During my first year of my master’s course in Physics at IIT Kanpur, I was selected for the prestigious ISTernship programme (May 2019-July 2019). ISTernship is a research internship organised by the Institute of Science and Technology (IST), Austria. As this was my first international internship, I was both excited and nervous at the same time! Details about the internship have been provided in a previous blog post. The institute is located in the town of Klosterneuburg, which lies on the outskirts of the capital city of Vienna (it would take roughly half an hour by bus to reach prominent places in Vienna from the institute). Towards the end of the internship, I decided to bike along the Danube cycle trail from Linz to Vienna in 3 days. Traditionally, the trip is scheduled for 6 days, so my 3-day travel itinerary would be more physically demanding. I had never made any such cycling trip before and was thus quite apprehensive. However, as I am involved in a variety of sports (like football, tennis), I felt I could do it if I focus my exercise routine on cycling for a few weeks.

After reading many blogs and surfing the net endlessly, I decided to make a travel booking with a company named Austria Radreisen. The staff were quite helpful in their interactions and helped customise the trip to suit me. The tailor-made itinerary for me was as follows:

  1. Day 1 (Friday evening): Bus transfer from Klosterneuburg (the town where the institute is located) to Linz (starting point of my bike journey); overnight stay at Trans World Hotel Donauwelle
  2. Day 2 (Saturday): Bike tour to Ardagger (58km); stay at Gasthof-Hotel Schiffsmeisterhaus
  3. Day 3 (Sunday): Bike tour to Krems (99km); stay at Arte Hotel
  4. Day 4 (Monday afternoon): Bike tour to Vienna (77km); drop the bike at Radubergabe Hotel Lassalle

Since I was travelling alone (as other students part of the internship felt daunted by the total distance to be cycled), I had made single room bookings at the hotel. Breakfast at the hotels, bus transfer, luggage transfer and unisex geared bike were part of the booking plan. The total cost was roughly 470 euros! This seemed to be quite a lot to me at first, but I decided to go ahead with the plan as it would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I was definitely not disappointed at the end, and will strongly recommend it to people who enjoy nature, adventure or sports.

When the day of the start of the trip finally arrived, I started feeling nervous. I felt like giving up, with thoughts like “I am a girl in a completely new country”, “I am going to a different city where I don’t know the people”, “I don’t know German so will not be able to navigate comfortably”, “I have never cycled for so long” and so on flooding my mind. Somehow I mustered up enough courage to pack my backpack with essentials and finally set off for my journey. At the designated spot in Klosterneuburg, a bus was waiting for me. Some other people who had made bookings with the same company joined from Vienna. Upon reaching Linz, I got my bike. To be honest, I was quite surprised with the good build and quality of the bike. The stepless gears were easy to shift and the seat was reasonably comfortable. However, it would have been better if there was a seat cover as well. I would suggest getting your own seat cover or wearing padded cycling shorts (none of which I possessed which resulted in sore butts upon completion of the trip). I explored nearby regions in the evening to get a feel for riding the bike. The next day, I woke up early, had breakfast and set out on my bike. After having spent a night at the hotel all by myself, I was having a sense of freedom and confidence. For navigating, I used google maps predominantly (had downloaded the offline versions of the regions), along with some inputs from the maps provided by the tour operator. Once I got on the Danube Cycle Path, the calmness of the river made me feel relaxed. Nothing can be more rewarding than the fulfilment of one’s dreams; riding just next to a river had always been a dream for me, and I was living my dream. The first day was the shortest in terms of distance but upon reaching Ardagger, my confidence was boosted.

Gasthof-Hotel Schiffsmeisterhaus is a small, cosy guesthouse and I had some trouble locating it initially, as I was expecting something as big and grand as the Trans World Hotel Donauwelle in Linz. The second day of the trip was to be the longest (99km) so I decided to leave as early as possible the following day. There were predictions of rainfall and I prayed hard for it to be proved false. Unfortunately, the rain gods did not listen to me. I got out when the intensity reduced slightly. I had taken with me my sports kit (jacket and trousers), which was waterproof to some extent. The day had started out on a bad note due to rains and some more mishaps happened on the way. Due to some constructions and diversions, the route directed by google maps made me land on some highway with fast cars pacing by. This scared the life out of me and I tried to be slow and close to the edge of the road. When I finally managed to make the cut for the cycle path, I was soon greeted by slushy, muddy and gravel-filled routes. By then, the rain had also picked up intensity. I began walking and dragged along my bike. Even after some time, I could not see any end to this bad route. I realised that I was probably on the wrong side of the river as I could see bikes on the other side move pretty smoothly. Also, I was the only one who happened to be trapped in that area! I decided to somehow lift up my bike (which was heavy) and placed it on a very narrow elevated concrete pavement, which looked like some incomplete construction project to me. It was going to be risky, but there was just no other way; I could not possibly keep walking as I had a long way to go. When this treacherous lane came to an end, I heaved a sigh of relief! Back on the now-familiar cycling track, I instantly felt comfortable.

The final day of the journey had arrived. I really enjoyed the breakfast at Arte Hotel in Krems. As I set off for Vienna, I felt the joy of going home! After 2 months of my stay in Klosterneuburg, Vienna started feeling like home to me. The destination hotel’s route involved passing through Donauinsel, where I had been a couple of times earlier as well. It is a popular weekend destination. After successfully completing the trip and parking my bike at the garage of the hotel, I went on to treat myself to a cup of chocolate ice cream and ice cream sandwich from Veganista, a vegan ice cream chain (I do not eat eggs).