As we entered from East Croatia the difference was dramatic. Suddenly we were in Russia or so it seemed – all the signs are in some form of Cyrillic, the people appear to be speaking a form of Russian, the flag hanging from many of the lampposts is the Russian one hung on its end. […]
It’s been over 23 years now since the horrible headlines of genocide and neighbour killing neighbour emanated from the Balkans. I remember riding through Bosnia 13 years ago and it was still all pretty raw, certainly still too early to discuss any of it with the locals, and not too long after to witness the […]
We’re zigzagging between Austria and Bavaria as we enjoy the roads of the Alps and tonight our rest is in Garmisch, a picture-perfect Bavarian village nested in a valley between mountain ranges. It really is the Bavarian stereotype with flower boxes hanging from the windows of all the wooden chalets, and the locals riding their […]
Coming from NZ it’s hard to envisage that you could do this with ease, but Europe is altogether different and when you set yourself the goal of riding as many mountain roads as the snow conditions will allow, you inevitably are criss-crossing over Passes that form the borders between countries. So for us to go […]
Into the Alps this time – French, Swiss, Italian, Austrian –it’s all the same range just carved up by national borders. Unfortunately for us we’re a bit early in the season to be able to ride the passes here – unlike in the Pyrenees, they are still all closed for winter. If we’d been here […]
The snow capped roads of the Pyrenees provided somewhat of a challenge to our heavily laden bikes, but steady-as-she-goes kept us all upright – even though it was every bit as cold as the Brass Monkey can be back home that we normally do if we’re in NZ. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJD9DTBTOXM&feature=youtu.be
It’s not just the corkscrew, the switchbacks, the stone walled one way stretches that make riding along the Pyranees fun – it’s the tunnels that we seem to be in and out of all day. You start to love them. I guess there’ll be a hell of a lot more of them once we hit […]
Mountain roads, always a favourite for motorcycling – and we have the Pyrenees, French and Swiss Alps in quick succession, so by the time we leave Western Europe our mountain fix should be satisfied. Starting on the West coast of Northern Spain and exiting Spain via Andorra into France has given us a great combination […]
Already on the European mainland we realise how cosmic the roading system is compared to ours in NZ. We most often have “Avoid Toll Roads”, “Avoid Highways” enabled on our GPS’s so as to keep our ride to the back country and small villages. But often these roads criss-cross over and below the fast roads […]
New Zealand and Spain have about the same per person income, Portugal’s is roughly three quarters of ours. But the regional disparities are significant. 1. The Alentjo Billed as Portugal’s largest but poorest region, this region of Portugal that’s south of Lisbon reminds us very much of those areas abandoned by progress – left with […]
