Kategorie: radfahren

Stefan didn’t read the route properly. So we end up dusted, soaked and busted. But the single-speed-grandpa’s had some fun in the alps …

Stefan, Ulf, me. Three fourtysomethings decide to ride on the top of a hill with their singlespeed bikes. Kaunertaler Gletscherstrasse in Austria.
It is hot. It is steep. Very steep. At no point we can see the whole road winding up the hill, it is not bad, but steep. Very steep. Stefan does zig-zagging, Ulf starts pushing his bike, I flip the wheel to ride fixed with a bigger cog. A group of guys with handbikes keep me motivated.
On top of the hill we feel the pain in all the bones, coincidentally the top of the hill is injured like us.

It is hot.

Hellish heat, hopping from graveyard to graveyard to get water.

It is sooooo hot.

Nice evening. Meet a young fox, he is too shy for the internet.

Nice Saturday. Counting trees and butterflies.

I ride my trusty rusty on ole‘ dusty …

With Felix through the hot and dusty woods.

Chaos. Appointment with Felix. Does not appear. Later comes Michi. We find the-dumb-duke-fell-from-his-horse-memorial, Garmin gets lost in the woods, kilometers of slow ride and search. But at least some fun …

Sunday is for the woods. Two wombats on tour.

Let’s close the book of July.

First ride after Italy. I miss it. Not only the spaghetti pomodoro.

Heat is on. AC in the woods.

On Sunday we do the baptism with Ulfs new Cielo bike. Now her name is „Christine König“.

Intothenightride with 2 of the 4 roses. Dusty gravel-roads.

When flood is over cross is coming!

Last night it rained. Stephan has a fine new white jersey so I try to guide Stephan and Michi to some muddy places … finally it stays white. For fighting the moskitos i bring a solid hangover into the woods, didn’t work as well.

Eddys birthday, we salute you!

Have to pick up something from bikedress, make a detour through steamy muddy rain-forest.

There are some misunderstandings about lumbermen these days … (they are as artsy-fartsy as me!)

Evening on bavarian B-roads. Snake-bite for Michi, dog-bite for me, beer for both.

This man. Felix. He was a bit lazy the last years and wants to become fit again. He soon regrets asking me to ride with him …

Bushwhacking sunday.

Hot evening ride on rural roads.

What happens when I join a group of riders from Valtellina which is famous for their fails? Together we do an epic fail!
Every fail begins with a plan, a plan where there is a little devil inside … The plan is simply to go together to München over Passo Muretto and then following river Inn through Switzerland and Austria. We have three days. Sounds easy.

I meet this group of splendid riders on the train to Sondrio: Ila, Cello aka Capitano, Pagha, Clava, Fisto and Guido.
So we start with Mäuerchen Pass, the german translation of what will become the solid impregnable white wall in the end. Here I have to state that I promised the Capitano not to say who had the idea to go over this pass to Switzerland. What happens at Mäuerchen Pass stays at Mäuerchen Pass. We start it the italian way (in my stubborn german germanity perspective) – cafe, cake, newspaper, technical fixes. We climb up the more and more winding road. In a small village we don’t forget to buy some cheese and bread and sweets for the way. A shopkeeper explains that it will be easy up there as there is no more snow and that we always have to stay on the left. Good omen, in fact we always have to go to the right. Then the tarmac road ends what is celebrated with a can of red wine. We have more or less push our bikes through the forest on an old military path. In the distance we can see the mountain ridge of Mäuerchen Pass. We are seven, and everyone in the group has his personal point where he is convinced that it will not work to go over the damn Mäuerchen. First is maybe Guido, still 2 km away. The last is the Capitano, he walks with his troops into the wall of snow. It is late in the afternoon when the whole group realizes that we won’t reach München in the available time and that we need a plan B, a plan that always works, where the little devil has to stay outside: plan B is a table full of pizzoccheri and a never ending row of sciatt in a special tavern in a special village outside of Sondrio. Just google it, I was not allowed to take pictures as it is a secret recipe from Valtellina.
We make a nightride home to Morbegno, on sunday morning I wake up by stereo snoring and have to leave without saying goodbye.

