Bad Lausick, Colditz and Leipzig.

Our route from Plauen to Bad Lausick took us past the Goltzschtal bridge. The railway viaduct over the river, is the biggest brick built viaduct in the world, with a mere 26 million bricks, and 574m long, consisting of 81 arches. (No photos, sorry)

While we were at Bad Lausick, we decided to investigate the local lido. Not cheap at 8E each, but terrific fun,  with water slides, and whirlpool current, and jacuzzi type areas. However, it was obviously bad luck day, as we got totally soaked to the skin, cycling back to the aire, then the next morning, after a night of torrential rain, we needed to be towed off the grassy pitch as we were bogged in. Well I suppose that´s the 3 things, so we should be alright for a while now.

Colditz Castle is in the midst of renovation. The POW museum, only 3E to get in,  tells the story of the various escapes and attempts made by allied officers in WW2. Photos and artefacts are well presented in German and English. Part of the building is now an award winning Youth Hostel, and another part is a music school.

On to Leipzig. Yes, yet another diversion.  Ended up having to backtrack to Bad Lausick to pick up the Leipzig road.

The aire was on the outskirts of the city. Small, friendly, clean. The woman speaks very good English and has all the information anyone visiting the city could possibly want, including bus tickets and timetables explaining how to change from bus to tram. A refreshing change.

The city centre of Leipzig is an astounding mixture of old, renovated and not renovated: modern, and Eastern Bloc architecture. The Nikolai Church here is famous for its prayer meetings in the 1980´s which led to the peaceful revolution of 1989.  There is Bach´s tomb at St Thomas Kirche, and the Hauptbahnhof: a truly amazing building which has 24 platforms, and the hall roof is 270m long. It also has a promenade of 130 shops over 3 floors, at one of which we managed to replace our camera.