Tag: Trek Checkpoint

And so the journey begins…

On By Sharron YaxleyIn Europe3 Comments

I slept crap, again! Quite annoying waking 4 times a night whilst my body still has not adjusted.

Packing took a while as Tony needed to rig an alternative fastening system for one of our rear luggage bags, as the correct straps were left at home. A series of cable ties did the trick.

Tony working on his bike – nearly ready.
Mine is ready, sort of 😊
Each morning I have looked at this cat on the roof of the house across the road. It’s a black cat, let’s hope it is lucky.

Bidding Ben farewell we descended into Stein and crossed the Rhine into Germany.

It was a nice river path, with a variety of surfaces. The water was calm and peaceful.

Looking to the west, the direction we were heading.
Who captured my image on a broomstick without my permission?

We had decided to deviate from Germany and head back to Switzerland to a town we’d visited before en route London to Venice. Rheinfelden is a town in both countries, with a bridge joining.

Rheinfelden (Switzerland) to the left.
Looking across to Switzerland

The village was just waking up but we found a cafe to sit and have a coffee in the street below.

We had only done 20 km of what was to be a longer day so we needed to keep moving.

Back on a river track we had about 15 km to do to reach the outskirts of Basel. We rode through a series of buildings owned by Roche, which is where Ben works.

This stolen photo shows their twin towers. it was too hard to get a decent photo with this particular angle.

Looking towards the southern bank of Basel.
Looking to the north and Germany. Many barges go up and down the river.

We rode over the walkway connecting Switzerland to France at Port Louis and headed to Huningue and followed the canal, on and on and on.

The next canal was the south branch of the Rhone and Rhine canal, followed by L’Allan. One waterway seemed to become another seamlessly

Following canals can get a bit tedious. There are a variety of surfaces to contend with, plus more locks than I could count. There are also no shops meaning a lack of food options.

As we closed in around Mulhouse we departed the track to search for food, and lo and behold Paul’s boulangerie magically appeared. The food was horrid, just horrid…🤩🤪 No photos were taken as we were starving.

The building below was one of the few close to the waterways. This is a relatively modern building by European standards having been constructed in 1869. it is a seminary.

One final peaceful waterway pic.

We were pleased to arrive in Montbeliard as we were weary having ridden 139 km and adjusting to riding with the extra weight of our luggage.

Whilst it was relatively flat, we had had issues in a few busy city centres with road works, and needed to re navigate quite a few times

We were both pretty thirsty and hungry too. We had run out of water about 20 km short of our destination, so veered off the track and headed into a village. No shops. The school gates were locked but I could hear voices. I saw a lady outside her house so approached her and she kindly filled up our bidons.

We have showered and wandered around the town. Surprisingly most food places are closed tonight so made do with some basic food.

Breakfast in the hotel is at 6.30 am. We will be there promptly and will devour heaps.

Walkabouts in Montbeliard
Chateau de Montbeliard

The Chateau de Montbeliard is built on a rocky outcrop overlooking the town. There has been a fortress on this site since Gallo-Roman times.

In the 1300s the castle was privately owned until 1793 when it became part of Revolutionary France. It has since been transformed into a history museum.

Todays route is below. A three country day with 5 border crossings.

The bike survived its first full day. The Trek Checkpoint SL7 certainly handles the gravel and uneven surfaces well. it is slower on bitumen for sure, but you would expect that given the tyre size.

I am getting used to the gear change differences. Multiple times I tapped the right shifter to only make it harder lol. Etap uses shifters on both sides. I will get there.

I am hoping I get a decent sleep tonight and my tweaky back improves.

Thanks all,

Ooroo and smile on 😊

Mother’s Day jaunt

On By Sharron YaxleyIn Europe1 Comment

We were keen to get the bikes out to check and test before starting our cycle tour. I had a broken night sleep again with my body clock still out of wack. My back ultimately insisted I get out of bed and moving.

With Ben and Sharon still asleep, we snuck out and rolled down the hill into Stein. We thought we would just head to the Rhine River path, cross over to Bad Sackingen in Germany searching for a bakery to purchase items for our latter brunch.

We rolled out of Stein along a lovely bike path and arrived in Sisseln with a lovely smiley welcome.

We turned left and headed down on a dirt track to the Rhine River and admired the view.

My new bike, Trek Checkpoint SL7
Looking west along the Rhine River

We then followed this nicely formed path but were quickly turned back by a no bike sign. Then took the only other obvious option.

We pushed our bikes up a grassy hill and found another gravel path and headed back out onto the bike path, heading to Stein.

The view from the Swiss Stein side looking towards Bad Sackingen, Germany.

We rode back into Germany and nothing was open. You can see from our map we wandered around a fair bit.

