Last year, when the Grampies went "By the Books" we travelled routes set out in 19 mostly Bikeline guidebooks. At the end of each segment, I tried to summarize what we had thougt of it. I actually found this a bit of a chore, and one that did not feel so useful, since we had obviously just finished crawling through the route in detail.

This time, with the tour pretty much over, we have the advantage of looking back from kind of a medium distance (and before we forget the while thing) to see what stands out. So here following are comments on 15 bits of the tour, where we feel we have something to add. Each title is a live link to the spot in the blog we are talking about, in case you want to refresh your memory on what we are blithering about!

When you first read this page you will not find all 15 comments, since we will be adding them bit by bit over a few days. So check back to see if there is something new, or check the table of contents page, which will show a note like "Added comments on ..." Verdun to Metz

When thinking about bike touring in Europe, there is always the initial major question about where we can inject ourselves on the merry go round. Frankfurt in general is a great place, since it is quite central. But the airport is a bug, and our favourite airline (Air Transat) no longer flies there. There is always Amsterdam, right in the middle of cyclists' heaven, and at the bottom of the Rhine - a cycle superhighway to the rest of Europe. On the other hand, Amsterdam is rather north, and could be chilly if coming in or going out in a shoulder season.

So that is why we thought of Brussels this time. Transat flies there, and it is close to the Meuse. The Meuse can be thought of like the Rhine - a highway from Northern Europe to at least Verdun. Certainly on the Meuse we had encountered lots of Dutch cyclists coming and going, north/south.

The question is, what to do from Verdun? In our limited experience, we felt we needed to link over to the Moselle, which is not only stupendous on its own, but also a pathway to the Rhine (at Koblenz). To get to the Moselle from Verdun, though, there is one day on something like the D903.

We have done this stretch twice now, and we say "Never Again". There is just so little joy in feeling we have to push the bikes on the facing the traffic side to see what is likely to hit us.

This is not to say that Brussels/Verdun/Metz/Koblenz is out as a route. It is just to say, find a way not to pedal Verdun to Metz!

The Moselle and the Middle Rhine

Because of the intense domination of the automobile worldwide in transportation, it is rare to find places where the bicycle is more than just tolerated. Amsterdam is such a place, and no doubt there are parts of Asia like that. And then there is the Mosel/Moselle. Here there is an entire industry that is based on touring, wine tastng, cyclists. That means good bikeways, guest houses with signage on the bikeway, restaurants, and camp sites.

The most scenic part of the route starts at Bernkastel-Kues, though traditionally people look at Trier as a beginning or end point. We always start further up river, at Metz, but oh - Bernkastel-Kues!

Admittedly, the whole way from Bernkastel to Frankfurt is no more than 300 km, but the route looms larger than that in our mental map. This includes the vines on the Mosel and the castles on the Rhine - so cool!

And oh, the river Saar enters the Mosel near Trier. There is a bikeway along the Saar, to Saarbrucken. From Saarbrucken one can connect over to Strasbourg/Colmar. Another bit worth considering.

The Taubertal

The Tauber valley runs from the river Main - beyond Frankfurt, at Wertheim up to Rothenberg, and beyond. It's only about 100 km, but these are magical endpoints, in a generally magical region, so I was eager to include the Tauber in our route. Added to this is the fact that Bikeline has a book for the Tauber, which means it has gotta be a good choice.

Of course, it was a good choice - a great place to cycle. The only thing is that measured against some of the great places in Germany we would have to say it was a little wild, and a little unserviced. What am I saying here? Look at the photos of Tauberbischofsheim and Bad Mergentheim - great! But hmmm, it just did not seem overall to be a must see or a must do.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber

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Of course in Europe there is no shortage of quaint, old, and picturesque places, and no shortage of history that still can somehow come alive for the tourist. Some places can seems too touristy (though we are quite tolerant on that score) and some can only be partial - as with a small old town hemmed in by a huge amount of recent development.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber strikes a really pleasant note for us. Yes, it is touristy, but the thing is, it really has the goods to show. It has a complete original wall, and it has fachwerk buildings that truly are gorgeous. The famous Nightwatchman tour is not only entertaining, but it describes a fascinating history, one that the actor (Hans Baumgartner) really brings alive.

