Europe 2023 from Frankfurt

Trip List Calendar

2023-05-31 : Bamlach
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle To Bamlach
$0.00 50.00 50.00
Today was very different from yesterday. Yesterday was all about looking at all the great stuff we encountered. Today was really just about the ride. It was our second day of pure tailwind, and nothing really remarkable about it. It was originally supposed to be a 40km day, but with the tailwind and lack of gawking around stops, we went 50 instead, which will make tomorrow a little easier. It was supposed to be a 60km day but now cut down to about 50km.

At Bellingen, we are camped at Campingplatz Lug Ins Land. It was a climb up at the end, and it was stinkin’ hot at the same time. But the campingplatz is AWESOME. Our camping fees included access to the swimming pool. The laundry machines are cheap, so we took advantage of those. They have a nice little cafe where we had snacks and beers. The sanitary building is new and really fancy, and there are brand new covered picnic tables up above the zelt spots. Highly recommend this campground.

We are very near to where Brent and I started riding in mid-April (Alsace) and very near to where Laura joined us (Freiburg) so they’re both accusing me of leading them in circles. Hahaha! It reminds me of our tour in 2017 which was uphill the whole way.


2023-06-01 : Murg
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle To Murg
$0.00 70.00 120.00
Today was a tough day for me. I felt barfy most of the day, I think from the sun and heat. It was cold and rainy for so long and now it’s hot and I haven’t had time to adjust.

We had a stop at St. Veitskappelle, which is a cool little chapel carved into a cliff. Brent and Laura went up to check it out but I did not - my barfy self didn’t feel like climbing bonus stairs. Brent said it was similar to the places we saw in Cappadoccia carved into the fairy chimneys. He also said it was like a Montezuma Castle chapel. I can see both from his photos.

It was a day of contrasts as far as sights. Villages and cities. Wild river, forest and hills, and big industrial… things. I enjoyed it very much.

Because we rode farther than planned yesterday, we had a shorter day riding, and thank goodness we did. I had planned for us to stay at Zeltplatz Schwörstadt. They have a good website, they’re listed on OpenCamping, in cycle.travel, Maps.me and Google maps. Buuuuuut… they don’t exist. We found the address but no campingplatz. We could have camped at the local Kanu Club, but it was just a field with no bathrooms or anything. We could have camped at the local Biergarten, but it was just a field with no bathrooms or anything.

So we rode some bonus kms, for a grand total of 70km, to the next campingplatz, Naturcamping & Kanuverleih. Thankfully it worked out. It is also a Kanu Club, but it’s really nice and we even got a locker with an outlet in it for charging our studs.


2023-06-02 : Reinach
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle To Reinach
$0.00 52.00 172.00
Today was not what we expected nor what we have been planning for months and months. I have been checking the weather forecast and for the last couple of days they’ve been calling for rain in the Alps. Forecasts can, and do, change, but this morning was sort of a decision point as we were set to start heading south into Switzerland. This morning the forecast was the worst I’ve seen, calling for several days of rain and thunderstorms along our intended route.

We had a ‘family meeting’, so to speak, about it. To my relief, Laura felt as I did that several days of rain and thunderstorms in the Alps was not our idea of a good time. We examined the forecast for the coming week to ten days and found a blanket of rain over the whole area. We could flee to France, Belgium or Germany north of Frankfurt.

We decided to ride back to Basel and take a day to decide what we would do, and hi h May involve taking a train somewhere. We’re camped south of the city; and for now the plan is to cycle into France and head toward Strasbourg. Which, of course, plays right into my evil plot to lead Laura and Brent in circles.

The ride today was very nice, and included several kilometers of rerun. Good thing it was nice rerun. Unfortunately today, Laura took a spill on her bike. Same cause as me a couple weeks ago - had to stop and couldn’t clip out. Brent loosened her pedal so hopefully it doesn’t happen again. Not being able to clip out is really scary.

There we another Canadian at the campingplatz last night named Jim. He asked us if we’d seen the beautiful covered bridge that was just behind us. For whatever reason we had missed it, but since we backtracked today we got to see it. It is called Holzbrücke Bad Säckingen and it is really beautiful.


2023-06-03 : Mulhouse
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle To Mulhouse
$0.00 53.00 225.00
Today was… one of those days. We rode into Basel, which was sheer pandemonium with pedestrians, bicycles, cars and trams. There seriously wasn’t a street we could take that didn’t have trams, and I just about got creamed by one. The best thing we saw in Basel was the Rathaus, and that’s what most of today’s photos are from.

