Coffee in Nördlingen and Heidenheim.

Exceptional ride today. Wanted to do a longer stretch at not too hard of an effort see if I want to sign up for the 160km Ostalb Giro toute in June. I love the climb up from Aalen and the view of Schloss Kapfenburg it provides at the end. in Bopfingen you get to see the Ipf, which is a flat top hill that used to house a bronze age settlement. Nördlingen was having a steam locomotive festival, which was pretty fantastic to get a glimpse of. Nördlingen altstadt is always amazing.. one of the few remaining cities with a city wall still fully surrounding it. My route from Nördlingen to Neresheim was not fantastic.. I did a lot of extra climbing trying to avoid busy roads and spend more time in the forest. The monastery in Neresheim is beautiful.. they are not afraid to splatter some gold leaf where they can. It has a cafe open on Sundays that I would plan a stop at if I were coming through again. Neresheim has it's own collection of old trains worth gawking at, so I guess that was the theme of the day. Leaving there and climbing up into the forest was crazy beautiful and well worth it. Heidenheim is not really much to speak of but they have a Mack Bakery, which is a chain that seems to always have some quality baked goods and outdoor seating. This ride was fueled heavily by laugenstange from those two cafe stops. Most of the ride from where you exit Heidenheim to where you get to Lauterburg has you bathing in the green of forests and farmland. From there you bomb down to Lautern and get a last stretch of gravel back to Mögglingen. Superb.