Finally, the food available in the town is unselfconsciously authentic. Bratwurst, sauerbraten, wiener schnitzel, schaufele, dumplings, venison in cream, mushroom dishes ... it's all what you would expect in this region. (Just give the schnee balls a miss!).

So whichever way one would approach - on the Tauber, or on the Romantiche Strasse, Rothenburg is pretty much a must stop. This trip was our second that included Rothenburg, but we would still be happy to come back again.

Fussen and Neuschwanstein

Fussen is kind of like Rothenburg - a great small town that has become a don't miss whenever possible for us. Fussen begins by being near the Foggensee - a lake with good camping and bike routes, plus that beautiful glacial green colour that comes from being in the foothills of the Alps.

The next thing about Fussen is the proximity of the two castles - Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau the former being the fairy tale (literally) castle of Ludwig II of Bavaria, and the latter being the castle of his father, Maximillian II

We have not been in to Hohenschwangau, but Neuschwanstein really is fabulous. It features full room frescoes of heroic figures from German myth, something Ludwig was really taken with, together with his idol, Richard Wagner.

The actual town of Fussen also has some great pedestrian streets, interesting buildings, and a Benedictine monastery (St Mang's Abbey). The whole area is just super great

Reutte to Italy

After the excellent bike paths around Fussen, we were a little surprised about having to fight rough paths and some possibly scary on road situations leading to Reutte. But, it was Ok. We also had to deal with the shuttles over the passes, which presented problems of finding where to get on and dealing with rushed and/or surly drivers. The mountain scenery, to be sure, was nice but overall this section is more like something to get past. It is worth it, though, because after that comes the ultra terrific Adige valley, down to Verona.

The Adige (Etsch Radweg)

The Adige River valley (Etsch in German) has left with us the wonderful image of a dedicated bike path ever descending into a twisting steep sided valley, studded with interesting villages and lined with heavily laden apple trees. The upper valley has two names too - to the Italians its the Val Venosta and to the German speakers it is the Vinschgau. Either way, it had us thinking early that Italy had gotten a bad rap and that there really were terrific bikeways there. Well actually, whatever we might say about the rest of Italy, this is a 400 km route that is worth coming to just for its own sake.

There are lots of great small towns along the way, but there is also Merano, Bolzano, and Verona, all also worth visiting in their own right. From Verona, it become a question about what to do, We took the train to Venice, but there are lots of other nearby super cities as well. We are just not so sure about cycling from that point. One could continue down the Adige to the sea, but then what? We are thinking next time to maybe take a bus tour to Rome and Naples. We have no idea if such a thing exists, but that is what we could one day be looking for.

Northern Italian Cities

Our experience in Northern Italy, naturally enough, was divided between the cities and towns and the routes that joined them. Our impression of the routes, notably the Po Radweg (Destra Po) was that they were rather boring, except for the times that the drivers were terrifying us. On the other hand, the cities were wonderfully interesting, with lovely old centers obviously well loved and used by the people, beautiful churches, markets, and suchlike,

There are actually quite a few of these medium sized cities in the north of Italy. We visited Merano, Bolzano, Trento, Lugano, Parma, and Ferrara, but there is also Cremona, Padua, and Turino, at least.

Milano is a big city, but it has the most wonderful of old centers, what with the magnificent cathedral and the luxury shopping district. This was a ll supremely fascinating.

We are not sure if we would really want to cycle among these cities again, but we definitely would visit them again - so that would imply a lot more use of the train.

Before we left we found a nice website covering the cycle routes of Italy. We need to have a really close look at that now that we have seen some of the roads and paths up close. Maybe there is some really good cycling for us between cities in Italy. We'll see.

We still think the Adige was one of the best cycles ever, though. That route included not only the cycle way and the smaller towns, but Merano, Bolzano, and Verona. Just for that bit, one could go back again and again.

