Best of Europe BOE2403

On our first riding day, we took off from Erding. Well, we tried to. One of our Harleys was still a little sleepy, so we needed a little boost to get it going. It was still grumpy afterward, growling in the background while we did our briefing to prepare everyone for the day ahead. The ride started off easy, moving from town to town through the fields. With little traffic, it was a great way to get familiar with our bikes. We had our first coffee stop where we treated ourselves to some milkshakes or coffees, and Axel came by with delivery service, providing everyone with bottles of water. Two of the Harley riders were adopted after the coffee stop, reuniting them with their long-lost brother. After the coffee break, we continued riding the beautiful, sweeping roads. We decided not to take the autobahn since the holiday season had just started, and we wanted to avoid traffic jams. I don't understand why people seem to love them so much; they queue up for it... Lunch took us to a small restaurant with traditional spices on the menu, along with some good pizzas and salads. Both groups met up here, and we all refilled our energy to tackle the rest of the day. After lunch, it was time for a picture of our first castle. During the afternoon ride, we had a coffee stop at a nice brewery, where the guests introduced me, Lars, to a cola float. It's a glass of cola with a scoop of vanilla ice cream because cola needs more sugar. It was an interesting experience, to say the least. After lunch, we had some trouble getting to Rothenburg. One roadblock led to another, and we had to take quite a big detour to get there. At one point, we decided to take the highway to get there faster, but of course, the road to the highway was closed... Now it's time for dinner and a walk around Rothenburg. Thank you for doing our blog, and see you tomorrow!

Our second riding day took us back out of Heidelberg, or at least that's what we were hoping for. In the morning, when one of the groups tried to take off, the Harley simply wouldn't start. We tried getting it running with power banks, starter cables, some praying and chanting, but nothing worked. Even after swapping the batteries, we simply could not get it started. Our only option was to put the good battery in the Harley, park it in the van, and then put the battery back in the other Harley, so we could take that out on our day's ride. This meant we got to use the 800GS instead of the Electra Glide Harley for the day's ride. For our lunch break, we had one of the famous Edelweiss picnics, consisting of different types of cheese, sausages, vegetables, and other things. Since I was slightly delayed by the Harley not starting, I was not yet completely done with the picnic when the first group arrived, but they were nice enough to offer me much more help than we could make use of. Before they took off, the other group arrived, so we could make some nice group pictures, and then set off to finish our ride towards Heidelberg. For our dinner, we took the train down that starts directly in front of our hotel. It takes you straight down to the old town center. After we told off some people trying to cut the line in the middle of our group, we all got on the same carriage, got into town, and had a lovely dinner in an old brewery. We all had a little too much food and dessert but had a great time most of all.

We planned to start our third riding day without any problems, but that did not work out 100%. The first group took off and followed Route A from the hotel at the top of the mountain to the highway. The other group took Route B and left a few minutes later. It turns out that Route B was exactly the amount of time shorter than Route A that was between the groups. This meant that Group A merged onto the highway at the same time Group B was driving there, meaning we had no other option than to completely merge the groups. This got our riding chaos started. Combine this with some heavy traffic, exits that came up unexpectedly, and some guy going for the bike land speed record, it's safe to say we had a little challenge getting everybody to the same place. Luckily, everybody paid attention very well during the briefing and did exactly what was expected. They stopped at a safe place, contacted the tour guide, made a plan, and met up at the agreed-upon location. During coffee, we brought back the adopted riders from one group to the other, and all was back to the way we started. From here on, we were glad to leave the highway behind and turn into the twists and turns of the Black Forest. To make sure we gave everybody the full experience, we started off with some narrow roads with loads of turns where the asphalt isn't perfect. As a reward, we traded these in for some of the most wonderful sweeping roads you can find anywhere, taking us right up to the place on the lake where we had lunch. From here on, we ran into a few roadworks that caused some confusion, but in the end, it was no match for us, and we all made it safely to our next hotel. Dinner was at a place that roughly translates to "The Grumpy Guys," where they were surprisingly friendly and served us a lovely meal, including some much-appreciated green stuff with vitamins. Tomorrow we will stay in the same hotel, so it's an opportunity to decide what everybody wants to do. A lot of good options, so let's see what tomorrow brings.

Today was the day when we could all leave our luggage lying around in our rooms and didn't have to get up as early. We will be staying in the same hotel for another night, so we could all make our own plans for the day. The agreement was to meet at 10 for a ride with whoever wanted to come, and everybody else could do what they wanted. These plans varied from going to the swimming pool and parading their speedos to shopping in town for new dresses, even though the French lady in one of the shops didn't want to help a non-French-speaking customer. A few people went to the castle to have a look around and walk through the old (rebuilt) halls. The way there was a lot easier than the way back since the taxis didn't really want to come up to the castle to pick people up again. With a bit of back and forth, it was arranged, so nobody needed to learn how to fight with swords and weave baskets to blend in with the castle. The group that went for a ride took off around 10 as planned. We made a quick stop outside the castle to look at the view, and from there made our way towards some beautiful twisty roads. We got some drone footage of the group riding, so keep an eye out for that. From the coffee stop, we split up; some kept going and some headed back to have some time to explore the town.

