Valdo - Pula

I'm sitting here in Pula, Croatia on Zoran's parents' balcony, overlooking downtown and the massive soccer stadium. Little brisk this morning, but sunny.
Pos: N 44.863570, E 13.851446

Back to Valdo for a moment. Saturday dawned to a fairly decent hangover. Definitely felt the countless bottles of Prosecco, not to mention the grappas - 3, maybe 4? that finished the night. Felt a little better after a walk to the store to pick up Bigoli and Bottarga. A solid breakfast (after all, we hadn't eaten in 12h), largely finished the recovery. We then set off to Bassano del Grappa because the blood alcohol levels were also dropping precipitously (well, some of our group, who will remain nameless to protect the guilty,  had already addressed the issue with a breakfast beer).
Bassano is a lovely old town with a popular, key feature - the Ponte del Vecchio. An ancient bridge that has been rebuilt numerous times over the centuries, the last time after WW2. In one of the towers is a bar that serves precisely one drink - as far as anyone knows, called a Rosso, which is a Nardini Amaro, with some seltzer and a lemon wedge. This is dispensed out of a tap by the hundreds. You grab one and the stand on the bridge and drink it. A very popular past time, esp at sunset, but appropriate for any time of day really.

We then set off to Asolo, a lovely village on a hilltop and had a Aperol spritz. Very much a cocktail of summer and indeed the temps reached nicely into the 80s.

Upon arriving back at the Riva we found that the local Ferrari club had come by for lunch and there were 16 of them parked all over the grounds. Wow. They did let one Lambo come along.

We settled in for lunch under the the birch. Home made bigoli with duck ragout, washed down by bucket of Prosecco. Aaaaahhhh.

After a nap and digesting precious little of lunch, we congreated to have another dinner - we mostly did skip the primi, except for the boys who probably figured they needed strength to lift all the Prosecco cases the next day. I largely behaved myself, since the next day I was riding.

The ride down to Pula was straight forward and boring. 250km of straight and empty highway, and a few villages. Slovenia had one hill with a few corners, but that was it for the excitement. By the time I got here, Mrs. Hruskar had a big meal prepared with lots of local sausage, meat, Tartufi , Strudel and a couple of bottles of local wine. We then went for a nice walk through town. Pula has an an astonishingly complete Roman arena. It's again being used for performances, which must be amazing.

Valdobbiadene, Treviso

Took me a day to get to get WIFI sorted, so I'm a day behind.
I'm at N 45.887016, E 12.000211

Fri, May 9. Hopped out of bed at 6am in order to get an early start into Italy. After breakfast I was on the road by 7:30. It was cloudy and some showers were in the air, so I was mulling whether to take the highway or back road up the Brenner pass. In the end, I decided to stay off the Autobahn and wake myself up with a few curves. Make that lots of curves. The first 15 miles up the Brennerstrasse are nothing but twisties. Yeehaw. No time for day dreaming, just settle in and go. It occurred to me that motorcycling on a road like that, driving on a track and cooking at a high level have similar attributes - focus and adrenalin. The world is blocked out, you're in the moment.
I haven't even hit the great passes yet and I'm already loving it. You need to definitely stay within your limits and lots of warning signs remind you of that. Crashing is not something you want to do on any day, but here you have the added twist that you will then fall off a mountain... Not recommended.
So after I crossed the Brenner I hopped on the Autostrada and started descending into Italy. It's really quite astonishing, in that you drive downhill for 100km, all the way to Bolzano. The temps rose probably about 20 deg from maybe 45 deg at the top, so I had to stop a couple of times to peel off layers.
All was not smooth however. As you leave the Brenner highway there are toll booths. I remembered that I had my wallet packed, so I decided to quickly pull off into a rest stop. There, I found out that that you just get a ticket and pay when you exit. Sigh, wasted stop. Fine, off we go. Wait, how do I get out of here? And surely I can get on the right road through this exit.... NOT. Back on the highway to Austria. NOOOOOOOOOO. Trying not to get totally pissed and simply enjoy the scenery - again. Next exit 10 miles, peel off ride down the local road. 20 min later, back where I started. Fine, onwards, don't dwell on it. The rest was smooth sailing and I rolled into Valdo by 12:20. 275 km. I was beat.
Valdobbiadene is Prosecco country. Vines as far as the eye can see.

The Riva de Milan, is what is referred to as agrotourisme. A farm, with a restaurant and rooms attached. The main business used to be growing and making Prosecco, but over the years they built a separate building of guest rooms and the restaurant is heavily visited by locals as well as tourists.

I was welcomed by the proprietor who asked if I wanted some Prosecco 5 seconds after he handed me the key. Why yes, what an excellent question. I dumped my stuff in the room, took a quick shower and settled down outside with a bottle and glass. Heaven. What could be better? A short while later a plate of salume showed up! Never assume that things cannot improve, even if they already seem perfect!

About an hour later, my parents arrived and we drove to Ca Salina, the preferred Prosecco supplier, to meet the rest of the group. He has a very nice table up on the hill where the seven of polished off a few bottles of Prosecco and  some salume - are we seeing a pattern yet?

The purpose of the trip for the rest of the group is to buy Prosecco for the year, so the two strapping young lads of the group drive down with a flatbed van, which can take 93 cases. It's popular...
Back to the Riva for a nap and then later dinner with lots of - yep - Prosecco, salume, gnocci with ragout, salad, filet. As happend last time, I hit Prosecco saturation half way through and had to switch to red wine. Not really specialty of the house, but great nonetheless. Some dolce and grappa to finish everything off. Nice.

Innsbruck, Austria

OK then, first on the road post.

