Five weeks, 12 countries and just practice!

[edog200]

Hay Rema in Paluda,

It's 1.45pm in Chamonix and Darren and I are baking in our tent and planning for tomorrows rain.

We will leave Chamonix around .830am heading towards Martigny in to Suisse then taking on the Nufenen Pass, St Gothard Pass, then possibly and then move towards Austria as the rain forecast the next day is really bad.

Does this sound OK?

[edog200]

Hard to believe it was minus 4 degrees C at the top of the Mount Blanc cable car this morning. Darren and I are sweltering in this tent at the moment.



and another

[ClearwaterBMW]

Originally Posted by viz

I seriously know how he feels - been there done that and scared the hell outa meself...


Which is the reason why I keep a TKC80 on the front all the time now. Big big difference to a Tourance or similar on the front and it does not give much away on the tar or wet at all.

viz

wow....
that video
the fact that ride a GS-Adventure...
but, am only 5'6" with a 27.5" inseam
about 6" SHORTER than necessary to even ATTEMPT something like that....
WOW

[Olirider]

Originally Posted by edog200

This campsite was amazing. It had been closed for sometime and we were the first paying customers. France has a heap of great camping spots for reasonable prices. This site was 10 Euros all up for two.



We were camped in a valley not too far from the Italian border and you can see the remnants of a fort built in 1929, to dissuade invading forces, the locals tell us. The campsite manager's father worked at the fort for many years.

The camping ground to ourselves. I've forgotten the name of the village and Darren is asleep now. I'll post that if anyone is interested.


A closer shot of the fort. We've seen similar structures at a number of pinch points, along the way. Machine gun posts are quite intimidating even when long past their use buy date.

Hello,



This is the Fort de Tournoux. Wiki : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_de_Tournoux

The village must be La Condamine-Chatelard.
On the other side of the valley, there is the Fort de Roche-La-Croix ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouvrage_Roche-la-Croixwhich is very nice to visit with a nice trail to ride up there.



Thanks for the nice RR !

[Rema in Paluda]

Originally Posted by edog200

Hay Rema in Paluda,
We will leave Chamonix around .830am heading towards Martigny in to Suisse then taking on the Nufenen Pass, St Gothard Pass, then possibly and then move towards Austria as the rain forecast the next day is really bad.

Does this sound OK?

Sure, when fleeing for the rain ist a good route, passes in the pooring rain are something for young diehards :-)

Until Brig its a relative dull but fast pace road, but from there on, it gets better, and the Nufenen is way more pretty than furka, so a good choice to forget the "highway" from Martigny to Brig, i'm not shure if you like the same kind of Rustic Roads as me and the misses, but if so really try not to miss the Tremola it's really the Gem most people miss because they lookfor the Old Gotthard, but it is *not* as good signposted (is that english) so the Swiis lure you onto the Gotthard itself, not a bad pass, but mostly riddled with the big plastic MilkmanVan's we all love to hate, because its an essential north south route, and lot of people riding Autobahn from germany to Italy, take it as a Break of the autobahn "Ach August ein Pass muss sein" (there is a tunneli)

The Tremola mostly is very quiet, no Haydens no Bautista, and best of al no cagers, in a car it is really rattling your fillings out...

When weather stays bad, it may be wisely to go down to Italy, it is almost always better weather as high up in the alps, because even if it not rains they are high enough to keep riding *in* the cloud all day long...



And in June its not uncommon to still have some *snow* in the fog, in May lots of higher passes will not be open yet (something to remember for 2012)

Be sure to buy some *good* fleece in the Hypermarche of Chamonix, then once up in the Alps it will cost tenfold, and i've done the gavia in 1992 with 32° in Bormio, and -6° (minus) at the refuge...

But what are the plans, to go onto the east and visit Romania and the Transfageras, or heading north to Bavaria for a Beer :-)

P.s. When you have acces to a good Wifi (McDonalds is a good free hotspot) download ITN converter, the new version, has a multimap option, so you have access to the great ViaMichelin Maps which give a real feel of a road without al the anoying adrage of the michelin site, and it can even be used to get GPS data, even off offroad if you opt for Openstreetmaps and "bicycle" as transoprtation,but beware, a BMX track can be wel uhhh a bit challenging :-)



Its a bit arcane user interface, but once masterd its a real KISS app. With the last clipboard icon with teh v on it you change mapface routing and sattelite images, really *as you like it*

[edog200]

Thank you Rema you have been very helpful.

Next stop heading to the KTM factory in Austria. Then Prestice in Czech to see my mother in law's relatives. Onto Poland and into Germany to BMW then blasting our way home

Weather for next two days looks like crap. It 7.15am on Chamonix with low mist. Hmm. Getting wet weather gear out.


Once again thanks for your help.

[Rema in Paluda]

Originally Posted by edog200

Thank you Rema you have been very helpful.
Weather for next two days looks like crap. It 7.15am on Chamonix with low mist. Hmm. Getting wet weather gear out.
Once again thanks for your help.

That's our "Job" as humans, to help eachother to get more out of lifer, not?

En route to Chur you can if weather allowing, jump the river at Ilanz, the little River is the Vorder-Rhein and follow it on its south coast just beyond valendus you will be high enogh and far away again of the Alp Massiv to have a spectacular view North (but its a slower road, but the north bank kan be heavy traffic, so impact isn't that big o travel time :-)

At Bonaduz go south onto Thusis, and there go *west* not north...

