"Dad, I can't stand France again", said Fred who has been there every one of his thirteen summers. "I want to go to Germany". "I want to go on the bike".
While I'm not averse to roughing it, a European holiday for me involves a well packed and stocked car, an airbed and a tent I can stand up in (with carpet)! Where would I put my accordeon? It seemed Fred has had enough of mellow evenings in French cafés. "Pastissed again, like we did last summer" is, apparently passée.
But - why not? I did a bit of research. All my Germanic friends seem to live in that big, flat hot northern bit. It looks poor potential biking territory, although at least my BMW might be expected to know its own way.
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| Fred with a cool bavarian blonde |
No, it has to be Bavaria, Black Forest, that sort of thing. And what's that white bit on the map that looks like crumpled aluminium foil? Ah, Switzerland! Surely they have some nice roads? I email my only Swiss contact (miraculously an erstwhile biker) and am assured that some of those high passes can be quite fun, actually. "Oh, and it's the Swiss national day on 1 August, come and stay". So, sorted then! It looks a long trip, but surely there are Autobahns for such trivia?
We set off on the Tuesday evening after school break up. Both panniers are crammed, mine groaning with a small accordeon stuffed between my socks. I've restricted the tank bag to just one tier as otherwise I can't see the clocks. Even as it is the horn sounds when I do a left turn. "All downhill" to London, and we make good progress to an old mate's "farm", tucked just inside the M25.
He's really a banker now, but has motorcycled for 30 years. Of course we talk bikes, but it turns out that my boxer has already covered more miles in 9 months than his in 9 years commuting to and from Potter's Bar station. (That was his R1100RS parked by the fence incidentally, overshadowed by the railway coach)! So we revert to putting the world to rights, and praising his most excellent Malt collection.
After breakfast Fred and I point the bike toward the sunrise over the M25 - a place where Londoners who can't afford Ken's charges park their cars. "What excellent practice for my IAM test" I smile - initiating a 20 mile filter!
Dover for midday, and we just make a Norfolk Lines ferry, hearing its door slam behind us. Mysteriously a 2 hour trip to Dunkirque is cheaper than the 1 hour Calais hop, (thanks to the P&O/Sea France cartel). Norfolk do mostly lorries, and their car deck seems awash with diesel, perhaps that's why? We lash the bike down carefully and enjoy a rest, following an inexpensive but excellent routier's lunch.
From Dunkirque it's east through Belgium's free motorways, and we get lost. This happens every bloody time! An Australian told me they have sheep farms bigger than this country, but of course it has only one road, and sheep all speak the same language. Belgium doesn't, and although I can get by in Dutch and French I can't cope with a town's name changing on the signs as you cross invisible language boundaries. Never mind, Charleroi is the right direction. But why no sign for Luxembourg, now so close?
"Because it's Belgium" Fred offers - "or because it's not Belgium" I reply. We keep the setting sun to our backs, but Luxembourg remains a lost city for the moment.
What's this? The Ardennes. I remember that from school! "Too hilly for tanks". It's time to overnight, and we find an auberge with some difficulty. Wrapping myself round a couple of Leffe blondes (that's beers, chaps) I note that Ardennes has much of the character of North Wales, and seems pretty good biking terrain. But I speak to soon ...
Our patron points us toward Luxembourg, and shortly before the border we spot our first sign. The country passes in a flash. It has none of the tattiness of Belgium, and clearly they manage their money rather better. Luxembourg's well-maintained roads are particularly welcome. Petrol is incredibly cheap there.
We explore the vine-strewn Mosel valley, which is beautiful, but not exciting riding. It's baking hot and I make a mental note to buy up some 2003 Spätlese next year. Sweating profusely, I put my gloves in my jacket - and promptly lose them. Fred thinks that's rich! Sunburn will be a problem until I get replacements.
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Our fellow traveller took the shot of this lovely valley, (and of course his bike) |
So we head for the hills. Saar/Ruhr is noticably cooler, and we find a nice Germanic youth hostel for the night. "Hier kommt ein Vater und ein Sohn"! quips the warden laconically as we limp in. I guess we're not the first. We get an interesting room mate, who is riding home after belting a K1200RS around the famous Nuremberg Ring. He gives us interesting reminiscences in broken English (my Dutch is utterly useless here).
