing.. so we then had a jolly fun-filled circuit of rush hour Linz before Dolly eventually lead us to Pats door.

Debs:  I’ve known Pat ’on line’ for four years, so it was wonderful to meet her in person at last, and after settling in and parking the bike up in her garage Pat took us on a guided tour of Linz.
We went up into the hills surrounding the town and got some great views of the area with the river Danube nearby. A quick drink to ‘chill’ and then off to dinner where Steve tried a local dish of pork and dumplings, filled with things he didn’t recognise but enjoyed anyway!


I felt sorry for him really as Pat and I were chatting away like schoolgirls, but he said he was content just to laze back and enjoy the evening.


The following morning it was up and away once more at a comfortable 24C, which was a relief after the high temperatures the last few days.. We had wanted to ride alongside the Danube on the way to Vienna, but Dolly told us it would take too long before we were to meet Steve’s daughter Holly who was joining us, so it was motorway once more.