In the morning, we discovered that some of our clothing wasn't dry. Fortunately, with a short day expected today, we expected to have time for everything to dry. Otto Senior drove the RV to Marienhof, and we proceeded to load it up with luggage and ride off along the Gail bike path. Following the bike path signs, the partly cloudy skies gave the backdrop a mythic look.
Despite the lack of direct sunlight the humdity was high and we found ourselves in need of a refill at a fountain in Wulfeniadorf, after which the bike path took us past a couple of impressive looking treehouses. By the time we got back to the Gail river, the sun had burnt off all the morning clouds and it was now quite warm in earnest. Looking for fortification before attempting the Plockenpass, we stopped at Zur Sage in Kotschach just because it had great reviews.
The place turned out to be a buffet place --- you didn't get a menu, you paid for your feed and then took as much salad, main dishes, and dessert as you like, but there was no choice. Arturo took one look at the menu and decided to visit a supermarket for lunch. The rest of us decided it was a good deal and ate up.
While the climb up Plockenpass was warm, we were climbing it from the gentler side, which topped out at 10% grade. We were pretty warm at the top and glad that we were done for the day. Descending into Oberdrauberg, we picked up our luggage at the campground and then rode over to town for ice cream. We then rolled the 6km to Nikolsdorf where more climbing awaited us before we found the Spiele-und-Buchhotel.
To our delight the hotel lived up to its name, and the tour the owner gave us was wonderful, showing us all the books and board games the hotel was filled with. "If you have any board games in mind that you can't find let me know and I'll put it from the basement!" They even had English books. Ben asked and we were also allowed use of the washing machine! We took showers, played a few games of Jenga, and then started the laundry.
There was a complication for dinner, however. It turned out that the only restaurant in town was fully booked! After having already showered and in the hot afternoon, I didn't feel like riding. However, it turned out that there was a train and with a single stop we could visit Oberdrauberg for dinner. It was a fairly long walk to the train station, and we discovered that the restuarant in town was right where we had ice cream earlier. Ben volunteered to ride because someone had to pull the laundry out of the washing machine and hang it up, and riding was the way he could make it to the train station on time.
While we were waiting for the train, I asked if I could test ride Ben's bike with a front load. He agreed and I rode it around and realized that Ben just liked the front loaded handling better than I did. I've tried front loads in the past and never liked how slow the steering of a bike felt.
The dinner took a while, as is usual for European restaurant, and by the time we finished it was nearly 8:00pm and we had to take the next train. Fortunately, the weather held and it was a cool walk back to the hotel. The next day would be the first half of the Grossglockner, and I knew I wanted to avoid staying in Winklern, but wanted to stay in Heglienblut, which I had seen from pass tours and thought would be a nice place to sleep, being relatively high and therefore much cooler than the valleys we had visited in the last two days.
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