The route
For privacy reasons (solo female traveller and computery reasons), I am not planning to share the full GPX files.
However in beloved MS Paint I did build a zoomed out view and summary of roughly the routes I took for others perusal and trip planning.
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From Cernobbio, Lake Como I headed straight into Ticino canton.
From there, I largely just pieced together EV5, EV6, EV15, and lots of local swiss routes. Komoot and Google Maps were my morning routine, and I usually didn't have the exact route planned until a day or two out.
Once I crossed the Alps, I decided I had to pick between heading towards French speaking Switzerland or Liechtenstein - because I chose the latter I followed the Rhine eurovelo from there (with plenty of random detours into Vaduz,Buchs, and later Feldkirch) and took it all the way north up through Austria where I met up with Bodensee (Lake Constance).
From there straight through to Heidelberg, the Rhine eurovelo was my pal. First west along the north of Switzerland / south of Germany and then north-bound into France and Germany.
I never had to stray too far from the river. I passed along through Kostanz, Schauffhausen, saw the Rheinfall, and rounded by Basel, finally heading properly northwards. Around here, I criss crossed between Germany and France a lot. Schengen is quite fun.
The river thinned out to the old rhine canal in this area up towards Strasbourg. It was flat and very very quiet. The Rhine parts of the route, especially the stretch from Basel to Strasbourg, is a perfect easy ride for someone who is newer to this.
From Strasbourg, I took a weird mountainous route Google Maps suggested to Heidelberg that in hindsight didn't make a lot of sense. You can try a different way, there should be a flatter way.
Then, craving something besides flatlands I decided not to continue north with the Rhine - just as well given London was still further west. I went through some foresty bits directly west to Kaiserslautern then Saarlouis. This whole area was pretty well marked after Kaiserslautern, since you are following the Saar river
Once I reached Belgium, the local bike networks were again pretty well marked. From Bastogne, I headed to Namur, then Brussels all along pretty nice cycling paths or farm roads. Belgium was pretty hilly in Wallonia. In Flanders, it was smooth and flat sailing all the way through the trifecta of Ghent, Bruges, and Oostende, and I don't think I had to check my map for any of it except finding the campground.
From Oostende, it's hard to get lost as you are basically following the coast all the way down to Calais. Then I caught a ferry to the UK and took national route 1 from Dover, upto Canterbury / Painters Farm. The final shorter day had a lot of map checking until signs of Central London started coming into view.
That was a lot of words. I hope that's helpful!
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