Moien!

Kilometers cycled so far: 10004

I've managed to really pack in a lot this month, so this one is going to be a long one, but I hope not too boring....

Rome:

After my last update, I had another day to continue exploring Rome and by coincidence and old work mate was on holiday there with his girlfriend. So we hooked up to check out St Peters church and to go out to dinner (thanks for shouting, Henry!).

Northern Italy:

Then I was off again northward to Siena and then on to Florence. I now see why people rave about Florence and they have good reason. Even full of tourists, it was a beautiful city. So it was here that I spent my birthday: a visit to the Uffizi gallery and later that night, I managed to hook up a top crew of people (3 aussies, 3 americans and a couple of germans) at the camp ground bar and partied on into the small hours.

Then again, it was the usual story of cooking in my tent in the morning sun and followed by a fuzzy cycle to Bologna. I choose this route especially to sample some authentic Spaghetti Bolognese and wasn't disappointed by the food or the city. From here it was an easy run to Milan where I was to meet Simon for the much anticipated Milan to Zurich leg.

When I met Simon at the train station, he'd bought the Dublin weather with him - it was bucketing for the first time in about 2 weeks. But we were lucky and got to Lake Como fairly dry. Surrounded by mountains, the lake was still beautiful, despite the clouds.

I left most of the route planning to Simon, which meant some very sore legs, because the third day started in Tirano (450m above sea level) and cranked up the Passo del Stelvio (2757m !). It's harder to find bigger pass in the alps and it getting up there was definatly one of the best moments in my last 6 months. And that was a perfect way to say goodbye to Italy and hello to Switzerland.

Switzerland:

Simon's sadism didn't stop there; the following day he had us up and down two passes! Thankfully they were not on the scale of Stelvio. But we were not very good conversation as we scoffed pasta in the Kloster's youth hostel. After that, the days were a little more sedate as we crusied through small "model train" villages and lakes. This included a visit to Maienfeld ("Heidi-land") and lunch in Liechtenstein one day.

We hit Zurich just in time for the weekend, and Simon and some of his mates did a great job of showing me around his old home town and it's variety of bars, including a bit of Thai Karaoke (to everyone's relief, I gave the singing a miss). But this topped off a great week - it was brilliant to travel with someone with the local knowledge and who always on for a beer and a joke and it was all too quickly that Simon had to catch his plan and I was on my way to Bern. And from here, zig-zagged my way northwards.

South Western Germany/North Eastern France:

The first stop was the black forest. The weather was sunny and the beer at the campgrounds was good, cold and cheap - perfect. From here I stopped in at the cities of Freiburg, Stratsbourg and Saarbrucken. My time in each was very brief, but each were beautiful cities with a mixed French/German feel.

As I cut across that top bit of France, I was lucky to stumble on the Youth Hostel in Saverne: probably my one and only chance to stay in a château. I was amazed that there were beds available on a Friday night and even more amazed that they were only 8 euros per night.

Then, back in German I thought it was time for something completely different... And this was a visit to the Volklinger Iron works, a unique reminder of the German industrial heyday and a UNESCO world heritage site.

Luxembourg:

I kicked off my tour of Luxembourg with a nice run along the Moselle river. Of course, you can't travel along the Route du Vin with out a stop off in one of the vineyards for some wine tasting. But I showed some restriant and was still able to ride in a mostly straight line.

I arrived in Luxembourg city yesterday and am so far very impressed. It's a beautiful, compact city with a very cosmopolitan feel and prices more reasonable than I had feared.

Well, that's about it for this month. From here the plan is to check out a bit of Belgium, Holland, Northern German and Demark - beer country! Even still, it will be tough to beat the month just gone...

All the best,
Rob.