April 25, 2016: Cycling home stage 3 - Terrible weather forced me to halt in Bad Marienberg.

Garmin Activity: https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1144379383

193 km, 8h51, elevation 2581m. Trip rating: 60%

第三天遭到惡劣到極限的天氣：上午刮風下雨，下午一直下雪，結果整個人淋浴了，失溫了。不要說原本規劃的飯店好了，連兩百公里這個里程碑都沒有騎到! 難得如此辛苦艱難的騎乘！晚上在飯店洗澡用熱水好舒服！

It had gone fairly well the last two days, but today I had my share of hell. The worst thinkable weather! I did not even make it to the place I had planned to stay before.

Early in the morning the skies were already grey and occasional drops pored down from heaven. The wind was also very strong and cooled me down a lot/ It was a suffering at times

No promising weather today

The hotel near Bonn was too far for my GPS, so I first navigated to Giessen. This was also 140 km. Would I have another monstrous distance to cover today? I noticed Google was not very reliable with its distance planning.

Bartman embraces a day full of meteorological setbacks: wind, rain, hail and bar cold temperatures. Are we sure this is the end of April?

Good part was that I never had to go through major cities, traffic was low

After the first 40 km or so, it seemed like things were changing for the better. There was a long flat section and it stopped raining. The sun would even come out and some snapshots were quite nice.

When I stood here, I thought the day would be like yesterday: constant changes between fairly nice weather and occasional downpours.

My GPS sent me through Radweg 7, which took me through some tourist areas, such as this farm.

I rode through this farm, and I mean THROUGH it. That was a strange sensation.

After that segment, elevation continued. Early in the ride I had nearly 1000 meters.

On day 3 I already made it 600 km out of Prague. Things were moving in the right direction.

All of the sudden, it began snowing BIG time. So big that I wanted to hide it out, but there was nowhere to hide. It was truly terrible.

It was cold, wet, slippery, the wind attacked me from every single side. In one word, it was rough

There was a little shack where I could hide out. I waited until it stopped.

I took a mini nap here, had my GPS charge and calculated the distance to the hotel. It was gonna be a very long all day ride. With all these setbacks, I already decided that I would not make it to there...

By the time I was able to leave this spot, it was already noon, with only 60 km in the pocket. Things were not looking good at all. No way I could complete this 280+ km in one day.

Between these  downpours and all of this snow, there were moments of good weather. I saw on the signs that I was closing in on Frankfurt and Western Germany. That was very motivational.

From this angle one would even dare pronounce that it was a beautiful day. Don't be fooled.

It never took long before the weather deteriorated again. The most painful was the wind, that sliced through all my layers of clothing.

At some point I stopped for a snack and calculated the total distance to my hotel. It was still 175 km, considering the fact it was already late afternoon, that was just impossible. I formally decided to abort mission.

I committed myself to finishing at least 200 km today. I could stop at every hotel I saw after 200 km.

Sometimes in life, you gotta opt for plan B. Today was one of those days...

Today's route turned out to be A LOT longer than what I had planned on google. I had calculated around 240, it turned out to be 290. Also, the elevation was 3000 instead of 2000. Needless to point out that I was unable to finish that all today.

In the later afternoon, the skies turned grey, this time permanently

This is a snapshot in the town of Giessen. Here, I stopped at a gas station, later at a cycling store and then I carried on with my business.

The weather was rough, I had hoped it would get better,  but this hope was in vain. No mercy for me today...

By now, I was in Western Germany.

These are the last two pictures I took, because in the afternoon, it began snowing and raining. It just would not stop. I got soaked and I had a very hard time. I saw one little hostel, I knocked but no one was there. That was after 178 km. I continued my road, it was so cold and painful. At the 193 km mark I saw a youth hostel. They had rooms free for the night, so I went for it. I needed to be outside of this weather. I went for a hot shower and relaxed the rest of the evening. Day 3 was no success, but at least it was not a complete failure either...