Next stop is Davos wher you best go southeasterly onto Such were you have to decide yourself weather and timetable permitting if you go straight on to Salzburg, or do a detour over Passo de Fuorn (at st. Maria val Müstair, you could go South to gat at the Stelvio via a backroad, but well Stelvio (go East!)is a noisy touristtrap)to Merano, there its decission time again, going for Timmelsjoch (Solden) or Jaufenpass onto Grossglockner hochalpenstrasse, but beware thats a Tollroad, and after Nufenen Tremola and Fluella well could be a bit disspointing, it is beautifull, but also very Touristtrappy like the Stelvio/Stilfersjoch.

Then its northbound to Salzburg Mattighofen...



Oh and in Austrua the Sign lure you onto the Highway, but the old road is almost everywere still in function, and swirls like a rippling snake under over and around the ghighways wit much better views... :-)

P.S. if i look at RainRadar you should try to have your stop early saterday, because at 14:00 the Heavens will open... In my experience, its quite dependable, but there good news too, Sunday will be nicer weather :-)

[edog200]

6.15am Monday 21 Prestice, Czech Republic

Rain and lack of access to the net has made life a little difficult to update. I will try to upload some pics. Another video is nearly complete, but there is not enough bandwidth to post.

In varying weather conditions ranging from sun to light rain we took on some of the passes in Switzerland suggested by Paluda in Rema. Just breath taking! Fast flowing roads and magnificent views were everywhere.

Darren found a hotel and a petrol station featured in a James Bond movie..."Gold Finger?"

The KTM990 has been a real hoot in the twisties. Sometimes I feel like an astronaut taking off.

It rained very heavily overnight in Switzerland so we quickly rode onto Mattergophan, Austria, the home of KTM.

The factory visit to KTM was inspiring. Being the current owner of four KTMs I thought I had a solid knowledge of the brand, but I walked away with a much greater appreciation of what this company is about.

There is an incredibly strong link between between, racing, research and development, and ploughing all that knowledge back into the manufacture
of the bikes we purchase. The turn around time for this cycle is short and we as riders benefit greatly.

The small factory footprint and its design ensures that people from all sections of the company can communicate easily with one another and I saw many corridor meetings where ideas and thoughts were being exchanged. It had been a big week of racing and the place had a hum about it.

But there is far more to KTM than this, that is best summed up by my observation that even the secretary on the door had ridden a 450EXC! These guys live and breath motorbikes.

We watched the 2012 model 300EXCs roll off the production line, each one hand assembled. This is a complete new bike with some significant innovative features.

Watch out for this one.

The effort to ensuring quality of production was obvious. The guys and girls that work on the line don't just do the same thing everyday. They move through the lines and models and after their two years of training can assemble an entire model from scratch.

Each engine is tested prior to installation in the bike and tested again on a dyno at the completion of assembly. There is another thorough check of the bike before they are sent off for export. There aren't any bikes sitting waiting to be sold as soon as they are assembled and tested they are out the door and on the way for sale.

Following our visit to the factory we headed into the Czech Republic to visit my wife's side of the family. A great night sampling beer from the Region.

[edog200]

The view from our tent, farewell to the best campsite in the world!...Chamonix, France.



But let's not be too depressed, after all there are the passes in Suisse!



And then, according to Darren, there's the James Bond connection. Gold Finger?

[Alik]

Originally Posted by edog200

And then, according to Darren, there's the James Bond connection. Gold Finger?

Yes, he is right. From the Hotel own website:

The Hotel reached a famous status with the James Bond fil „Goldfinger“ when 007 passed the Galenstock chasing Goldfinger.



From the EON Productions - United Artists Motion Picture „Goldfinger“ (1964)


What are your plans for Poland? You should be already on the move there today or do You want first to visit Prague?

[edog200]

Originally Posted by Alik

Yes, he is right. From the Hotel own website:

The Hotel reached a famous status with the James Bond fil „Goldfinger“ when 007 passed the Galenstock chasing Goldfinger.



From the EON Productions - United Artists Motion Picture „Goldfinger“ (1964)


What are your plans for Poland? You should be already on the move there today or do You want first to visit Prague?

We are heading to Prague (Praha) in about 2 hours. Really looking forward to that.

[Alik]

Enjoy it! ;)

[Malcolmlovesbikes]

Hi really enjoying the RR. Going along part of your route next year, just wondering whats the name of

The view from our tent, farewell to the best campsite in the world!...Chamonix, France.

.
Cheers Mal

[Rema in Paluda]

Nice to see you at least had some sunshine waking up :-)

I was fearing all electronics were washed out, not seeing any V-Logs anymore, i don't know if you are into Racing, but this weekend on Saturday (weird Christians prohibit Sunday racing) Assen is on the menu, one of the Biggest racing events on the Calander, people from all over EUrope come there.

And Yamaha is having a special 50th aniversary so perhaps they now are willing to give you acces to an S10 (wink wink say no more)

[edog200]

Originally Posted by Malcolmlovesbikes

Hi really enjoying the RR. Going along part of your route next year, just wondering whats the name of .
Cheers Mal

Hi Mal,

The camping ground is in Chamonix and called Ile des Barrats

http://maps.google.de/maps?q=Camping...3&z=16&iwloc=A

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Größere Kartenansicht[/IMG]