Up, up and Alpway

When someone asked me about our route before we started I would jokingly say ‘and then somehow we cross the alps’. Part of me thought we might get the train to avoid the mountains but I think we both knew in our hearts we wanted to give it a go cycling over them. As the past four weeks have gone by we have both been building immense anticipation for the stunning scenery and difficult riding we were going to endure. 

We have now completed two days of the alps and have climbed just over 1500m. Yesterday we didn’t actually gain that much altitude overall but the route had a lot of tough climbs as well as thrilling descents, we peaked at about 950m above sea level. The views were absolutely stunning. We spent a lot of time silently staring at the mountains around us in awe of their massiveness. 

We also spent a fair amount of time unable to look around us too much as we sped downhill gripping the handlebars, especially when the barriers on the side of the mountainous roads were non-existent. As we flew downhill into our first campsite we were both in good spirits after a day of challenging, but beautiful cycling. Unfortunately the campsite turned out to be a field that you had to rent the whole area of… but no worries, there was another campsite 12km along our route! We set off again (now steadily uphill), the road became rougher, our bellies got emptier and the day seemed to get exponentially longer. The ride was tough. This was partly because of the bumpy hilly road which we had to push the bike up multiple times. Mostly, though, the struggle was a mental one. We were physically tired and hungry and the 12km seemed like an impossible task. We trudged along, powered by knock off percy pigs and the thought of a warm shower. Eventually, just as evening was setting in, we arrived at the campsite. 

“I’m really sorry but it’s high season so we don’t have any space for another tent”. I honestly thought I was going to cry when the campsite receptionist told us it was full. Despite having nowhere to sleep, we both knew one thing that would help: food. We sat in the campsite restaurant and had some extremely tasty dinner while we mulled over our options for the night. We settled on sneakily using the campsite’s showers and toilets and then heading out to find a spot nearby we could stealthily camp. But just as we had finished eating, the receptionist popped over to us and said he’d managed to find space for us to camp on their site after all! Hallelujah! I once again, could have cried.

We settled in and went to explore the genuinely very luxurious facilities. We were surprised to find that the campsite was very very empty and there was a lot of space. We still don’t know why they told us they were full initially (maybe a licensing issue on the number of people or something?) but we were glad we had a safe place to sleep. 

Today we had a short day of only 25km planned but given that this was a constant uphill journey with 770m of climbing we, rightly, assumed it would be hard work. The first half of the route included some especially steep segments which we took very slowly. We were constantly asking each other if we needed to stop and probably spent as much time resting, stretching and catching our breath as we did grinding up the bigger hills. Both our muscles and our faces were burning as we ascended, at times in the full sun. Whoever said it gets colder as you go higher up clearly wasn’t cycling!  My back wasn’t feeling at its best thanks to a combination of over exerting myself on steeper hills and a subpar cycling position. Hopefully it will not cause too much trouble for the rest of the trip. We made plenty of stops at the frequent fountains giving out icy cold fresh water. Sometimes we filled up our bottles, but sometimes we stopped just to cool off by putting our hands in the cold water. The day felt long but we made it to the campsite and had no trouble finding a spot to pitch the tent tonight. We have two more days of big climbs ahead of us so I’m definitely ready for a big sleep tonight to rest my troublesome back and my tired legs. 

Tomorrow, we will have had exactly 1 month away from England and will be reaching the first big milestone of the trip, the source of the Rhine river. It’s crazy to think we have followed the river all this way powered only by bike. Fingers crossed for a happy climb!

Speak soon,

Jack and Baz