Another bright day breaks and I survey the map and our route ahead - Jeez is it that far? Autobahn time. Recounting my IAM training I shall drive to the limit point, and respect all local speed restrictions. The latter don't of course exist here, and opening up the R850R on the strangely quiet Bahn I am amazed to see it clock 120 (the manual says 115). Nevertheless a big Mercedes steams past us, vanishing around a gentle curve as the motorway starts to bite into hillside.
We get a bit of light rain and it's time to slow down. First benefit of my IAM training comes as we round a right-hander and I am able to slow to a safe crawl as the cadaver of the Merc comes into view, lying crazily across the middle lane with a wheel hanging off. They are just getting out and no one seems hurt, so we toddle off as police arrive to close the road.
We dip the (rather dull) Rhine valley and clamber up its eastern escarpment toward the Black Forest and our first hairpins. Actually we waste most of our afternoon there. Fred thinks Germany's great! Freiberg has a wonderful youth hostel, so we revisit that. Slip off at dawn. Fill the tank. I can see the dual carriageway ahead that will take us back toward France and my "quick fix" trip to a most excellent Saturday music festival at Château sur Allier (hence the accordeon, you see)
A bin lorry has stopped for lights in one lane, and four cars in the other. Loads of space between them with only hatched road paint. "You should now consider filtering" (it says here). I ease into the gap and squeeze the brake gently, watching lights and other vehicles like a hawk. Calamity! We're falling... falling. Brutally hard road rises to greet us, followed by .. Oblivion.
I wake in a flood of light, surrounded by bearded men wearing night-gowns. Did that one have wings? Surely they're not Hell's Angels! And I'm not at a WAM meeting, so I guess that old baldy with the halo might be St Bernard. And wow, there's God astride a gigantic Harley! No helmet, but I guess he might qualify for religious dispensation. I can't believe it. I've killed us. We're in motorbike heaven!
As Sally Barnes might have said, everything is beautiful here. The sun shines constantly. There are mountains to all sides. Fantastic bendy roads serpentine up green slopes to high passes, about 10 hairpins to each side. The corries contain fantastic bright lakes. Rivers jet straight out of the side of cliffs, and streams braid off the plateaux in silver filigree.
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We promised ourselves cold wheat beer in St Moritz after a long sweltering day in the saddle |
On the hillsides picturesque green fields (called alps incidentally) are full of happy goats, cows chewing cud and even the odd deer. These randomly scattered houses and barns must surely(?) all be reproductions, taken from Heidi illustrations. Pretty little red narrow-gauge trains travel with you up the valleys, their own hairpins tunnelled deep into the cliffs, their passengers waving to keep your pillion entertained.
On the tops (6-7500 feet) the air is noticeably thin, and even in August there are drifts of snow up to 3m thick by the side of the road. Glaciers grey in the hot sun to feed the fast rivers. Traffic is light, just perfect for a little overtaking practice. Every third vehicle is a bike. Two in five of these a big BMW. All Germany must be here, trying hard to get anywhere near Switzerland's 60mph limit on such challenging roads.
While smashing Africa tectonically into Europe may now seem a little over the top, all the evidence is that God made Switzerland so that he might ride his motorbike!
I joke of course, but it's all so clean and pretty! Coming back over the Jura after our festival we rode with a weather system, some 4 hours in rain. I met with all manner of crap on the French roads, with two unsettling flicks of my back wheel due to oil on corners, and every type of broken surface. There's none of that in Switzerland and the hairpin bends are all well swept. Just as well - fencing is minimal, with often just wooden posts above the precipice below. Despite good surfaces, cars and buses have misjudged the turns, as evidenced by numerous gouges in the tarmac. Marmots skip suicidally across my path. Is that a golden eagle circling above, or a bearded vulture? And is he waiting for a marmot's mistake, or mine?
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| Lest anyone doubt that we got there |
We criss-cross the mountains for best part of a week, getting to just beyond St Moritz. Brits seem scarce, and we meet with just two other GB bikes. One delivering his R1150GS to Greece prior to a "lifestyle shift" rides with us over several high passes.