Thanks for the sleeping bag and sorry for not wrapping it up and thanks for the Torta Engadina, my only meal on the 14 hour train trip home, where I got pickpocketed (Fisto, my sun-glasses are now also gone) and where border police slammed a toilet door into me and where I had to hide my not allowed bike in the baggage rack over anxious japanese women in an overcrowded train. Going to München by bike is more easy, let’s try it again Cani!

Edit September 2015: finally a poetic, artistic, historic and even culinary review can be found at my friends of Caniscioltivaltellina

We leave beautyful Edolo (best pizza on our trip and first contact with Braulio, a liqueur made of fine herbs from Bormio), go over Passo di Aprica to Morbegno. There is always a nice mountain in sight, we don’t know its name and call him Mount Fuji. It is like a rest day. Via the internet we found a room clearly near the center of Morbegno, but it turns out it is 200 meters above the center. Makes the day not like a rest day.

We meet Stefans father who will pick him up to go home to Germany, but before we spend a day visiting Lago di Como. We heard George Clooney lives here. George, we totally agree.

We are in Punto di Legno, a village at the bottom of Passo di Gavia, a must-do side-trip! We load the bikes, Stefan buys sun-protection for 18 Euros, oil the chains (we oiled ourselves with pizzoccheri and wine the evening before), and off we go. The Gavia gives us also a lesson: zig-zag this beast. For sure we do not use the tunnel but the old road on the outer side and immediatly get the next lesson: there is a good reason why they built the tunnel. We climb the remains of an avalanche and must enter the tunnel from the side.
On top they serve spaghetti pomodoro for us two veggies, we dress our decent descend kits and let our brakes scream bombing down. We find a room in Edolo, on local TV we see Stefan and remember the camera-guy on the roadside …
Annotation: following an easy lifestyle there is only one track for our remaining Giro days documented by Igor Stravansky, find it at the last stage.

Amico Stefano and me want to do an easy riding through the italian alps on our going-anywhere singlespeed horses made of steel, in the best case on a mostly flat route, always in the sun, stopping at every bar and trattoria …
Train brings us to Bolzano and we roll to Arco at Lago di Garda. The first little climb teaches us the difference between luggage loaded bikes in the mountains and one-day trips in rolling hills at home.
Next day brings us from Arco to Ponte di Legno, we have to master the first baby, the Passo di Ballino and then going up from the next valley to Madonna di Campiglio. Because we haven’t read the map carefully we have overlooked that there is another pass before Ponte di Legno, the Passo Tonale. This long and high pass gives us the second lesson about reading maps. It rains. We certified idiots need some breaks for Bourbon to go up. We have also overlooked another thing. Unintentionally we are following the route of the Giro d’Italia always a day later: the tarmac is brand new, there are a lot of TV-cars and a lot of empty gel-shots at the roadside. For hours we are the only cyclists on the road, but some car-drivers and all elderly people in the villages cheer us. Italy is a cycling nation.

Recovery ride. Recovery from office or Rando pain?

With no plans into the wood. Always a good plan.

A sunday in hell. Green hell.

That evenings when futbol clears the roads … gracias Barca!

Sunny day after rainy night. Means now sober again …

Da hood is in da wood! And Erik, nice to meet you!

Alexei from Rome asked me to join him on the Rando Imperator, 650km from Munich to Ferrara, most on cycling path with gravel. I said maybe. He did not had to make me drunk to sign the registration, I’m old enough to do it by myself. Some days later Stefan had also a weak moment and signed. As having the best stuff is paramount we are sporting singlespeed steel cyclocross tanks equipped with 46×18.
We start at 5:30 in pouring rain, on the first muddy section we leave the field behind. After an hour we are totally soaked, it will not stop raining this day. 10 hours later we are at the Reschensee. Freezing. Water in the boots. Still more than 100 km to Bozen, where we have no bed but should ride on to Ferrara. To keep it short: we quit our first Rando and chose pizza, beer and bed instead.
Next day we enjoy a sunny ride to Bozen to take the train home while confirming each other that we may be old losers but making amazingly good decisions.