After Basel, we had a good 30+ km of monotonous verdant canal. It was nice for the first five kilometers but then I was over it.

We reached Mulhouse and went to the Carrefour, Brent and Laura went in to grocery up because it’s Saturday and the stores will be closed tomorrow and after choosing all of our groceries, were turned away for not having a membership. That was quite alarming so we decided to head off to the campingplatz to get set up and then deal with the grocery problem. I’m glad we did because the campingplatz had not been approved to open yet this year so we had to ride another ten kilometers to the next campingplatz. The good thing is that Brent spotted an Aldi enroute to the closed campingplatz and we were at least able to grocery up.

Enroute to the next campingplatz we ended up taking a gravel shortcut of some description and it was so bumpy that my phone mount broke off of my bike. Thankfully I got to the phone before it got broken but now I don’t have a way to follow a gps track.

We’re in the next campingplatz west of Mulhouse, trying to sort out where we’re going to go. We’re contemplating EV5 north then my adhoc route to Frankfurt, trying EV15, or taking a train to Rotterdam or Venlo and riding to Frankfurt from there.

We’ll most likely book into this campingplatz, Camping de L’Ill, for another night so we can make an informed decision. I’ve been looking into campgrounds and Laura has been looking into trains.


2023-06-04 : Mulhouse research and decision day
We took a research and decision day in Mulhouse. With the plan changing we are not going to Switzerland and we needed to figure out where we WERE going. We considered various riding options and several train-then-ride options, all of which would have us finish in Frankfurt. We looked at trains to Amsterdam, Brussels and more, but trains to far away were just too awful. I sketched out a route mostly in France, but Laura really wanted to go to Dijon, which made the route just a little too long so we’ve booked a train for tomorrow to Besançon and we will ride from there.

When we weren’t researching and deciding, we had a nice walk around Mulhouse.


2023-06-05 : Fraisans
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle To Fraisans
$0.00 42.00 267.00
Took train(s) to Besançon
Belfort Connection: A very nice easy train day. Both trains were roll-on… no crazy lifting. Getting to the platform in Mulhouse was a tiny elevator for Brent and me, and stairs for Laura with her longer touring bike.

On the train, the bikes sat on the floor and we removed the baggage. We dutifully put ‘hospital bracelets’ on our bikes, as required, although I don’t think it was really necessary - the conductors didn’t check for them.

At Belfort, our next train platform was not posted. We weren’t sure if we’d get lucky and use the same platform or if we’d have to switch platforms. Finally I asked a staffer, in French. He understood me, and answered in French, and I understood. Yay! And we used the same platform- double yay!!

On the second train, our bikes had to hang from the hangers, but at least we know better than we did in 2015 and we removed the luggage first.

For both trains, we disembarked at their terminus so we had lots of time to get all of our gear off, and for the connection we had forty minutes.
The scenery and villages flying by today on the train were beautiful and I kind of wished we had ridden that section.

Besançon is a beautiful city. We had lunch and a quick look around, but we had 25km to ride so we had to keep it short.

Past Besançon we got more of the lovely green hills, so that was nice.
We were going to ride 25km to Osselle after the train today, but, for the third time since Laura joined us, we ran into a campingplatz that is either closed or nonexistent. This is getting less amusing.

So we rode an extra 12 or 13km to Fraisans, and, thankfully, found the campingplatz open, if more than rustic. We rode about 40km starting from Besançon, starting AFTER 14:30, which is about my least favorite thing to do but the riding was good and the scenery was stunning.


2023-06-06 : St. Jean de Losne
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle To St. Jean de Losne
$0.00 54.00 321.00
Our campground last might had no electricity but at first break today we found an awesome little place to stop that had outlets! The universe, and the town of Audelange, provide…
To all of our relief, today’s campground exists and is in operation. As a bonus, it was pleasant, affordable, has free showers, has toilet seats and toilet paper, has a restaurant/pub, and washer and dryer.

The registration lady even met us at the entrance with ice cold water and three glasses. We’re in heaven.


2023-06-07 : Bragny
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle Ride to Bragny-sur-Saône
$0.00 46.00 367.00
We had a great day today weather-wise albeit pretty hot in the afternoon. Laura is not feeling well so she is relegated to consuming only ginger ale until further notice.

