Black Forest Tour
The Plan
A nice easy tour to the Black Forest with the Journey broken by a stop in France on the way in and out, also gave us some time to look around WW1 sites at Verdun.
The Bike
I was on my ZZR1400 with MCT reworked forks and shock, so prefered the faster bits of road and did not go down too many tiny lanes.
Day 1
Boring run down to Folkestone for the Train, for me this involves leaving my house, going across about 4 roundabouts before I am on the M40, then M25, Then M20/M26 - 150 miles without a single corner!
Once in France it was a relatively boring blast for a few hours down the A26 before I could turn cross country to Dun-Sur-Meuse, Dark clouds where everywhere and we came across some damp / wet roads almost escaping the forecast torrential rains until we were about an hour away from the B&B, 20 minutes of heavy rain, then all was OK again.
The French motorways as ever were dead, combined with an official 130kph limit (83mph) allowing an indicated 95 cruise without fear of the feds.
Arrived at http://www.twowheelmoorings.co.uk in good time, the main reason we broke up the trip is as to not have tight schedules as the Forest is an extra 2.5 hours and would have been an all motorway affair.
Accommodation was excellent, comfy place with great riverside location on a corner by a big war memorial and bridge over the river. A rather neat garage at the side of the house has a two-level storage for bikes courtesy of a lift, so all bikes were locked away within the house building.
The service was 1st class with tea being made on arrival and Carol offering to dry any wet items overnight, everything here is perfect for those with bikes with handy in-room hangers and shelves for helmets and leathers etc.
Ian and Carol are superb hosts and I will definitely stay their again.
Day Two
On to the Black Forest, again lots of motorway right up until last glorious run as you enter the Black Forest, Pension Williams is just on the near side of the Forest about half way up – in fact perfect for the bike roads and bang dead central for all good roads, especially the B500 as they are at the start of the tighter (best) bit.
On the way out we visited the Ossuary – Google “Ossuary Verdun”, and looked around the area abit on the way out.
A very moving place, you can see into the basement to where the bones of @130,000 unnown soldiers are stored.
Pension Williams is the perfect place to stay, great location, excellent view from room balcony, top class service – the best I have ever experienced, Angela and David just cannot do enough for you, we had lifts to restaurants and stations and nothing was too much trouble for them.
http://www.pension-williams.com/
Great View from most Rooms:
Although not bikers they certainly know how to look after us!
On the first night David gave us the run down of where to eat and then took us up the road to a Steakhouse and arranged for the owner to bring us back, we then set about his honesty bar with the help of two other couples staying there.
Day three
A nice run around North East part of Black Forest, some great roads and scenery were to be had, plus the famous B500.
Day Four
Off-bike, David took us to station to save us a 25 minute walk and told us to call when we return and he would collect us. Public transport was free using pass provided by David at Hotel so we went to Baden-Baden and spent an afternoon relaxing in the springs Google “caracalla baden” for more info.
Day Five
We decided to visit the Europark, a giant Alton Towers only much better, except the German kids had not gone back to School and it was rammed so we missed out on a couple of the biggest rides as we could not be bothered to queue.
Day Six
Out to the Triberg Waterfalls, we passed through some lovely valleys, up and down some great mountains and stopped off to look at the Kaiserstuhl Formations.
Wolfach (on the way to Triberg) above
Kaiserstuhl Pictures below
Great roads, great views, so good we passed by our accommodation and went up and down some of the B500 again.
Day Seven
Back to Verdun, woke to another perfect day, unfortunately it turned a bit dull in France and we had the odd spot of drizzle on our travels.
We did manage to see some more of Verdun though as it is under 3 hours form BF, so we visited the Forts of Duamont and for Vaux – where the famous Pigeon won a medal for Valour.
Very interesting we went in both forts as it was fairly cheap and they are close together (2 miles apart tops) we also filmed a drive by at the Ossaury wargrave and stopped to look at the destroyed village of Fluery before driving off to the American Cemetery (Quite a way away from the other stuff, but near where we were staying) - for future reference it is easy to swing by this place when heading to TWM from the UK, it takes you about 10 minutes out of your way - on some great little country lanes.
The American Cemetery was particularly moving
Forts:
http://www.geocities.com/Pentagon/Base/3495/FVerdun1a.html
Fluery
http://www.webmatters.net/france/ww1_verdun_champbat.htm
Then another perfect night at Two Wheel Moorings
Day Eight
Had to come home.
Returned to both Pension Williams and Two Wheel Moorings on our Alps 2010 tour and friends of ours are getting married at Pension Williams in 2011 so we are going to both these places again, before heading off to French Alps for a week.
