Anybody miss me?

[yenrod]

>Anybody miss me?

If your names not down your not coming in

 

[xilios]

I am trying to upload lot's of pics to Flickr.

Hey welcome back BTFB.
I've heard Flickr "might" be going out sometime in Sept. check out Google Picasa same thing but you get 1GB+ of space.

 

[Andy in Sig]

We weren't so far away from Sigmaringen...but we cut down to the Bodensee before we got to it.
..
I am going to try to figure out exactly which paths we did take using the GPS tracks (although the thing wrapped around a few times I think) memory and the pics etc.

I think I can guess where you cut south: about 20 km west of Ulm? I've never gone down that bit. You'd have perhaps done better to cut south just on the outskirts of Sigmarningen (Schwäbisch Alb Radweg, I think) which takes you down to the W end of the Bodensee and it's certainly not all potholy and horrible.

Did you do Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Nördlingen etc?

 

[Dave Davenport]

What are you doing to that pig??!!!

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

Did you do Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Nördlingen etc?

yep pretty much. Most of the rougher radweg sections were further north. The southern sections for the most part were very good.

 

[ChrisKH]

Welcome back BTFB. Posts have halved in your absence.

Nice pictures. But....but.....where's your helmet?

At least I'll know who to look out for when I next get lost around Billericay/Brentwood (as I did on Friday).

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

Here are some more pics (I still need to organize them and place them on the maps etc...but my life is short and my will to remain at the PC is dwindling...)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/btfb/

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

The major waypoint towns were:

Bremen
Achim
Verden
Nienburg
Stolzenau
Hameln
Holzminden
Bad Karlshafen
Hahn Munden
Fuldabruck
Melsungen
Rotenburg
Bebra
Bad Hersfield
Schlitz
Fulda
Sinntal
Gemunden
Karlstadt
Wurzburg
Ochsenfurt
Creglingen
Rothenburg
Schillingsfurst
Feuchtwagon
Dinkelsbuhl
Nordlingen
Donauworth
Dillingen
Ulm
Ehingen
Riedlingen
Mengen
Ostrach
Willhelmsdorf
Markdorf
Friedrichshafen
Konstanz
Steckborn
Schaffhausen
Waldshut
Bad sackingen
Basel

We stayed on the radwegs wherever possible and hugged the rivers as close as we could.

 

[Danny]

Welcome back - how was German TV

 

[longers]

Welcome back .
From your smiles in your photo's it looks like you enjoyed yourself immensely

 

[Riding in Circles]

Only two comments to make.

What were you doing to the pig?

Get a hair cut you tree hugging hippy! (said with a redneck accent) lol




Looks like you had a good time, did the weather behave?

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

..Mostly we had good weather, but it did change quickly and often. Ranged from really hot dry sunny days, to heavy rain and cold. One day the temperature was a full 12 c lower than the previous afternoon!
Much of the time we faced headwinds from the south (those were on the sunny days) but they were not that strong. In northern Germany it was cold and damp at night in particualr however things got better as we rode south.
Basel was more like Malaga with a piercing dry heat interspersed with a single quick very dramatic thunder storm.

I did have one day on the Fulda when i was wearing my full longs, jaclet, gloves and over shoes all day....but mostly it was shorts and a cycle shirt.

At the Bodensee it was tropical...I swam in the lake several times, and in Basel i swam in the Rhine.


...the pig...erm...yeah...well see.. it's like this...there weren't that many good looking women around....Urluab....so I took the best looking woman I could find when i had the chance!

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

This is my bike (I call it 'Shinto' after a donkey in a book a still havent read but carry with me on my tours)



Here is my GPS which stands for Good for nothing Piece of shoot!



The Wesser river on day 2



There were small 1Euro ferries to cross the river



I think the dog was tired for me! Taken on arrival at petit port campsite in Basel



Swimming in the Bodensee



Forest Radwegs (bike routes)

 

[Andy in Sig]

So on the bit where you went Menge to Ostrach etc, is that a recognised bike route or did you just follow the local bike paths? I ask because one route down to the W end of the Bodensee goes through where I live and the other variant goes from the Danube somewhere between Ulm and Ehingen.

 

[Bigtallfatbloke]

we tended to follow the 'shilders'..green signs for most of the route. However they often left us stranded at a junction with no idea which fork to take...which is where asking the locals was crucial. The GPS didnt even know these paths existed and tended to want to send us to our destination via tibet and the M25. Sometimes we would deviate from the Radwegs shown on the map and follow a more direct route along the B roads that had radwegs alongside of them. We usually did this if it was getting late and we needed to get to a campsite PDQ. So in answer to your question I suspect we did a little of both but turned south just past ULM...Ehingen .

One thing I have to say was a problem for me was the German habit of riding on the pavements in the towns. I am used to staying on road even in busy traffic, so is my bike. The continuous jumping over kerbs and changeable surfaces played havoc with my low riders which broke twice. Once I managed to fix it temporality with a spare spd cleat screw. Eventually I had a bike shop run a proper bolt through the low riders braze ons so that the continuous vibrations and schocks could no longer loosen the screws.