Venice

Just as people seem to agree that Paris is in France, but is not exactly part of it, so Venice seems entirely special within Italy. Of course, there is the obvious fact that Venice is an island, that it is riddled with small canals, that there are no cars, or even bicycles. But Venice is unique in more ways than just that. Probably the main thing about it is the incredible density of buildings, including fabulous palaces and churches, but also interesting structures of all sorts. If you walk through Venice you are sure to get lost, and you see so many people wandering around with map in hand wondering where in heaven’s name they actually are.

Venice, of course, is a maritime environment, and that means boats of all sorts swarming around, plus other islands and bits that these boats can be heading to. Among the boats are the famous gondolas, which are exactly as you saw on movies or TV, with possibly singing gondoliers in striped shirts, and very elegant design of the gondolas themselves. A gondola ride is quite pricey, though.Then there are “taxis”, which are wooden speedboats, and “vaporettos”, which are busses, all run by a single company, between fixed stops. The taxis are also expensive, like 80 euros for a run from one end to the other, but the vaporettos are reasonable.

Through the middle of Venice runs the grand canal, and it is on this that some of the most fabulous views and photo ops reside. The other central focus is St Mark’s square. Beyond that, the place is fabulously complex, and we benefitted a lot by getting a kid’s guide, which nonetheless was very detailed.

Despite the crowds, it is all worth it. It would take several days to feel like one had a real visit. Although we would have thought that places to stay that are actually in Venice would be very expensive, a quick glance at Booking.com seems to show some reasonable prospects.

Swiss Route 3

From what we have seen, the Swiss are as conscientious as the Germans and the Austrians about having bike routes going everywhere and marking them well. Swiss Route 3 was our way north through the whole of Switzerland this time, and we were gratified to see just how well marked it was. It was a big contrast from Italy, and boy were we ever relieved when we left Italy and immediately hit the first Swiss 3 sign.

However, having the route and marking it well does not also mean the path will be pleasant. We ran into plenty of rough gravel and ugly surroundings as we followed 3.

The north/south way through Switzerland had three stages - Italy to the Gothhard Pass, Gothhard Pass to Lucerne, and Lucerne to Basel. The first stage was the roughest in terms of the path surface. The second had a fair amount of on road, descending from Goshenen, but also fabulous mountain scenery. The third bit had the beautiful lake and town of Lucerne, plus the reasonably safe but not totally lovely run over to Basel.

Switzerland is criss crossed by bike routes, and does have great scenery, so it seems logical to make this country a destination, rather than just a place to pass through. On the other hand we do not have enough experience to pronounce on the quality and safety of the routes. We think it is worth checking out further.

One thing we are sure about, prices in Switzerland are twice as high as in Germany or France. That means Switzerland would need to have some awfully attractive stuff to make an extended stay worth it. We will probably just dip our toe in a few more times, before taking any kind of plunge.

EV6 Basel to Nantes

Eurovelo 6 (EV 6) will always be a favourite of ours. It is well marked, safe, with lots of cycle and general support, and it passes through all kinds of interesting places.

The bit between Basel and Nantes (or St Nazaire) qualifies for this praise equally with the other sections. However there are more ordinary parts and more highlight parts. Starting out from Basel, the ride is mostly along canals or dike tops. This is ok, great actually. But it does involve quite a lot of just cycling along, without too much to see or do.

From about Orleans to Angers you are cycling more on or near the Loire, and passing through the area that contains 70 or more chateaux. The chateaux themselves are great to go visit, although two or three would be lots for one trip. Then there are the fine cities, Orleans, Blois, Amboise, Tours, Chinon, Angers, and Nantes, plus many smaller ones. It's a wine area, and an area of nice houses and gardens. Really, hard to beat, and a route we plan to return to as often as possible.

One other thing about Basel to Nantes - it is linked in to other key cycle ways. Basel, of course, is on the Rhine, so from there one can head north towards Netherlands or east toward the Bodensee. On the other end, from Nantes/St. Nazaire one can go south past Bordeaux toward the Pyrenees and then either west to Santiago or east toward the Mediterranean. Or, if from Nantes you go north, then its Brittany and Normandy!

Yikes, I am back home as I write this, and just thinking about it makes me want to hop the next plane to Nantes, or Basel!