And 2 more pics of this wet day from the organization. Yes, Stephan wears rubber gloves from the kitchen.

… always closed. Michi and me exploring the Karwendel.

Cyclotreeclimbing with Rebekka.

Easter is in a tradition full of symbols for fertility. The lumbermen put in on the next level.

Test run with rando ratio 46×18.

Nighty with da bros. Note to self: order Bourbon tomorrow.

Fueled by champagne after a wedding weekend …

Two fatties try to become fit again. Ulf and me.

Sunday sunny super sonic super solid with da boyz. Lost in da wood.

Sun is out. Girls are out. Spring is coming.

Again sun. And more girls. Ah, Ladies day …

With da lumberman Michi in da wood …

Shoot by Michi. Electric fences are a essential part of cyclocross.

Take the hangover in the woods and leave it there …

First nightride with short bibs. High viz legs.

In the woods. Michi wears long/long/boots. I wear nothing. Almost.

Rain and temperature dropped over night, now I wear long/long/boots.

Sun. Road. Michi. Garmin. Lost.

Counting trees in the wood.

Light at the end of the tunnel.

First ride. First flat. A „Skid-flat“. Signs of cool new year.

Comes quick, goes quicker. Snow these days …

If you ride against the wind you will get free sailing home.

After two days sick in bed I try to do a flu exorcism on the bike. Didn’t work.
Edit 2 weeks later: what a stupid idea, got a pneumonia instead, off the bike for several weeks … idiot me …

It’s like being a child when you wake up and all is white outside. Hurry and get out.

More detailed – i wake up by a cat-bite because little principessa wants her breakfast, same for me, I really need some espresso, kit up, kiss the sleeping wife and get out. And then is’t like being a child: it is important to be the first in the snowy woods drawing lines in the fresh white.

These are not the conditions to clock miles, but if you love the silence of the forest, being alone with only trees and animals they are perfect.

Every year I need some days to remember how to ride in snow. To sum it up, it is like jumping in a hotel bed.

If you don’t like insects crashing in your face this is your season!

Enough for 2014, if snow is higher than hub-level go skiing!
So good that I can finish this year with a classy fail.
Better to be mad than sad.

December is dark and dirty. Really dirty. So dirty.

… oh, not today.

More mess than miles. That’s cyclocross riding. Says me. I’m genius.

Conversion is finished! First ride with Joga and his „GT Tachyon Singlespeed Monster Crosser“. What a beast.

Typical sunday afternoon hangover therapy …

With Stefan and Michi to the lake. Festive hangover. Oh man …

Old farts on tour to Forsthaus Aquila. Closed. Ok, we drink the beer at home. And bourbon. Jochen, Michi, Stefan, me.

This man and his Garmin …

Nod nod nod, so much cyclists on the road. November is the new August.

Free fridays for fycling!

Friday again! Yipeeh!

Ulf forgot his bidon in a wirtshaus yesterday, we go to pick it up.

Skid exercises with the Fixie in the dark wet park. Wild boars are laughing. I’ll come back!

Foggy forests are the home of the german soul. Ulf and me do a lot of photostops today. Annoying.

… and an Ulfogram presenting me

… and on fridays on detours to the lake

Joga, Michi, me. Joga crashes and cuts his skin and bibs and jersey and left shifter and right shifter. This is a painful ceremony on your way becoming a singlespeeder.

We want to see the bohemian national park of Sumava, Joga the Joga, Ulf the sheep, new fellow molto simpatico Stefan and 44×18 me. Sadly Mario is pregnant and Michi is sick at home. First day brings us from Cham to Kvilda, next day to Passau to catch the train back home. Great company and first overnighter without epic weather but some beautiful detours over some beautiful hills. Sumava is a great place for cycling, czech it out!