Vosges and Black Forest, May 2011

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I suppose someone had better start a ride report...

Five bikes, six people, and a week staying mainly in Turckheim, near Colmar. Turckheim itself is a pleasant little town with a selection of restaurants. Conveniently placed in the foothills of the Vosges, amid lots of vineyards, and about 20 mins from the Rhine. Or, put another way, both the Vosges and the Black Forest are on your doorstep. It was a short ride to Haut Koenigsburg, WEBSITE a big old castle on top of a mountian with an amazing road up to it - fast , smooth, twisty, and climbing 2,500 feet in not very far at all.

Anyway, four bikes met up on Tuesday morning at Eurotunnel - Wapping (Richard) on his F800R, ncpierce (Nigel), billynomates (Ian and Karen) both on R1200GS Adventures and me on my K1200GT. Day one was a gentle wander down to a hotel near Verdun, about ten minutes on the autoroute to get away from Calais, then on a selection of big and little N- and D-roads. Lovely scenic route, nice gentle riding to start the week, and lunch noteworthy only for a minor incendiary incident involving a discarded dog-end and a flower pot. (Little did I know that at a similar time a rather more serious incendiary incident was developing at Robin Towers back in Blighty...) The hotel that night in Marre had a restaurant that seemed to specialise in serving unorthodox bits of dead animals - pigs ears and beef cheeks, frogs and kangaroo legs. I didn't get a room with pornography on the walls...
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Day two saw us head to Turckheim via Toul, Luneville and Saint-Die, although I split from the others at Toul to wait for the sixth member of the group, Richard on his Ducati ST4S who hadn't been able to leave the previous day. As the others continued, I meandered down taking plenty of breaks for coffee (and even a decent little nap on a park bench in Neufchateau). It took him longer than expected to catch up, and eventually we met at the top of the Col de la Schlucht in the early evening.
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Ian was laid low by a passing stomach bug the next day, so four of us headed out for a trip to the Black Forest, with a lunch break at Titisee. Lovely weather in the morning, a few showers in the afternoon, and lovely roads all day. Not quite the dramatic hairpins of a high Alpine pass, but beautiful roads everywhere, with every imaginable combination of corner. The density of traffic, especially compared with the South-East of England, is just a revelation. Occasional traffic gives a minor challenge of something to overtake, but most of the time it was empty roads.
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The following saw us riding round the southern half of the Vosges - a bit of the Route des Cretes, which is just fantastic in my view (apart form the occasional cobbled hairpinjust when you least expect it), and a trip to the Ballon des Vosges. Weather was a little cooler, with a low of 4.5 Celsius at the highest point, but we were spared any consistent periods of rain. We seemed to split up a bit that day for some reason.

I'm not entirely sure where we went or what we did the next day. I believe that might have bee the day I got back early and had a few beers with the Other Richard in the cafe on the corner. For some reason it became important to identify a place in Essex beginning with 'J' - saved by a chap touring in his XJS Cabrio at the next table who suggested Jaywick Sands. Mission complete.

Sunday saw us heading for the Rhine Falls in Switzerland. Very pretty, very popular with Asian coach parties including one chap from Calcutta with ginger hair, and all a bit sterile.
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The others went on a boat trip to the falls, I was suffering with a bit of an upset stomach following the previous night's pizza with an egg on, so decided to stay on terra firma. All was well by the evening for an unbelievable steak and chips at our hotel.

Monday saw TOR and me heading straight for Calais home while the others took a two-day route back via Dijon. Col du Bonhomme, coffee in Luneville, then back via Ardennes, including the Semois valley on the France/Belgium border, before picking up the motorway at Charleroi in Belgium, and thunderstorms an hour later. Just after Richard's waterproofs and gloves had detached themselves from his bike. Still, I was nice and dry.

Others may be along shortly with more detailed information on the routes we took. All I remember is laughing a lot every evening, and riding lovely roads. Thanks to Wapping for arranging and planning it all, planning a million routes we didn't ever use, and generally being a cool Tour Dad again.
 