The plan was a 54km ride to Sassenay, but we realized that following the EV6 added a number of kilometers compared to my cycle.travel route. We’re staying on EV6 because my phone holder broke a few days ago which makes it hard to follow a track. Following EV signs is just easier.

Anyway, I want to get to Beaune asap because there are a few bike shops there and I want to get a new phone holder. Plus we have some rain days coming up, and getting to Beaune a day early gets us to Dijon a day early, and maybe we’ll take a rain day in Dijon. I looked at whether we could go cross-country to Beaune, and, very fortunately, we CAN, but it meant stopping early (at Bragny) today, which is better for Laura.

The first photo in this series is one of my most common views when I tour with Brent and Laura - the two of them climbing a hill ahead of me. The photo of Brent demonstrates his noticing skills… he is so good at noticing. In this photo he has noticed a place for us to get drinking water.


2023-06-08 : Beaune - Corpus Christi (DE, CH, AT)
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle To Beaune
$0.00 35.00 402.00
We went through Verdun yesterday. It is at the confluence of the Doubs and the Saône with the Petit Doubs tossed in for fun. It’s really beautiful but we didn’t get any photos of the view across the Doubs looking at Verdun.

This morning we backtracked and had a croissant and coffee in Verdun and then backtracked a little more to get some photos of the view.

Thankfully the lighting was just as stunning as yesterday afternoon.
A few days ago my iPhone mount broke and we haven’t been able to use the phone to follow GPS tracks.

For a couple of days we followed EV6, so we just followed the signage.

Today we went cross-country - no signed cycle route to be had, so I used my iPhone on its holster around my neck to try and follow a route. It was… less than ideal.

There have been no bike stores so far- either none to be found, or none open. Bike stores are all closed on Mondays in France (which is also common elsewhere), and then we were just in small towns that didn’t have bike stores.

The countryside was WONDERFUL - we weren’t sure what to expect going cross-country, but it was just really great.

I had searched for bike stores in Beaune, and made us a dramatically shorter route to Beaune to give me time to hit the bike stores and try to get a new phone mount. The first store was a phantom but we wasted about a half hour looking for it.

We then went into the Centre Ville of Beaune in search of lunch, which we found. It’s a beautiful town full of wine bars (we are in Burgundy, after all).

I stopped in at the tourist office and asked about a Magasin du Velo (bike store). The young man directed me to a rental shop, Active Tours/Bourgogne Vélo Evasion. I was skeptical and asked him to confirm it was a store. He said yes, and it was the only one in town. I was still skeptical. Googling it seemed to confirm it was a rental place, not a store.

Anyway, after lunch, we made our way over to a store that Laura had found on Google. It was not far from the rental place anyway. They did exist, but they did not sell any phone mounting things.

In desperation, we went over to the rental place, which was clearly a rental place. I asked for a phone mount thingy. My French was so bad that the lady just said she didn’t understand what I was asking for. With a bit of charades, she understood, and she showed me a slightly used phone mount and said she could sell it to me for €10. I’ve seen them in stores (before mine broke, obviously) for €40. SOLD!!! We’re back in the cycle.travel track following business.
We had a brief visit to Beaune, enroute to Dijon.


2023-06-09 : Dijon
Category Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total
Activity Cycle To, and around, Dijon
$0.00 48.00 450.00
We woke up to a balloon over the campingplatz this morning
We started the day with a baguette, since Brent has gotten the words croissant and baguette mixed up in his head and ordered us three baguettes (instead of croissants). Oops. But the baguettes were very good.

We had another great day of riding through the Burgundy countryside today. Endless vineyards, now with leaves on them (instead of just sticks like at the start of our trip). It was a busy day on the vineyards - lots and lots of vehicles, farm equipment and workers. At one point I had a really cool yellow spider come sit on my bike for a visit.
The plan for Laura’s portion of this tour was to go through the Alps - Switzerland and Austria, and have a visit to Innsbruck. None of that is happening. The weather forecast for our dates looked awful so we changed direction and headed into France. We’re having a great time, but it’s not what Laura came here for.

One thing that she did ask for is to go to Dijon. She is a mustard fanatic so it seems like the thing to do. Today was Dijon Day and it was fantastic! Laura wanted to see Palais des Ducs, Rue des Forges, Église Notre Dame and Église Saint-Michel. We saw all those things and more. Laura found le Moutarderie. Dijon has an AMAZING Altstadt and I am an Altstadt junkie so it was a great day.


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