Mostly I can keep up, but dipping Italy for the second time I begin to have to force my bike around the hairpins, and then hear clicks from the back end echoing off the narrow village streets. The back block seems very hot and it's the classic "brakes binding on the descent". I will strip the brake three times to get us home. Despite heavy use the front brakes remain totally, and coolly reliable. Perhaps my tutored "system driving" in the lower gears in helping in that.
Most bend sets are either 1st/2nd or 2nd/3rd gear runs and the torque of the boxer engine is just perfect for this work. Nevertheless ascending a mountain, and pulling out of hairpins, and climbing from deep cambers, and a 50kg teenager, and full luggage, and overtaking buses on the straights, tests the machine to its limit. It chews on all this without complaint, but I make a mental note to look at an R1150 for next time.
Finally after dropping back to the Interlaken valley we witness another accident as a big Kawasaki drops, seemingly spontaneously onto its right side while overtaking on a straight lane, spewing its rider onto the road. We help pick her up and there seems no great damage, although the bike will never be pretty again. It's meadowland and there's dung on the road. "Silly cow!" I mutter.
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| Grimsel: a typical Swiss mountain pass, with several 1000ft above and below this - dots are cars! |
Interlaken's contribution to the 1st August festival is fun, with the best fireworks I've seen since Edinburgh in 1989. (Perhaps not as good as the sparks that came off that Kawasaki)! There's a big procession, featuring William Tell, Germanic bands, and that sort of thing. It's led by 8 cows with enormous (we are talking suitcase size) bells round their necks. This being "oh so tidy" Switzerland the next item is .. Interlaken's road cleaning service! "Shame they don't do the country lanes too", I think.
We return north, back through Black Forest, and "cross the Rhine" into France up the Lorraine corridor. Passing Verdun I revisit the awe-inspiring cemetery at Douaumont which had shaken me cold 30 years ago. 3.7 million died here, and cleaning up afterwards they had a lot of bones. Douaumont's Ossuary has femurs stacked like firewood in the crypts - no one knows even which side they were on! It did a lot to make me a keen European, fearing and detesting the nationalism that blighted the first half of the 20th century.
After overnight on the Belgian border (fantastic coucous, but not quite as hot as the 40°C afternoon) we follow signs to Dunkirque, eventually being directed onto a route nationale - which is barrée after a mere 10km. Diversion is toward Calais, but there is no second sign, and after a despairing diversion off the diversion (!) I put the midday sun behind me and head toward any village ending in "kirque".
We arrive to see the outer side of the ferry door this time. The next is 2 hours away, but turns out to be broken down. Never mind - it was fun watching divers hack fishing nets off the propellers, and we had a nice natter with the other two bikers there - one moving a racing 250 back from Germany. Would you believe a 4kg front wheel?
I drop Fred to his mother and sister at the Oxford dance camp, and decide to stop overnight, joining the band. They seem to like my French stuff here. Home for a rather late start to work, I look at 3500 miles added to the odometer and wonder if I had gone completely mad.
Switzerland was enormous fun, surprisingly quiet and cheap in the summer. Zimmer frei (B&B) signs are everywhere, with our best deal a £15 stop in a hostel 15 km east of St Moritz. For me a really high point was staying with a Swiss family, and grandma's wonderful cooking on her log stove. This stuff that just doesn't exist in restaurants. Yummm! Swiss hospitality is exceptional. I hope they enjoyed the mazurkas on the accordeon, and didn't mind Fred abseilling their barn.
Kümmerly+Frey's Automobil Club der Schweiz 1:250000 map is highly recommended for planning your routes through the mountains. And it's a looooong way! I shall seriously consider driving down solo, and easyJetting my pillion down to Geneva should I go again.
Our tumble? Well, someone had left an 8mm steel pipe on the road and I suspect it was tucked into the cross hatch, perhaps critically under the wheel at 45° as I touched the brake. This might have converted the force so efficiently into that sideways throw of my front wheel. Actually at just 2-3 mph it was one of those lengthy controlled falls, with little hurt beyond my pride, Fred's wrist and some scratches on the starboard cylinder. WAM had taught me to expect the unexpected, and I suspect more "correct" rear wheel braking might have avoided this.
Going back? You try and stop me!
Article was originally written for WAM's newsletter
WAM: Wirral Advanced Motorcyclists
IAM: Institute of Advanced Motorists
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