Swan song upon crossing the Rhine
Today, I did one of my last school visits, observing an English lesson taught by a student of mine. The school is in Marthalen, about 20 km from my own neck of the woods, and hard to reach by public transport.
So I decided to journey there on my bike. Yes, the one I'd used to cycle from Scotland to Turkey and from Norway to Romania. It's still running strong while me, myself and I: less so, on this first outing this spring. I had calculated a good hour, but it took me a bit longer because (hark, hark, an excuse is coming up) I often had to stop and marvel at the wondrous spring morning and its sights and sounds.
I crossed the Rhine on the one-lane bridge between Rüdlingen and Flaach, and the River Thur shortly afterwards. Marthalen is the most picturesque village of the area, but the remarkable thing was the spotless behaviour of the pupils in this large secondary school class, quite a contrast from their peers in the city of two days ago. If anything, they were a bit too cowed for my taste.
On my way back I took the shortcut through Germany, via the tiny hamlet of Nack. To reach it, I had to take a ferry. It was one of those contraptions hanging on to a rope across the river and using only the current and a rudder. I guess it's the physics of friction.
In Ellikon, at the ferry head, I observed too swans in a synchronized mating dance. Elegant though it looked, I was a little shocked when the male grasped his partner around the neck with his beak and submerged her for quite a few seconds. It didn't look like consensual sex, and the fleeting question ran through my head if swans could also twitter #metoo.
So I decided to journey there on my bike. Yes, the one I'd used to cycle from Scotland to Turkey and from Norway to Romania. It's still running strong while me, myself and I: less so, on this first outing this spring. I had calculated a good hour, but it took me a bit longer because (hark, hark, an excuse is coming up) I often had to stop and marvel at the wondrous spring morning and its sights and sounds.
I crossed the Rhine on the one-lane bridge between Rüdlingen and Flaach, and the River Thur shortly afterwards. Marthalen is the most picturesque village of the area, but the remarkable thing was the spotless behaviour of the pupils in this large secondary school class, quite a contrast from their peers in the city of two days ago. If anything, they were a bit too cowed for my taste.
On my way back I took the shortcut through Germany, via the tiny hamlet of Nack. To reach it, I had to take a ferry. It was one of those contraptions hanging on to a rope across the river and using only the current and a rudder. I guess it's the physics of friction.
In Ellikon, at the ferry head, I observed too swans in a synchronized mating dance. Elegant though it looked, I was a little shocked when the male grasped his partner around the neck with his beak and submerged her for quite a few seconds. It didn't look like consensual sex, and the fleeting question ran through my head if swans could also twitter #metoo.