Today it was time to leave France again, so after a nice breakfast outside, we got on our bikes and headed back towards the German border. To avoid the traffic on the highway, we had to go through a bunch of towns where you're only allowed to go 30 km/h, which wasn't super exciting. But at least it was compensated by turning into a wonderful mountain pass with perfect asphalt for the first half, turning and twisting through the forest, climbing higher. About halfway up, the asphalt got a lot worse, but it was still a nice ride. At the top, we got to enjoy the view and see a paraglider take off. We decided it would be better if we got on our bikes and rode on instead of going parasailing, so that's what we did. Our coffee stop was at the Hexenlochmühle, an old watermill that was used for cutting logs. They make cuckoo clocks there and sell a lot of other nice things from the area and not so from the area. More importantly, they serve a famous Black Forest cake, which we had to try. Sadly, the pieces were a bit small, so we only gained about a kilo each from eating it and not more. After Sean basically had a little swim and we were all ready to go again, we got on our bikes and headed towards our lunch stop where Kurt had prepared a beautiful picnic. He even had warm Leberkäse for us and some well-needed salads. During lunch, we all debated whether we would need to put our rain gear on. Most of us decided this would not be needed and a little bit of rain would be welcome to cool us off. Switch to about 15 minutes later and the rain is absolutely pouring down. The roads are getting flooded, it's hard to see where you are going, and all of us are completely soaked. For a while, it was still manageable, but when the hail came, we decided to stop in a barn where the door was open and wait for the weather to clear up. The farmer came by to close the door and keep his hay dry. All he said was hello, I'll just close this and then goodbye. So we assumed he was okay with us being there. Once it cleared up enough, we went out again and decided to take the fastest route to the gas station before the Swiss border. Once we got there, it stopped raining. As soon as we crossed the Swiss border, about 200 meters from the gas station, the roads were not even wet anymore, and the temperature was climbing rapidly. I guess the Swiss don't only make watches and pocket knives, but also have time to train the clouds to stay away from their borders. There is a national holiday in Switzerland today, so we will have an early dinner and then head to the Rhine Falls and watch the fireworks there tonight.

Der Wetterbericht versprach nichts Gutes für heute – überall waren Gewitter angesagt. Die Regenbekleidung wurde deshalb von allen ganz oben und griffbereit in Seitenkoffer oder Topcase gepackt. Von Schaffhausen ging‘s zunächst Richtung Steckborn und auf wunderschöner Route - mit praktisch null Verkehr - weiter am Bodensee entlang nach Romanshorn, wo wir rechtzeitig vor dem Regen einen Kaffeehalt einlegten - perfekt um auch die Regenkleidung anzuziehen. Danach ging’s auf einer spontan leicht angepassten Route durch Kurt’s Heimatort «Horn» Richtung Schwägalp - wo das Wetter bis dahin wieder aufgeklart hatte - und mit der Gondel gleich rauf zum Säntis. Das Mittagessen genossen wir auf 2’500m im «alten Säntis-Gasthaus» das ganz unscheinbar hinter und 100m unter dem neuen Säntis-Restaurant zu finden ist. Super gemütlich und leckeres Essen ! Als wir mit der Bahn wieder runter schwebten, konnten wir Axels Gruppe, die einen anderen Weg zum Säntis gewählt hatte, noch zuwinken. Wir sattelten wieder unsere «Eisen-Rösser» und «ritten» über spektakuläre Kurven und super enge Strassen zum Furka-Joch wo uns Charly und seine Frau herzlichen empfingen. Kaum in der warmen Stube brachen Sturzbäche aus den Wolken. Nach Kaffee und heisser Schokolade, Scherzen und viel Gelächter, klarte der Himmel wieder auf und es machte unheimlich Spass auf nahezu trockenen Strassen zügig zu unserem Tankstopp in Au zu cruisen, wo dann auch Axels Gruppe wieder zu uns stiess. Das letzte Stück bis zu unserem Hotel in Warth nahm dann die gesamte Gruppe mit 20 Bikes zusammen unter die Räder und Lars filmte mit seiner Drohne noch ein paar spektakuläre Aufnahmen unseres Konvois. Ein Tag mit Wetter-Kapriolen, tollen Kurven und atemberaubenden Landschaften nahm in unseren wunderschönen Hotel mit einem absolut delikaten Abendessen sein Ende.

The last riding day. The rain has passed. Rolling down the Lech valley towards Reutte, then along the picturesque Plansee, just in time for a coffee with a view. On to Linderhof castle, the only one of the famous castles that Ludwig II., king of Bavaria had ordered to be built, that was finished before his death. And the one he spent most of his time in. Finally back to Erding with a bit of agitation on the way, but everyone made it back safe to the hotel. Some tears were shed by grown men as they had to part with the machine that had carried them for a whole week. But by dinnertime everyone was happy again. A great tour with a great bunch of people!