For time and tire thread reasons we hauled the bikes to some starting point at a friends house on the Cote d' Azure near Menton/France and rode from there.
That saved uns 2x 1000 km and left 5 full riding days. As always it is not only about riding, but camping as well - especially camping in the rough.
Day one was just an afternoon trip, for filling up, packing, shopping and eating out. We did a light ride to some mountain villages:
A local farmers car hauling sheep - the little Citroen C15 is very popular there and perfect for small winding roads and narrow village streets:
This is what the area is like - the opposite of any highway:
After that 190 km warm-up on Sunday our camping trip began Monday morning.
Breakfast at a roadside bakery and Cafe:
Uwe is on his trusty Enfield India 350, which is the least capable bike for the job, but our toughest rider on it.
Phil rides his Honda XR600 (US Import), and the blue bike is my Austrian downsized Version of a Tenere 1VJ, sporting 500 cc only.
We cross the border to Italy and head North to the start of tzhe Ligurian Border Ridge Road, a famous old military road (WW II).
We always try to get local beer. Success!
For non-tarmac navigation I have a Pocket PC system running "Pathaway", which can display scanned and calibrated paper maps. This is the start of that military road:
September is nice because it is not so hot any more - but there can be fog and rain really:
We hit a narrow bit of road which you can not do on a car - a landslide had destroyed the better part of the piste there. That XTZ 660 blocked our way, somebody had left it in the middle of the track. Was quite a job to move it as that honk left it locked. We met him later, after falling over the engine did not start and he hiked to get help, probably a towing service.
Uwe, having passed the service truck of the next alpine shelter - they turned around there and did the next 2 km in reverse to get that 660.
And this is Phil behind him:
The road is about 2000 meters above sea level, and covers a distance of 60 km roughly:
I only found a proper map on that German web page: http://alpenrouten.de/Ligurische-Grenzk ... ack59.html
We found a nice overnight spot, just off sight, near an old military post, where we made good use of the firewood we collected earlier along the road. We camped clearly above the trree line.
More to come ...
Andy