The Plan
A nice easy tour to the Black Forest with the Journey broken by a stop in France on the way in and out, also gave us some time to look around WW1 sites at Verdun.
The Bike
I was on my ZZR1400 with MCT reworked forks and shock, so prefered the faster bits of road and did not go down too many tiny lanes.
Day 1
Boring run down to Folkestone for the Train, for me this involves leaving my house, going across about 4 roundabouts before I am on the M40, then M25, Then M20/M26 - 150 miles without a single corner!
Once in France it was a relatively boring blast for a few hours down the A26 before I could turn cross country to Dun-Sur-Meuse, Dark clouds where everywhere and we came across some damp / wet roads almost escaping the forecast torrential rains until we were about an hour away from the B&B, 20 minutes of heavy rain, then all was OK again.
The French motorways as ever were dead, combined with an official 130kph limit (83mph) allowing an indicated 95 cruise without fear of the feds.
Arrived at http://www.twowheelmoorings.co.uk in good time, the main reason we broke up the trip is as to not have tight schedules as the Forest is an extra 2.5 hours and would have been an all motorway affair.
Accommodation was excellent, comfy place with great riverside location on a corner by a big war memorial and bridge over the river. A rather neat garage at the side of the house has a two-level storage for bikes courtesy of a lift, so all bikes were locked away within the house building.
The service was 1st class with tea being made on arrival and Carol offering to dry any wet items overnight, everything here is perfect for those with bikes with handy in-room hangers and shelves for helmets and leathers etc.
Ian and Carol are superb hosts and I will definitely stay their again.
Day Two
On to the Black Forest, again lots of motorway right up until last glorious run as you enter the Black Forest, Pension Williams is just on the near side of the Forest about half way up – in fact perfect for the bike roads and bang dead central for all good roads, especially the B500 as they are at the start of the tighter (best) bit.
On the way out we visited the Ossuary – Google “Ossuary Verdun”, and looked around the area abit on the way out.
A very moving place, you can see into the basement to where the bones of @130,000 unnown soldiers are stored.
Pension Williams is the perfect place to stay, great location, excellent view from room balcony, top class service – the best I have ever experienced, Angela and David just cannot do enough for you, we had lifts to restaurants and stations and nothing was too much trouble for them.
http://www.pension-williams.com/
Great View from most Rooms:
Although not bikers they certainly know how to look after us!
On the first night David gave us the run down of where to eat and then took us up the road to a Steakhouse and arranged for the owner to bring us back, we then set about his honesty bar with the help of two other couples staying there.
Day three
A nice run around North East part of Black Forest, some great roads and scenery were to be had, plus the famous B500.
Day Four
Off-bike, David took us to station to save us a 25 minute walk and told us to call when we return and he would collect us. Public transport was free using pass provided by David at Hotel so we went to Baden-Baden and spent an afternoon relaxing in the springs Google “caracalla baden” for more info.
Day Five
We decided to visit the Europark, a giant Alton Towers only much better, except the German kids had not gone back to School and it was rammed so we missed out on a couple of the biggest rides as we could not be bothered to queue.
Day Six
Out to the Triberg Waterfalls, we passed through some lovely valleys, up and down some great mountains and stopped off to look at the Kaiserstuhl Formations.
Wolfach (on the way to Triberg) above
Kaiserstuhl Pictures below
Great roads, great views, so good we passed by our accommodation and went up and down some of the B500 again.
Day Seven
Back to Verdun, woke to another perfect day, unfortunately it turned a bit dull in France and we had the odd spot of drizzle on our travels.
We did manage to see some more of Verdun though as it is under 3 hours form BF, so we visited the Forts of Duamont and for Vaux – where the famous Pigeon won a medal for Valour.
Very interesting we went in both forts as it was fairly cheap and they are close together (2 miles apart tops) we also filmed a drive by at the Ossaury wargrave and stopped to look at the destroyed village of Fluery before driving off to the American Cemetery (Quite a way away from the other stuff, but near where we were staying) - for future reference it is easy to swing by this place when heading to TWM from the UK, it takes you about 10 minutes out of your way - on some great little country lanes.
The American Cemetery was particularly moving
Forts:
http://www.geocities.com/Pentagon/Base/3495/FVerdun1a.html
Fluery
http://www.webmatters.net/france/ww1_verdun_champbat.htm
Then another perfect night at Two Wheel Moorings
Day Eight
Had to come home.
Returned to both Pension Williams and Two Wheel Moorings on our Alps 2010 tour and friends of ours are getting married at Pension Williams in 2011 so we are going to both these places again, before heading off to French Alps for a week.
