Destination: Spass 4
Day 1, June 14th 2002, Eindhoven (NL)- St. Märgen (D), 600km
(375mi)
I was late leaving Eindhoven at around 2:30pm. Needed to make my 7:00pm
appointment with Mark, some 600km down the road. Traffic was heavy on the
A61 into Germany. Some traffic jams, so I lane-split my way toward St.
Märgen. Most Germans make room for ya. Especially if they see the
blue/white roundel :) Some never look in their mirrors though...
Via the A65 (Neustadt a/d Weinstrasse) toward France, to cut off the
traffic-infested autobahn near Karlsruhe (D). Back into Germany, it was a
quick stretch to Freiburg, where I exited the autobahn system to head
toward St. Märgen on secondary roads.
At 7:50pm I arrived at the agreed-upon junction in St. Märgen. No Mark
yet, but he arrived within 10 minutes. When we both had our bodies back to
normal temperatures (it was hot!), we started the search for a hotel. I had
some good experiences with Hotel Löwen, but that one was full (despite
the green lights at the information board). So we opted for hotel
Rössle across the street and got a room there. It was pretty good. The
shower gets a 7 (out of 10).
After a quick discussion what route to take the next day, we relaxed with a
nice cold beer in our hands.
Day 2, June 15th 2002, St. Märgen - St. Märgen, 391km
(243mi)
We got up at the Destination Spass-traditional time 7:17am and went
downstairs for a tasteful breakfast. At 9am we started our engines and headed
off toward the south.
The roads were quiet and we enjoyed the still cool weather with the nice
curves in the road. Germany - Paraguay (World Championship Soccer) was being
broadcast on TV, so the roads were really deserted, except for a couple
other motorcyclists, also enjoying this opportunity. Great!
It all to soon became warmer and warmer. We stopped in the town of Kandern
to gas up the bikes and refuel our bodies as well. On the road it's pretty
nice, big green trees provide enough shade and the nice curves in the road
make you forget the heat, but as soon as you're standing still, it just hits
you. Sweat starts pouring. We soon continued and enjoyed some more forested
sceneries. We got on top of the Hoch Blauen, and skipped the Belchen (both
large hills). A part of the route near Schauinsland (we got from an earlier
bike trip Leon took), is closed for motorcycles in the weekend. So we took a
different road to meet up with another route more to the north. Even the
wider roads are curving through green forests and nice little towns. And you
can do 100km/h outside of city limits without having to fear for a ticket
from our green friends :)
We find the roads enjoyable in a different way than the ones in Switzerland
or Italy. Here we have long high-speed sweepers on fairly good pavement and
green scenery. Switzerland has the best pavement and more switchbacks per
mile than any other country we know. And the scenery is a bit more
impressive too. Nevertheless, we are enjoying our ride tremendously. We have
to come back here again...
At one point in our ride, we saw a siderig standing next to the road. We
quickly rode past it. After conferring on the radio with Mark if he thought
too that the guy sitting next to the rig could have trouble, we turned
around. We had to take those nice curves back to the place where the guy was
sitting. He wasn't reading a manual (I we thought we saw as we were passing
by), but was looking at a map. As he was german (according to his plate at
least), we asked if he needed any help in german. He was astonished that we
stopped just to see of he needed some help. He said help was on his way, and
we couldn't help him. He was really friendly. So we took off again, and agin
we had to tackle to thos curves. That's what you get when you want to help
your fellow biker.
Mark has been complaining of the lack of beautiful women here. Most of them
weigh a ton and make you wish your sunglasses were less transparent. Only
the bride of a local wedding could pass his judgment (barely). We haven't
taken many pictures today, only two action photos. The scenery doesn't lend
itself to amateur photography, the roads do lend themselves to amateur
riding though. :)
After our dinner (which was spoiled by other loudly chatting guests), we had
a nice stroll around St. Märgen. We did find out however, that one
shouldn't walk into the fields because local farmers then start calling you
"Vollidiot" among other things...

Mark in action. At a curve in the Black Forest.

Leon in action. Same curve
Day 3 June 16th 2002, St. Märgen - Eindhoven, 800km (497mi)
We left St. Märgen around 9am in the direction of St. Peter. We
stopped at the local gas station for bread and a map of the French areas
of Alsace and Vosges, which would be today's playground. I am glad we
were not in need for gas as a group of about 15 Dutch riders were
filling their machines when we arrived. Through many small villages and
over less exciting roads that we'd seen yesterday, we reached river
Rhine and crossed the French border at Breisach. The route from there to
Cernay was a drag and made me think of the incredible straight roads you
can find in the Dutch "polder" landscape.
Although the French road signs had been pretty good so far, in Uffholtz
they were not helping very much. We had to make a couple of 180s to find
the first nice twisty road today over Col de Herrenfluh to Le
Grand Ballon, which is a landmark in the area. As the name says,
it's a big ball (on top of a hill). The pavement was better than I had
expected for such small French "D-roads". Every bump in the road is
called a "col" (pass) here and that's why we stopped counting them or
writing their names down.
We tried to stay away from the "tourist" roads that are marked on our
map, which appeared to be a good decision: we could have plenty of nice
sweepers all to ourselves and we enjoyed taking them at a brisk pace. We
continued to Munster, Col du Linge, Col du
Wettstein,Col du Bonhomme, Ste-Croix-aux-Mines,
Rombach-le-Franc, Villé, where a motorcycle accident
had just happened. A motorcycle was lying in a ditch and other motorists
were already helping out. The situation didn't look so wonderful as I
remember the panicked face of one of them. We decided our help was not
needed and carried on towards Le Hohwald. It was difficult to
find our way to La Broque and Schirmeck, but with a little
luck we found it.
As Leon didn't want to be late leaving for home, we decided to take
the faster roads to Molsheim and have a quick dinner at Saverne, where
we parked our machines between twenty others. The Péage
(toll road) was an interesting exercise in keeping the toll card in the
map holder (aka "het Mukmapje") while doing 140kmh (85mph). It quickly
led us toward Strassbourg and exit 52, where Leon continued northward
and I went south, back to Switzerland. The end of yet another terrific
tour in the Destination Spass series. We also have to return to
this area again as there are many more beautiful sweepers to discover!

Mark, Zoeki and Magnet in France.

Leon, Zoeki and Magnet in France.
Leon's total for Destination Spass 4: 1800km (mi)
(c) 2002, Leon Brunken (leonb(at)steeg.nl.eu.org) and Mark Verhappen
(m.verhappen(at)tue.nl)
(Edited in joe)