This cracks my friend Birgit up, so I thought I’d share it. As I’ve mentioned before, cobblestones are tough on Lucky, my Bike Friday, with his 20-inch wheels. And cobblestones (pflastersteine or kopfsteinpflaster) are actually getting increasingly common in Berlin as the city tries to find ways to limit rain run-off and recharge its failing aquifer. So, I developed a rating system designed to quantify exactly how miserable pflasterstein streets make me, using the same system used to grade sparkling water in Germany (oh, you didn’t know that there are *degrees* of sparkle available in German bottled water? Du armes Ding….)
Sanft/Leicht
These little stones are the easiest to ride on, I think because they adapt best to changes in ground level and also because the cracks between them are narrower
Medium
These are by far the most common pflasterstein around Berlin. They’re OK. I don’t love them.
Stark/Classik
These probably began their lives as innocent Medium pflasterstein, but erosion has rounded them and widened the gaps between them, turning them into monsters. This is the one time I will hop up on the sidewalk–as long as no pedestrians are coming: if I see a block of Classik coming up. They’re basically unrideable for Lucky and me.
The Rookery 