Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Travelogue Approved

Lovely pictures GP. Waiting for the rest

Do mention about the bike as well

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Simply Beautiful. Waiting for more visual treat.

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\
@ GP Racingji

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Surely this thread gonna be hooked onto my favorite list. Great buddy! Keep riding on such places.

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Europe..Bike...

What more does one want?

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Bring it..

How was the bike at higher altitude? did u feel the power loss significantly or meager???

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Thank you
It's a CBR 500R, I'm thinking of writing a comprehensive review of this also

Thanks, I'm sure you won't be disappointed

Thanks

Thanks

The Highest point was just around 2400m, I didn't felt power loss or any change in performance of the bike.

And please expect some delays, as I'm not getting enough time on weekdays to update this log and weekends I spend in travelling here and there

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Prologue

Ever since I first rode a Kawasaki Z300 on the schwarzwaldhochstrasse (Black Forest road), I was truly obsessed the by its seemingly endless number of sweeping trails and deserted roads. It was a big adventure for me to ride solo on the foreign soil, where all the traffic rules are different and people follow all of them. You can check out the travelogue of this Black Forest ride here http://www.xbhp.com/talkies/tourer/3...ml#post1257147
Since that day, I had in my mind about riding in the Apls. And as Switzerland is close to Stuttgart, Swiss Apls was my obvious choice. I started gathering information about all the mountains passes in Switzerland, when they are open, the best route to reach there from Stuttgart, where to stay, where to get myself a motorcycle, etc. Before planning anything it is very important to know whether the road is open or no, as during winter most of these mountain pass is closed due to snow. This is where this website https://www.alpen-paesse.ch/en/ came in handy, it has all the latest information about which pass is open, which is closed and when is it expected to open.

My initial plan was to ride through Grimsel-Furka-Susten Pass, as all these passes are near to each other. But during the month of May Furka & Susten Pass were closed and Grimsel Pass was partially open. So, I changed the plan and decided to ride through the Flüela Pass & Julier Pass. Now the question was which route to take, for this information I turned towards my German colleagues and every time I approached someone saying that I want to travel to Switzerland on a motorcycle, they said a big No. The reason been, the Swiss police are very strict about the traffic laws and the fine for disobeying it is outrageously expensive. For example if you are caught doing 51kmph in 50 Zone, you would end up paying 40 euro. Ignoring all this this warning, I still wanted to go to Switzerland. I started doing my own research about the route for Flüela Pass & Julier Pass. Germany & Switzerland share a common border, so crossing it was a piece of cake as nobody at the border would be interested in checking the documents of EU registered vehicle. But certainly, I didn’t wanted to end up entering the Swiss Motorways, because then you will need a swiss motorway vignette which cost 40 euro and is valid for 12 months. As I was traveling in the rental motorcycle, I didn’t had any plans to get one. So, I decided to sneak into Switzerland via. Austria & Liechtenstein, and then follow the same strategy to avoid the motorways throughout my complete road trip.


Now, as the route was decided the hunt for motorcycle begin. Most of the motorcycle dealers here provide motorcycle on rents for a day, for a weekend or for a whole week. But they provide only 600km free ride for a weekend, if you intent to ride more than 600km you’ll have to play extra for that. I found a motorcycle rental shop with the help of a colleague, which provides motorcycle for rents with free unlimited km, but they charge a little more than other. I will write a separate article about how and from where you can rent a motorcycle in Germany, what all documents are needed, about the driver’s license, etc. So, everything was in place now, hotel was booked, route was finalized and saved on my Satnav, and Motorcycle was booked. Now I just had to wait for the day when I begin The Alpine Adventure.

Day 1:
I had booked a motorcycle for a weekend, which means I can pick it up on Friday afternoon at 14:00hrs and had to return it back on Monday morning by 11:00hrs. So, I decided not to waste any day and started my journey on Friday afternoon itself. Target for the day to reach Davos, which is small town in Switzerland. This town is more famous for its ski resorts as it’s very close the Swiss Apls. This place interests me, as this is where the Flüela Pass starts and it was reachable from Stuttgart in less than 6hrs thanks to German Autobahn. I Started from Stuttgart at around 14:15hrs, took the A8 Autobahn towards Ulm, then took the exit and entered the A7 Autobahn towards Memmigen. Then again took the exit and entered the A96 before the crossing the border into Austria. Now before entering into Austria, you must know that just like Swiss motorway, you also need a Vignette to use motorways in Austria. But unlike Swiss, you can buy it for 10 day or 1 month or 12 months. For motorcycle, a 10 days Vignette will cost you 5.10 euro, which can be brought from any petrol station near the border area. If you are going to Austria via. A96 Autobahn, then there is a Aral petrol station just before the border, so you have to exit get, your Vignette, stick it on your cars windscreen or any non-removable panel of your motorcycle like the fender and then you are good to go on the Austrian motorway. As I arrived earlier than expected to the border, I decided to ditch the motorway save those 5.10 euro and continue on the inner roads or what they call here as B roads. What could possibly go wrong, I had more than enough time to reach Davos as the sunsets after 21:30hrs and had covered more the 60% of journey.



