First impressions on entering Slovakia was that we had landed in a giant cereal bowl, with seemingly endless fields of corn and wheat on the horizon - a bit like a scene out of ‘Honey I shrunk the kids!’ Our frustrating discovery that a symbol of a tent on a map does not mean there is actually a camping ground in the vicinity happily led to us spending some very comfortable and inexpensive nights in pensions (guest houses with self catering facilities). Camping does not seem to necessarily translate and sometimes can refer to private grounds with little chalets on them [View Full Entry]

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We are resting for a few days near the border of the Czech republic and Slovakia near a place called Lednice which is part of a UNESCO protected area. Czech has lakes everywhere, mostly formed by dams built dating as far back as the 15th and 16th centuries by rich aristocrats who wanted large private fishing lakes. Some of the dams displaced local people at the time and there was similar kind of political debate at the time as there is now when a dam is built. But they are now so integrated into the natural landscape that they have [View Full Entry]

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Now I know it’s not really a frontier any more these days with the EU and all that and they didn’t even look at our passport as we crossed the border from Austria into Czech, although they do still have token customs officers. But what a difference from the places we have just been. We left Munich, followed the Isar river along a beautiful but bumpy car free road until we hit the Danube, followed this east over the German/Austrian border to Linz, then headed north into the Sumava mountains that border Austria and the Czech republic. As we crossed [View Full Entry]

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We have spent the last few days cycling in the foothills of the Allgau Alps, in southern Germany. We’ve had some beautiful views and also some typical mountain weather (rain, which I think we are finally getting used to!) The famous Ludvig II Neuchwanstein castle looked very mystical in the rain, if not quite matching the postcard view. The Allgau region is very pristine, with intricately carved mountain chalets and neat geranium window boxes and many speciality farm products are sold here. The beer in this region is also very good, with small breweries still using large copper vat [View Full Entry]

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What can I say? - we love Switzerland! Switzerland has fantastic long distance cycle trails, and they don’t all involve climbing the alps. You don’t even need a map as all the routes are way-marked and take you to amazing places, into the forest, up by waterfalls, nature reserves, lakes with reed beds or enticing clear water, mountain views, quintessential farm chalets, crop fields, needle top spire churches and of course, cows with bells! Our average daily distance has gone significantly down, partly due to more challenging terrain and unsealed roads, partly due to there b [View Full Entry]

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After a month on the road on mainly flat or undulating roads, we turned with some trepidation towards the Jura ranges, on the border of the French Comte region and Switzerland, finding our hill legs at last. With visions of having to walk for 3 days, pushing our bikes, or perhaps off loading excess baggage down the side of a mountain, we commenced the climb. We rode the D437 to Pontarlier, stopping to free camp in a pine forest where we spent the night listening to cows bells, the deep resonance making it sound as if we were across the road [View Full Entry]

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Rain is not something we are particularly fond of when cycle touring and camping. Lying in the tent hearing the rain drops pelting down it always seems a daunting prospect to get up, and it’s tempting to have…a tent day (lying in bed wondering if the tent is waterproof and your shoes are wet!) But, after 3 weeks of sunshine, we must take it as it comes, and learn to live with ‘the nature’! Having left Nancy we followed the Marne du Rhin canal, using quiet back country French roads (D2, D955). It was a beautiful ride through the Parc [View Full Entry]

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For the last few days we have been heading ....south west - not exactly in the right direction to get to the Far East. Is it the strong pull of the mother land calling us back? No actually it’s the beautiful Moselle river, leading us from Koblenz in Germany, along the border of Luxembourg, and into Lorraine, North east France. We’ve been a bit more intrepid since leaving Cochem, wild camping for 2 nights in a row and was never more grateful for a shower than yesterday arriving in Nancy (those wet wipes don’t quite cut it for more than 2 [View Full Entry]

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Cycling from Holland to Germany it felt as if we were back in the rolling Kent countryside again - and yes we did feel those extra acquistions on the hills! We arrived in Aachen early and met a couple of other cycle tourists in the campground. Like many other cycle tourists we have met, they were up and out of the campsite before we had even put our heads out of the tent the next morning. There is some logic in this, it means you have covered considerable ground before the sun gets high and hot in the sky. Somehow this [View Full Entry]

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Cycling from Brugge to Maastricht was a breeze, literally, a nice strong hot tail wind blowing us across the flat plains, giving us a false sense of confidence in our abilities! We lost count of the border crossings as the border between Belgium and Netherlands is somewhat fluid and undefinable. The roads in both countries are perfectly designed for cycling, every road caters for cyclists (and cars give way to cyclists!) but the most impressive thing was crossing under the river into Antwerp where we had to use a special lift for cyclists, then cycle under the river to the other [View Full Entry]

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