OK,

I'll stick my recollections up here as well.

I have a distinct lack of photographs - apart from the Rhine Falls which look pretty similar to Robin's!

After the ride down on the Tuesday/Wednesday and the trip into the Black Forest on the Thursday Wapping and I did a fantastic loop around the southern Vosges (as recommend by the Michelin Man in his 80 virees a moto book) on the Friday.

It was about 233miles and took us most of the day but despite the variable weather (very cold at times, torrential showers and some sunshine) has to rate as one of the best days I have ever spent on the bike. No near misses on bends, very little traffic and just one of those days when everything clicked.

Saturday saw a foray for Ian/Karen, Wapping and I back into the Black Forest for a pleasant bimble around. Ended up in Triberg (Cuckoo Clock Town) for lunch in the old bank strong room before a nice ride back through some of the smaller roads (missing most of the B500 out).

Sunday was the trip to The Rheinfallen. We took a boat trip out the island in the middle of the falls where you are dropped off for 10mins to climb to the top and back before being collected. We took a trip across the river and then the glass lift up to the castle for a bit of lunch. The day was finished with a brief river cruise up to the falls and back before the tip back across Switzerland and Germany to France. What I learnt was to stick your panniers back on so you have somewhere to leave your crash helmet and jacket instead of having to carry them around all day.

Monday saw us all packed and ready to leave and the intrepid four heading south :confused: towards Dijon for an overnight stay. The temperature on my bike peaked at 33.5 degrees Celsius following a lorry out of Vesoul after the lunch stop. The less said about the leaving of Vesoul the better but it was the only time all trip that we lost our esteemed leader.

After a nice meal at the Logis south of Dijon it was the long ride home on Tuesday. A run up the D996 (in the damp) started the day before a short stint of autoroute up to Troyes and then cross country to St Quentin before the last autoroute slog up to Calais to get the train home.

I managed 1867miles in the week and did not want to go back to work. Also probably over indulged in the eating as well:augie

Thanks Wapping (Richard) for organising and the others for their company.

In case you are interested the hotels we used were as follows:-

Just South of Verdun

Turkheim

Just south of Dijonl
 
I'll try and put together my track logs and routes for the week and stick them up some time in the next couple of days.

Nigel
 
Great thread!


I am heading to the Vosges on the 18th June.http://www.bmw-club.org.uk/~eastanglia/Events/2011/Vosges/Vosges.html

Do you have any intersting routes for the Black Forest?

Tom

Hi Tom

This was the third year I've spent any time in the Black Forest, including the "main" one a few years ago when we rode from north to south. I've heard and read people talking about the B500 as a great road but, to be honest, one person's idea of a great road will vary from another's. In my opinion, all the roads are pretty good. I don't know if you've been there before, but the name Black Forest is a little misleading - the most notable feature of the area is the mountains rather than the trees!

If you enjoy riding up and down passes, just aim for the particularly twisty roads on a large scale map.

The route we took a few years ago was (vaguely North to South): Gaggennau - Bad Herrenalb ("Big Hairyknob") - Wildbad im Schwarzwald - Calmbad - Calw - Grombach - Freudenstadt - Wolfach - Triberg - Schonwald - Furtwagen - Titisee - Todtnau - Schonau - then can't remember, but we ended up back in France. That was split over two days, camping near Freudenstadt, but I can still remember it as being a great ride. But we weren't at all scientific about route selection, and I'm sure there are equally good (or better) roads elsewhere.

Bear in mind that it'll take you around an hour to reach the Black Forest from Domaine des Bains. However, that will involve going over the Col de la Schlucht from Gerardmer, so that's no bad thing. Try to avoid Colmar to cross the Rhine - I'd suggest heading via Marckolsheim.

