For ease the next day, we decided that we would do another cycle from the campsite, rather than having to move the van. So instead of heading east down to Lienz, we headed in the opposite direction with the plan of cycling around 60km. Again the route was excellent with mostly very good surfaces and almost no cycling on roads.
After wild parking in a beautiful location on the first night, and enjoying a wonderful pizza nearby, we definitely wanted to be in a campsite for the next night given the heat. Therefore we decided to head to near Sillian where there was a nice campsite which was still reasonably priced. Unfortunately we could not check in until the afternoon, so we parked next to the campsite and started our cycle straight from there. The plan was to cycle along the Pustertal cycle path down to Lienz, which was all on an excellent surface and all either car free or on very quiet roads. The cycle was really beautiful, the only downside being that it was down all the way out, and up all the way back!
We decided to make the most of the sunny and hot weather by heading to the Chiemsee, with the plan of cycling around it. Unfortunately it turned out that in my route planning I had looked at one route which was entirely on asphalt and then managed to download an alternative route which contained a lot of gravel. The cycle was very nice, other than the gravel, with lots of excellent cycle path, nice views over the lake and towards the mountains. On the first half of the route we ended up doing the majority of the gravel, but by the middle of the cycle we started to manage to avoid most (but still not all) of the gravel with some deviations.
Thankfully 2022 was a more normal year than the previous two years, and our first full year with our new lifestyle living an hour from the Alps. A high point of the year was the number of visitors we were able to host, for skiing, walking, paragliding and climbing. We certainly made the most of living near the alps, with most weekends spend in the mountains one way or another. Winter Our winter was fairly dominated with piste skiing, where Becky progressed from tentatively skiing easy blue runs to confidently skiing red runs with the odd short black run as well! This was great to see and I am looking forward to her continued progression this year. Despite the focus on piste skiing we also squeezed some paragliding in and I managed to get 4 days of ski touring as well. General Through the winter we managed to squeeze in some paragliding, and on one of our final days of skiing of the year, I am managed to combine a morning skiing with my first proper cross country flight on my paraglider which was a very memorable experience, as I. Read the full article…
After two days of climbing our feet were certainly starting to feel uncomfortable, so we decided to take a break for climbing and headed off on a cycle around Lake Garda. The route itself was around 89km of cycling, which was split up by a ferry across Lake Garda in the middle. We set off in the morning sun from the campsite and had a very pleasurable cycle down to Lake Garda on cycle paths with wonderful scenery. We then soon joined the road down the east side of Lake Garda which was very scenic but unfortunately not in the sun for most of the ride down the lake, although this did prevent us from getting too hot! The road was really enjoyable without much ascent, not too much traffic and excellent views over Lake Garda. All too soon we were at Torri del Benaco, where we caught the boat from. We arrived perfectly timed 10mins before a ferry left, so after quickly buying a ticket and carefully walking onto the boat in cycling shoes, we were soon off across the lake on a very smooth crossing. After we crossed. Read the full article…
With a surprising early spring weekend Becky and I decided to get back on our bikes by jumping in the deep end and cycle touring the Devon coast to coast. The route was from Ilfracombe to Plymouth via sustrans route 27, which is mostly off road due to old railway lines and follows the Tarka trail, Granite way and Drake’s Trail. After the initial shock at how heavy the bikes were when loaded up with our gear the initial climb out of Ilfracombe went surprisingly well. We were soon well on our way and made reasonable time to Barnstable where we stopped at a bike shop for some warmer gloves! The rest of the first day was mostly enjoyable cycling on good cycle paths, with some road at the end of the day. We didn’t quite make it as far as we had planned but managed to find a good spot to wild camp before Okehampton. In the end this turned out to be an excellent idea as it meant we were sheltered from the wind which was fairly brutal the next morning. The next morning we woke up to. Read the full article…