Featured Touring Heading To Switzerland

Day -1:
Today I went after my office duties to the neighbouring province to rent a trailer for two of our bikes. The trailer was ok from the technical perspective, but the rental service had only got one set of lashing stripes for one bike. Therefore I had to buy some for the second bike in a hardware store before I drove back to my home. Meanwhile my wife arrived at home and blocked some parking possibilities for my "bike transport system" with her car and her bike.
Then we started the loading of the trailer. We got some hints from our friends and had watched some specific videos on YouTube before.
It was tricky, because the profile rails of the trailer are very small. Tyres with from 140/XX to 160/XX would fit perfectly. Our rear tyres are 180/XX. Therefore the loading process was not really easy. But we made it. After loading the first bike we fixed it with our lashing straps and did the whole procedure again. The next time it will be easier.
Tomorrow we will head across Austria to the most western province called Vorarlberg to the city of Bregenz at the Bodensee. There we will stay in an apartment for one week. From Bregenz we will start some whole day lasting tours to some beautiful alpine areas in Switzerland.
More will follow.

 

@Dawsy: Many thanks to you!

 

@Bikerman: Many thanks to you! Our first trial with a trailer.

 

We are being followed!

 

@Vulpes: Yes indeed! Your trailer is much bigger than our rented one! It also looks much more easier to load too. At our destination I changed the front wheel rail to a more forward position on the trailer to get some more room for the two bikes. But we will use it only for our journey back home next week again.

 

Day 1:
Today we started our journey through Austria at 0645. Due to the trailer speed limit of 100 km/h we expected an overall time of 8 hours for the 645 km to reach our final destination in Bregenz. In this time frame I planned some breaks and some road works on our way. The reality was like this: We arrived the destination at 1500. We had lots of road work situations and lost about 1 extra hour in more then 3 traffic jams. But finally we arrived here in Bregenz and unloaded the bikes from the trailer and then our car. We took lots of stuff with us this time. Hiking clothes, boots and sticks for some alpine hiking touring. A SUP for the trips on the Bodensee, which is directly on the other side of the street in front of our apartment. Naturally our complete biking equipment for the touring to Switzerland.
In the afternoon we went for a snack and a delicious ice-cream. Afterwards we took our inflated SUP to the lake and paddled about half an hour before we swam some more time in the lake. The water was great. Really refreshing but not as cold as the last two swimming options of the last week's. Tomorrow we will start our first bike tour to Switzerland.

An historic house in our neighborhood


A delicious ice-cream with different kinds of berries.


Our SUP which we use sometimes like a kajac.


A view of the outskirts of Bregenz.


A historic "bath house" of the Austrian monarchy which is still in use.


On the beach.


Another view from the beach.


Another great ice-cream. Pistachio ice-cream with vanilla ice-cream rolled in chopped pistachios and accompanied by pistachio cream and some more sweet stuff.

 

@Wessa: Many thanks to you!

 

@Dawsy: The taste was great.

 

@Vulpes; We don't have this great loading option like yours here.

 

Day 2:
Today we started again at 0645 with our first tour to Switzerland. A few weeks ago we bought an electronic vignette for the Swiss motorways for €40.- for each bike. Therefore we were able to ride directly from Austria some parts of our tour on the Swiss motorways. We passed Vaduz and reached the area of Chur. From there we stepped into the alpine sections and did endless curves and hairpin bends on some very narrow alpine roads in a wonderful landscape. This time the weather was with us. We were always behind the rain in a distance of about 10 minutes. Therefore the water and mud only ran down the roads, but we had not to ride in hard rain. - As you can imagine, the bikes look like motocross bikes again. No matter. I will clean them completely after our journey at home.
The views from the roads were great!
Today we did 495 km on our bikes. At 1500 we reached our apartment again and refreshed ourselves. Afterwards we went to the harbour and had some refreshments there.

The road conditions in the morning.


Lovely smooth hills at the beginning of our alpine session.


Short stop for a drink


The weather gets better.






Today we passed about 12 lakes!!!


A lovely bakery which offers also some small dishes and drinks.


A view of the Bodensee.


Very delicious Rose wine from Austria.

 

@Bikerman: The weather forecast looks pretty good for the next days!

 

Day 3:
Today we started a non riding day at 0615 in the near Germany in a very cool bakery. I have never seen before a "Drive-In" bakery. We had our breakfast inside and enjoyed the local food there. After that we used the opportunity to visit the little town Lindau, also in Germany, with its lovely harbour and old town and with no tourists on the streets. Because beginning with 0800 you can cross from Bregenz the Bodensee by a ferry line and then whole Lindau is crowded with tourists like Venice in Italy normally. This time we had Lindau nearly for us alone.
Afterwards we did some shopping in Germany in some stores. It is a checkiness! The same shops, the same products like in Austria, but the prices are less than 30 percent here in Germany.
With a filled car we drove about 20 minutes back to our apartment and unloaded the car. Until 1300 we then visited the nature reserve in the "Rhein Delta" and had lots of fun with endless amounts of different kinds of birds in this area.
After some local food we had some fun with our SUP as a kajac on the Bodensee again.
The forecasted weather from yesterday did not appear today. Tomorrow it will be also a bit "interesting" with many sudden changes. Therefore we will start our all day main alpine tour with 3 alpine passes on Monday. Our Sunday will be a mixture between hiking and enjoying of local culinary.

The "Drive-In" of the bakery


The coast line of Lindau


The entrance of the harbour in Lindau


The nature reserve in the "Rhein Delta"




The "entrance" of the nature reserve was flooded from the rain the last days. In the background the parking lots.




We "disturbed" a group of swans at their morning body care. The "boss" grumbled really aggressive!




A lizard crossed our way along a little bridge.