Over the
Alps in October
From
Pompeii one can ride directly to Germany but it would be a very long day; that
would be for Iron Butt Riders, not for me. While Carol has her Saddle Sore1000, I am no longer interested in chasing miles. Sure I rode huge distances (Daytona to Boston)
in a day, but like I said, I don’t like riding that way any longer. Nor do I
like to race. I ride my 6 to 7 hours a day, then call it quits. We made it to
Ponzano, North of Rome the first day, after leaving in the afternoon from
Pompeii. Then from Ponzano we made it to Campogalliano.
We found a
hotel that was highly rated at Bookings and had an attached restaurant which
was, we saw, heavily visited by many locals. You can’t always trust the
ratings. The restaurant had an ‘air’ about itself that bordered on snobbish.
Sorry, but I was totally not impressed. I have seen many ‘impressive’ acting
restaurants in my life and some were without substance. This was one of those.
The pasta soup Carol had was way too salty and the breakfast we received the
next morning even had rancid butter; the bread was as hard as Survival Tack. I
could not wait to leave this place. I do not like snobs.
We rode
another day until we got to Innsbruck and stayed outside Innsbruck (Zirl)
because I did not want to ride the Brenner Pass late in the afternoon, just in
case there is some frost on the road and maybe even snow. It rained all the way
to boot, and rain could turn to snow at night. It sure was getting colder. At
Innsbruck we had 43 F, so we sure had left the warmer southern lands. Finding a
hotel in Innsbruck is easy if you have unlimited funds. I chose to stay in the
small town of Zirl, just west of the large city and it turned out to be almost
a private home we slept in. The hotel was very clean, very organized, with a
great breakfast. We are now in Austria.
I like that
the currency in Europe is in Euros. No longer do we have to change all kinds of
money to travel across Europe. The Euro is great, it sure makes traveling
easier. We rode through Austria instead of Switzerland because it is cheaper
going this way. Switzerland would ask us to buy a Vignette for the whole year
even though we were just passing through. Switzerland charges per person in a
room, not for the room itself. Switzerland has their own currency and we would
have to exchange funds. Switzerland is just too expensive and too cumbersome to
travel in.
After we
woke up at Haus Bergland (our
Hotel) we finally set off to ride the Brenner Pass and across the Dolomites,
part of the Alps. The day is very misty. Not sure if the clouds are this low or
if it is fog. The Brenner Pass is an old, very old, very big and very much
traveled Pass through the Alps. Not even so high, only 1370 Meters (about 4000
feet) but yes, we had snow. We had slush in the local streets when we left Zirl and snow left and right of the highway that winds itself over the mountains,
but snow it is. One can slide in snow even if it is only minimal, it is sleek
stuff. Riding across bridges, while travelling the local roads I slowed down
and kept the bike perfectly level. Ice forms here quicker than anyplace else.
The road was wet, so it was hard if not impossible to see ‘black ice’. I chose
the Brenner Pass because it was the lowest pass, because it is heavily
traveled, because it is well maintained and all the cars and trucks would have
left a groove in the snow for us to ride in.
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| Yup! Snow And It Is Cold |
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