Well, I managed to get most of my gear packed. This was a nontrivial affair and involved repacking the bags after the cases wouldn't close and adding my messenger bag for a little bit of extra storage. I will not be getting any souvenirs. Definitely a new experience. There's quite a bit of 'just in case' gear in there that just wouldn't be necessary on a shorter trip or indeed if this wasn't a shoulder season. By the time I got into Innsbruck it was in the 70s and tomorrow morning, when I ride up the Brenner pass it'll be around 40.

The ride into Innsbruck was nice. Total 330 km. I did most of it off highway, stopped for lunch at the side of the road. Turns out those side cases make a decent table.

I hopped on the highway after Memmingen. Was tooling along at a comfy 85-90 mph, when after crossing into Bavaria and the Allgaeu, the Alps came into view. Very cool. It was really momentous to have that first glimpse of the snow tipped peaks. Of course they became ever more prominent as I crossed into Austria and then I was just in them. Drove up the Fernpassstrasse and right past the Zugspitze.

Slight delay as they closed the road to remove some debris from a minor rock slide (No worries, nothing to see here), but I made it to the hotel without any trouble.

Innsbruck is literally surrounded by mountains. This is not a huge surprise if you look at a map, but it is very striking when you're just ambling about town.

Grabbed a beer in the old town and the with the aid of Yelp, tracked down a very local bar/restaurant just a half a block of the tourist square, called "die Wilderin" (the (female) poacher). Had Kohlrabi carpachio and a horse ragout with spinach bread dumpling, accompanied by old vine Zweigelt. Fantastic. Wish I could get that wine stateside. Had a body more akin to cabernet than Zweigelt. Nonetheless, I stopped early, since I am planning one hitting the road before 8 am tomorrow.

Scharzwald addendum

There are two videos in that post which don't show up on email - way too big. Gotta go to the website to see them.

Also, those BMW bags are not as big as they seem. Who knew that a couple of t-shirts take up that much space. Also, 2 pairs of shoes (as in running shoes) - right out.

Off to Innsbruck...

Schwarzwald

So two 250 km Black Forest tours later I think I'm ready for the Alps. That was about 9h of awesome scenery, first gear switchbacks, 80 mph sweepers, mountains, passes, valleys, all basically starting minutes from my parents' place. Who knew? The start of the Black Forest is about 30 min away from here, but just getting there on the well maintained German "Landstrassen" is a joy. Lots of fields with rolling hills and no one around. To be sure on some sections you run into traffic, but that can usually be dispatched rapidly, though there were a few teeth gritting passages stuck behind trucks.
The valleys of the Black forest are dotted with loads of little spa villages. Some for the air, some for mineral springs. I, of course, tried to make haste and get past them and the tourists contained within. One wonders what all the tourist cars do for the air quality. The crowd of motorcycles on the road there on weekends do the rest to upset the tranquility. Rode up one mountain that had a 60 kmh (40 mph) limit to keep the noise down. Oi. Earplugs, people, earplugs :)

Still figuring out the the bike cam. I decided to keep it mounted on the bike, but I'm still trying to figure out the best spot. Did one attempt yesterday that resulted in unusable video due to vibrations, because the mounting arm was too long. Oh well. Getting the hang of making clips and frame grabs.

I think I'm used to the BMW now. Doesn't handle much different from the Tiger, which is good and not too surprising. Same type of seating position, similar power, similar weight. The BMW is about 50 lbs heavier, both have 100 hp, which is sufficient, since high speed isn't an option with luggage anyway.

Apart from riding, I'm chilling, hanging out with my sister's family - Judith, Eddie and nephew Jamie, which is very nice. I don't normally see that much of them when I'm here, which is too rare as it is.

Tomorrow, I'm off for Italy, well Austria really. I'll be staying overnight in Innsbruck and then Fri morning I'll be setting off across the Brenner pass for Valdobbiadene. Planning on riding about 5h tomorrow, half on secondary roads and half highway. All highway did not seem very enticing. If I get into Valdo in time, I'll take a quick run through the Dolomites before meeting my parents at the Prosecco winery (not sure if that makes it a prosecorria?).

Today is final prep day. Do my first load of hand wash - oh joy, do some route planning, pack the bike. Ready to roll...

Arrived in Germany

Made it here without problems. Smooth flight, no bumps, no delays. That's how I like it. No, I still didn't "enjoy" the flight. Why do they keep asking that? The subway driver doesn't...
My parents surprised me by being at the airport to say hello before heading off to Italy. My brother-in-law picked me up - and then later that night knocked me out with a Weizenbock.

Coordinates for my parents' place: N 48.717917, E 8.888323 

Germany is GREEN. I was blown away by how much further along spring was than at home. They didn't have much of a winter here and spring took hold nice and early.

Today I picked up the bike I'll be riding for the next 3 weeks - 2004 BMW R1200GS. 40000km on the clock - That's barely broken in for a BMW. Sweet bike, not a speed demon. The boxer vibes get a bit much over 100mph. That's ok, I'll try to avoid highways anyhow. Great weather to pick up a bike - 45 deg and drizzling. Bleh. What happened to spring? Heated vest and hand grips are a good thing.

And yes, that's me in my battle gear.

Tomorrow it's time to have some fun and start getting used to the BMW. Planning a day ride through the black forest.

D Day

Well, the day has finally arrived. I'm sitting at Newark airport, waiting to board - and feeling the pain of typing on a tablet. The Bluetooth keyboard is safely (l hope) in my 85 lbs of checked luggage. Perhaps I should have followed the advice of tossing half of what you think you need.

Was trying to figure out what I'm feeling right now and the answer is tired. Big rush from 6 am till now - 5 pm, and now I'm crashing. Boarding is in a few. Time to get on the plane and take a nap!

There have been requests to note my position wherever I go, so here are my current coordinates. Just plug them into Google maps.

My current position: 40.698193 N, -74.178904 E