Alps, alps; and more alps.....note: unedited

We left Germany for the Austrian Alps and some big climbs.  Lots of them, so many huge passes and descents that a lot of it is a blurr.  The scenery on the clibs is awesome, when its nice out.  They take some time to get over when your bike is 40kg.  And they just kept getting bigger and more epic as we continued southwest thru Switzerland into France.  Jen decided to add a bit of distance to our route and we took the long way to Neusweinstien (the famous German castle that I'm sure I spelled wrong).  Upon reaching the castle we immediately did our laundry in the sink, in the castle.  Funny that we both reacted independantly when we noticed the sinks and upon finishing realized the other had done the same.  Great minds think alike, I hope.

We had some great weather and some bad weather.   Great campsites with epic alpine scenery and some crappy sites where I was just waiting to get busted.  A couple times were close, one time we watched a guy move brush with a tractor 50m from out tents and another time some kid showed up to milk goats, I'm sure he was trying to tell us we wern't supposed to camp there.  Kyle (Jen's boyfriend) and Hansi (from Germany) joined us for a week making stealthing clumsy at times.  But still up to now we continue to bandit camp most nights, saving money on lodging.  Just 6 campgrounds, 8 motels, and 8 youth hostel nights thus far since July 13.

Sometimes we have been a bit sloppy.  One good example is the time after eating a chicken from a roadside vendor I was pressurized to the max, I really had to pee.  So as soon as I saw a half good spot I stopped to relieve myself and leaned my bike on a post at the top of a steep banking with a long drop below.  While depressurizing I randomly looked towards my bike and notice it loose balance and start its way down the bank.  I sprung for it and managed to grab the only part within reach, the rear rim and tire, with my right hand.  Then I dug my heels into the bank and dragged its 40kg back up to the road preventing a lot of broken stuff I'm sure!

Speaking of broken stuff I am currently breaking spokes on my rear wheel.  It started in Germany when I noticed my 600g "shit quality" Velocity rim was cracking along the brake track so I re laced it with a 450g Mavic.  But I was stuck with DT spokes and even though they are 2.0's they are snapping off at the nipples.  Not good when you need 238mm spokes which no one has, one of the few cons caused by using a Rohloff.  With some effort I managed to track down a small local framebuilder who threaded and cut me seven more spokes in exchange for a postcard.  Guy Reboulet is his name and his handmade steel frames and racks are showpieces.  I sure hope cut threads are strong enough.

One night I caught Oracle Jen a nice frog after hiding in our tents during a thunderstorm.  Upon presenting it to her she yelped, go figure.  She doesn't like slugs either, which is a problem in the alps.  There are huge alpine slugs that get on your stuff while camping and leave big slime trails.  These things can handle the cold too, weird.  Kyle likes slugs though and demonstrated slug agility to Hansi and I one morning, much to our delight.  I questioned Jen's equal dislike for snails until I realized that a snail is just a slug in a pretty little shell,  such wisdom.

So I mentioned at the start that Jen got sick.  After some great alpine weather we were in for some nasty stuff as we journied west to meet Kyle and Hansi.  The last ascent in Austria was foggy and cold and we encountered a road full of cows wearing flowers being led down the mountain.  I wish we knew at the time that was the traditional ritual of taking the cows down from the mountains for winter.  The next day it poured on us and there was a few inches of snow at the top of Oberalpass at 2000+ meters and the fog so thick in the next vally we had to stop and get a hotel in Andermatt Switzerland.  In the morning it really felt like winter and snowed a few inches so they closed the passes out of the valley

I would have been content to wait for good weather to continue over Sustenpass (2200m) because I wanted to ride every inch of the way to Madrid but Kyle and Hansi were meeting us in Thun so Jen got us on the train.  The sation was conviently located 200m from the motel.  Ironically we went thru the same tunnel that Weston Price took to reach the Loetschental Valley when he wrote his book "Nutrition and Physical Degeneration".  I wanted to see the valley but that will have to wait for another time.

The day after joining Kyle Jen came down with a sore throat, understandable after big days in bad weather.  And the weather stayed cold, but dry.  Apparently Kyle had read my blog cuz he showed up with my list of four things for Jen: handlebar bag, socks, BOB fender, and.......165mm crankarms!  We installed the cranks and Jen looks great.  No more side to side reaching for the pedals.  And she said they felt great right away.

To make Jen's days easier I towed her BOB trailer over the col de la Fontaine and then super motivated (and strong) Hansi towed it over the col de la Madaline and the col du Glandon, two epic passes often used in the tour de France.  I was motivated from the change to great weather and the famous names pained on the road and climbed the Glandon's 1500m ascent in just over 2 hours; glad Hansi had the BOB trailer for that one!  The next day Hansi was free of the trailer and we did 5x4 minute threshold intevals (4 minute pulls) early in the morning to get him to the train back to Germany on time.  I don't know if he made it, it must have been close.  I sure hope so cuz we sure rode hard, hard enough to leave salt lines on my jersey.

One day that Jen was really suffering from her sore throat we had gone up a long dead end climb looking for a campground that was on our map.  Of course it wasn't there but we managed to fill water at an elderly widow's house.  Knowing Jen was not good to continue I managed to score us a home stay at her house with the help of a carpenter that was working there.  I asked if we could put our tents on the cement cuz the grass had just been planted and we ended up with the empty downstairs apartment that had been vacated 4 days before.  The electricity was off but there was hot water left in the tank for showers.  We made dinner for our host, Jacqueline, on the msr dragonfly and shared stories thru Hansi translating via German.  She even gave us two bottles of local wine.  Great experience, kinda had to be there.

Now we're in Valence resting a bit (doing laundry and finding spokes) before Kyle leaves on a train to Munich tomorrow morning.  I  hope Oracle Jen is ready for the big push to Madrid.  Kyle gave her his fast 32mm tires so that will help.  I hope I'm up for it myself cuz sometimes I'm tired of logistics lately, mostly off the bike stuff like grocery shopping and camping.  I hope the winds stay with us.

so theres some stuff thats happened, no time to edit and this French keyboard is really killing me.  I plan to upload pictures when I get home next month, sorry I haven't managed while on the road.  Other stuff...I chased a ferrari down an alp, kept catching it in the turns, saw the highest Alp: Mont Blonc, my polish toothpaste seems like bengay, Austrian alpine butter is the best in europe (maybe the best food overall is in Austria), got airborne in road construction pavement change and landed it....sweet, found the UCI, rode thru no bicycle allowed tunnels to get out of the cold rain, shaved my legs in a cold alpine brook, goosebumps = bleeding (oops) etc......