I entered Austria without even realizing it, the border crossing was like a check post and nobody was stopping there. Few minutes after crossing the border the problem started, problem of traffic. The road which runs along the Bodensee was packed with cars, seems like many people were trying to save few bucks. Struggling in the traffic for around 30 mins, I reached the city called Bregenz where the traffic smoothed out and now all the vehicles were gaining speed. By speed I mean 50kmph, which is general speed limit inside the city. The noticeable thing in Austria was the traffic single, in Germany when the lights are orange you can cross the junction, but in Austria orange lights mean slow down and don’t cross. Same like in India, we are not supposed to cross the junction when the lights are orange. So, I kept on going at 50-60kmph as per the speed zones and reached Liechtenstein. Border crossing to Liechtenstein was also similar scenario, small check post, nobody stops and you keep on moving. Fact about Liechtenstein, it’s a small country with25km-long principality between Austria and Switzerland. Local language is German and currency is Euro like all other European countries. Once you are in Liechtenstein the landscape starts getting beautiful with Snow Mountain in front of you. You keep heading towards those mountains and soon you’ll realize that you are at Swiss border. This border crossing is little different than others, no check post here. There are just flags and sign boards, not even a single line which can define where Liechtenstein ends and where Switzerland does starts.

You enter into Switzerland and the landscape starts getting even more beautiful. The Road from Liechtenstein till Davos itself is wonderful. It goes thought many small tunnels, thought small town, thought the valleys and some straight flats too. But you have to be careful here, as this is Switzerland, if caught overspeeding be ready to empty your pockets. So after riding thought all this beautiful road I reached Davos. At around 20:30hrs I was at the hotel. Droppedthe luggage in my room, freshen up, ate my dinner and went to sleep. Tomorrow is a big day, because it is the day I start the adventure of my lifetime.

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Wow! Do you guys travel all the way for the riding experience?

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Awesome first person capture! Loved it!

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Day 2:
Woke up early in the morning. The hotel services breakfast at 7, so I went on a small ride in the city center of Davos. It is very small town, and even if you want to walk in the city center it won’t take more than 30mins to cover all the areas. I found an empty parking place and did a small photo shot. It was wonderful, it wasn’t too dark and light wasn’t too harsh as well.

Headed back to hotel, had my breakfast, packed up all my stuff and started towards the Apls. First up was the Flüela Pass, it gave me goosebumps when I saw those mountains cover with snow from far away. The way up to the top was amazing, the corner where getting sharper and the elevation was also changing. It was hard to concentrate on the corners as the views were beautiful and distracting. The photographer in me wanted to stop at each and every corner to take photos but the biker in me wanted to keep on going, attacking one corner after another. I reached the top in no time. The elevation at the top is 2383m from the sea level, which is the highest point of this road. Once you start descending, the turns start getting sharper and dangerous. If you missed any corner entry there are chances you can run wide and as there are no barrier, you may end up at the bottom of the mountain. So I was very careful here, taking all the corner safely.
Once this alpine road was over, I reached a place called Süs, took a right turn from there for the next destination which was Julier Pass. But before that I had to pass through Sankt Moritz. You might have not heard of this place, but trust me it’s worth visiting.St. Moritz is a luxury alpine resort town at an elevation of about 1800m above sea level. It lies on the southern slopes of the Albula Alps. What I liked about this place is the Lake Sankt Mortiz. The main road around this town runs along this lake and on the other side of the there is a snow covered mountain. This view was wonderful, so stop there for a while. Parked my bike in restaurant’s parking which was right next to the lake, walked to lake sat on a bench and kept on admiring the view for some time.After spending a good amount of time at this lake it was time to resume the alpine adventure. I had planned my launch break at Silvaplana, which is another small town with a typical Swiss landscape-lake, mountains, snow, etc. I didn’t spend much time here, had a quick lunch and was back on the road. While I was coming near to Julier pass, I came across many biker who were coming from Julier pass. The landscape of Julier pass was totally different from that of the Flüela Pass. Where mountains in Flüela Pass where fully covered with snow, Julier pass was more green and brown and it was visible from far away. View was amazing as usual, and there was river flowing along the road. One thing I have noticed in the Switzerland is the water in lakes and river look blue. Maybe because the sky is blue, but then sky is blue in Germany as well but water here looks more greenich. Anyways, not going into the science behind this as this is travel blog not science blog.The elevation at the top is 2284m, which is little less then Flüela Pass, but doesn’t matters. Once you start descending, your eyes will be pleased. What you will see is a small town in between mountains and everything is green apart from road and snow covered mountains. By the time I was at Albula/Alvra, it was started getting hot. I was wearing my textile riding gears but with thermal liner, as result I was getting dehydrated. Lucky I was carrying plenty of water with me but I had to stop more offen as I didn’t had hydration bag. Riding though alps make you tired specially when the weather is warm because you have to concentrate more on the corners and riding slow is not an option as you have to keep up with other vehicles around you. Once I reached Chur, it was already 6pm and no, it wasn’t getting dark yet. From Chur I have again go back to Davos without using the motorway, which took almost 2 hrs because of the speed limits. Reached Davos all exhausted and tired, checked in the hotel ate whatever veg. food they had and called it a day.


Day 3:
Next day was again interesting, I had to take the same route back to Stuttgart, via Liechtenstein-Austria, without using the motorway. This time I was more familiar with speed limits and the roads, so was not relaying on the navigation much. This was supposed to be my non-stop ride to Stuttgart, but it’s almost 4 hrs ride. So took few stops at resting places along the Autobahn in Germany. Reached home, parked my bike and I was done for the week. Even though I had the bike with me for one more day, I didn’t took her out. All I did was took rest, as next day I had to get back to regular 8-5 life.

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Nice Update Parag.. Looking forward to a time where we could join you in an international ride.

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Thanks Bhargav
I'm also looking forward to that

Re: The Alpine Adevnture

Amazing pictures with a beautiful bike Hooked to the thread.