Riding back into Switzerland across the covered wooden bridge. The bridge is 203.7 metres in length and is the longest roofed wooden bridge in Europe. It was built in 1272 and has been destroyed several times. The current bridge was completed in 1700.

Originally a road bridge, it is now only open for pedestrians since 1979

Viewing the bridge from the German side

Back at Ben and Sharon’s place we had a wonderful brunch with local. This was about half of what was on offer. We will need to ride 3000 km now!

We needed to work off some calories so we headed off for an afternoon walk in the local forest.

The first km was quite steep as you can see from the ascent map. Never shows in photos.

It was a beautiful forest, recently greened up with spring.

At the top of the climb, we walked around the edge of a farm with some curious cows.

The next paddock we managed to upset a bull who clearly indicated his discomfort with our presence, roaring and hoof scraping the ground. The single strand of electric tape seemed inadequate so we took the hint and moved on.

The upset bull.

Lovely farmland including flowering rapeseed (Canola).

Well signposted tracks clearly indicating direction and distance at Chatzeflue (top of this section of climb).

From Chatzeflue looking down the valley on the southern side towards the pretty village of Obermumpf.

Obermumpf

More pretty park like farmland.

At Mumpferflue, the ever reluctant Ben complying with the photographers request despite his wife’s pleading.

Mum and son

We then descended on the northern side of the hill, with views back towards Germany

Looking westerly along the Rhine, Switzerland to the left, Germany to the right.

No breeze to fly the Swiss flag

The very pretty forest carpeted with a white flower that is used for culinary purposes. It has a sweet onion smell.

Decent little walk. Our second for the day. Total walking today is 10 km, and total pottering ride, 17 km.

All set to finalise our bag packing for the morning. We plan to be on the road by 8 am at the latest. We just need Ben and Sharon to be up so we can say farewell for a few weeks.

So stay tuned, as our odyssey is imminent.

Smile on 😊

New Bike Day

On By Sharron YaxleyIn Europe8 Comments

Always an exciting day when you get a new bike – after a long gestation period, Charlie finally arrived.

Charlie – Trek Checkpoint SL7 eTap- is my new touring bike and heading off to Europe with us this week.

The gestation:

When Trek first announced the release of this bike around September 2021, Tony noted it and suggested that this would be great for me for touring – better set up, with better gearing for my knee. So I contacted Aaron Keefe at Trek Port Melbourne, who is the one who recommended me as a Trek Ambassador. It was ordered and the deposit paid.

The birth:

The bike arrived into Australia only last week. Via local contacts who pulled a few strings, the bike arrived into Tasmania last night! Thanks to Aaron for running it out to an unmanned warehouse in Sunshine North.

Aaron looking a bit bewildered – needing the secret code to get through the gate at the unmanned warehouse.

He gets through the gate and into the building – will this ensure it gets to Tasmania?

Big thanks here to Aaron and Trek for going out of their way to give the bike a chance of getting here on time. Trek also sent their marketing loan bike (albeit size down – so my actual bike was always going to be the preferable option.

If you want to talk Trek and look at what they have to offer, remembering N+1, contact Aaron – now at the Rapido store in Essendon that has recently been taken over by Trek.

Big thanks for David Urquhart, Kara and Price’s Transport for expediting the transport across Bass Strait in a matter of days – a well known Tasmanian freight carrier took around two weeks to do the same journey with the loan bike.

What does the new bike look like? What are its features?

Colour – Dark aquatic and carbon smoke.

The bike is essentially a gravel bike despite the fact that it will predominantly be on bitumen – we need to provide for all terrain surfaces touring. As we have found on previous trips, there are always mapping surprises! We have ridden through farm paddocks and vineyards, scouted land mine fields, ridden over many varieties of dirt and gravel, puddles of unknown depths.

The bike has a carbon gravel frame – SRAM wireless electronic drivetrain, carbon wheels and internal storage area for tools in the downtube.

The tyres are describes as “meaty” – and are 45mm. As a comparison for non cyclists, my road bike has 23 mm, and my Roubaix used on previous tours, 30mm. Touring is not fast – if we wanted to go fast, we would use a road bike and go on supported tours.

How much does it weigh? 8.9 kg – without me and the gear! It is rated up to 125 kg so plenty of room for those French boulangeries!

There is an integrated frame bag mounts – and thanks to Trek I have two new bags on the top tube.

Not yet ridden it – so once we are in Switzerland we will need to tweak the seat height, position etc – and fortunately the first few days of our trip are following rivers and canals so we can stop easily and play mechanics.

It is getting all very real now – this time tomorrow we will be in the air on our first leg, leaving Tasmania, and leaving our beautiful Khaleesi whom we shall miss heaps.

As you can see from the photo below, she is trying to prevent us leaving – that was a neck pillow – minus its case and some filling – and now relocated to the rubbish bin!

Talk soon!