The day off and the constant icing seemed to have done John’s knee a world of good, so we got back into the swing of things today. Down to breakfast at 6:30, and on the road by 8:15 (we don’t dawdle at breakfast, but we generally make two or three passes, but most to the time is spent repacking the panniers and separating all my recharging gear into the appropriate containers. The weather today did not look promising, but at least we weren’t going to have a headwind. We donned our rain gear and set in motion a new game plan: we’d bike stop every 5 miles for John to stretch; at 15 miles we’d get a small snack; at 30 miles a big snack; at 45 miles lunch; then repeat until we got to Volshofen, shortening today to 80 and then lengthening Wednesday to 74. Before we got to our big snack break in Straubing, we came to a crossroads where we met up with two couples, one French and one German; I admired the German man for smoking a cigar while riding. Past Straubing we missed the sign for a turn, and after we’d gone for a few miles without seeing the markers I got concerned. Thank goodness for the unlocked iPhone and GPS. We weren’t too terribly far off course, and after a quite bumpy dirt path we got back on the trail. Our next hiccup happened when we got to the lunch destination of Mariaposching: the guide book said there were a couple of places to eat there, but they were both closed, so we were forced to continue to Deggendorf (mile 60), where we had an excellent dining and people-watching experience at the Ratskeller restaurant on the main square. By the time we hit the road again, John was still feeling great (despite a fall earlier in the day), and thinking that we might make a go of Passau (97 miles). As if by way of apology, the wind decided to actually follow us for a bit, so we were crusing along up to 17mph quite merrily. We rolled into Passau around 8:30, and John got some goulash while I worked my way through laundry and typing.