For a decent round trip, try this:

Gerardmer - Orbey - Marckolsheim - Riegel (coffee) - Triberg - Furtwangen - Titisee (lunch) - Todtnau - Badenweiller - around Mulhouse somehow - Cernay - Gerardmer. About 250 miles, and a top day's ride for roads and scenery. (Cernay to Gerardmer is the southern end of the Route Des Cretes, I think, and is a jolly nice ride on its own.)

(Place you're staying looks good. :thumb2)

Robin.
 
Thanks for the heads up Robin.

I will see what routes I can put together with the info you provide in Mapsource.

All the best

Tom
 
Hi Tom,

There is a thread where I put together a whole bunch of Vosges / Black Forest routes, all converted into Mapsource.

http://www.ukgser.com/forums/showthread.php?t=244746&highlight=Vosges

I lifted them from assorted sources, including Michelin's 80 Motorcycle Routes and ADAC. You can download the ADAC maps from their website.

The day out in the Vosges Nigel describes was indeed one of the Michelin routes, whilst the jaunt
to the falls was lobbed together from a decent map on the morning. There are so many good roads compressed into a smallish area you'll not go far wrong, for sure.

I agree about the B500. A great road if there was no other way to get from A to B. What the ADAC and Michelin routes do is mix in large chunks of the lesser roads all crisscrossing the area. We bumped in to several packs of motorcycle tours at assorted points along our days out, all probably using the same ADAC or Michelin suggestions.....or maybe they were just lost?

Distances? A lot depends on you, your riding companions and what you expect from the day and, not least, the weather. We saw temperatures that fluctuated from the high 20's / low 30's down to 4.5C. In other words, a very hot summer's day down to say, February. If you are in a large group, who want to make lots of stops, anything over 200 is a long way if there are no motorway chunks. A bimble with a couple of mates? 150 can take all day if you want it to. A couple of bods who want to press on, coffee stop in the morning, a 45 minute lunch, a coffee stop in the afternoon? 280ish,
I guess, with no motorway sections. Those are the rough rules of thumb I use.
 
be aware the B500 is closed between titisee and schluchsee for a distance of about 3kms and you have to make a huge detour..... unless its a sunday and we rode thru the roadworks followed by lots of fist shaking from the locals on pushbikes :comfort

i would also advise to avoid the main roads in the vosges on a weekend, esp the route de cretes as its caravan and sunday driver time.

thousands of smaller nicer roads around....
 
Enjoyed that, maybe I'll do a bit of the same, next month on my way back from Garmisch/Dolomites
 
Hi Tom,

There is a thread where I put together a whole bunch of Vosges / Black Forest routes, all converted into Mapsource.

http://www.ukgser.com/forums/showthread.php?t=244746&highlight=Vosges

I lifted them from assorted sources, including Michelin's 80 Motorcycle Routes and ADAC. You can download the ADAC maps from their website.

The day out in the Vosges Nigel describes was indeed one of the Michelin routes, whilst the jaunt
to the falls was lobbed together from a decent map on the morning. There are so many good roads compressed into a smallish area you'll not go far wrong, for sure.

I agree about the B500. A great road if there was no other way to get from A to B. What the ADAC and Michelin routes do is mix in large chunks of the lesser roads all crisscrossing the area. We bumped in to several packs of motorcycle tours at assorted points along our days out, all probably using the same ADAC or Michelin suggestions.....or maybe they were just lost?

Distances? A lot depends on you, your riding companions and what you expect from the day and, not least, the weather. We saw temperatures that fluctuated from the high 20's / low 30's down to 4.5C. In other words, a very hot summer's day down to say, February. If you are in a large group, who want to make lots of stops, anything over 200 is a long way if there are no motorway chunks. A bimble with a couple of mates? 150 can take all day if you want it to. A couple of bods who want to press on, coffee stop in the morning, a 45 minute lunch, a coffee stop in the afternoon? 280ish,
I guess, with no motorway sections. Those are the rough rules of thumb I use.

Thanks for that Richard, I'll take a look at the thread. I am sure I will be able to form a route from them.:thumb

Tom
 


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