Touring Lake Constance

Somewhere in the last few months we were at a tourism or cycling exhibition and I stuffed a postcard from the Vier Länder Region Bodensee (Four nation region Lake Constance) into a one of those useful free cloth shopping bags you find at continental trade fairs. I am just in progress of emptying the bag out and filing a lot of the information material in the round file. The postcard has a link to www.touren.bodensee.eu where you can find tours, a route planner with GPS download and accommodation suggestions for cycling, walking and canoeing trips in the Austrian, German, Liechtenstein and Swiss parts of the region. The website is an excellent place to start planning a trip to this cyclist-friendly scenic region. It has the great advantage that the tours are international and do not end at the border which is a typical snag for information issued by national tourist offices.

Cycling in Sweden

We have recently come back from a trip along the Inlandsbanan - Inland Line, a railway line running roughly north south in Sweden. We spent some time in Malmö and Stockholm on our way to Mora and were surprised by the number of bicycles and the excellent bicycle facilities. Why we should have been surprised in the case of Malmö is not clear as it is only a hop, skip and a jump from Copenhagen which has probably the best cycling facilities in the world. Sweden is not a cheap place to visit, but empty spaces and wild life in the north or the greenery of the south coupled with good waymarking mean it is an excellent place to cycle. You can cut costs by using one of the Swedish Youth Hostels which also welcome grey and white heads such as ourselves. The official Swedish Tourist Website is here. This is a country where everybody speaks English. The only Swedish I know is "Hej, do you speak English?".
Cykelfrämjandet, the Swedish Cycling Club has followed the example of the ADFC in Germany and set up a Bed & Bike website. Some parts are in English, but the hotel/hostel/guesthouse descriptions are in Swedish. However this is why you have Google Translator on your computer.
If you are interested in a guided tour then check out www.swedenbybike.com. This website which is mainly in Swedish in August 2013, but a full English version is promised. The idea is you find a tour that looks interesting and then contact the tour operator via the website.
We will discuss bicycle service and hire in a later blog.

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The Black Forest Panorama Cycle Route

The Southern loop we wrote about yesterday is a family route. At one point does the going get tough and you can get on a train. However the Black Forest Panorama Cycle Route  is slightly longer and a lot hillier. The description uses the word challenging from time to time. The first day is 75 km long with a climb of about 500 m. In this case there is a let out and you can take the the Sommerberg Funicular Railway 300m uphill which chops 25 km off your day. The day after on your way to Villigen, the 70 km are easy. On day 3 you cycle 52 km and climb to the highest point of the trip at 1084 m. The day after, on the final day cycling is easy, mainly downhill to Waldshut and the railway station. If the vision of long climbs is not your idea of fun, then you can hire e-bikes to ease the pain.

The Black Forest Tourist Authority offers organised self guided tours with B&B, luggage transfer and lunch packets starting at around €400 for a four or five night trip. Contact service@schwarzwald-tourismus.info for more details.

Southern Black Forest Cycle Route

Cycle touring on holiday is offered by all the major German holiday companies. I was pleasantly surprised recently to see cycle touring holidays in a brochure put out by ALDI, the German discounter. It is therefore no surprise to find that the regional tourist authorities have planned and executed cycle routes and that one can book self-guided holidays.

The Southern Black Forest Cycle Route or as it is known in German Südschwarzwald-Radweg is a fairly gentle circular 240km long route around the edges of the higher regions of the southern Black Forest. The main route crosses the Rhine into Switzerland and goes through Basel/Basle. After Basel you can also visit the French nature reserve "Petite Camargue" in southern Alsace, before crossing the Rhine again to return to vineyards and picturesque villages of Markgräflerland to reach Freiburg and return to the Black Forest heights. There is a rail link between Kirchzarten and Hinterzarten. There is no shame in taking the train. If the vision of the odd slight climb is too much you can also hire e-bikes. This is an ideal route for families.

There is more information in German about trips of up to a week from the following companies:

Original Landreisen AG
http://www.original-schwarzwald.de/Radwandern-im-Schwarzwald-Suedschwarzwald-Radweg.
The company is based in Hinterzarten. Price per person sharing a double room range from € 289 to € 949 for up to a week depending on the quality of the accommodation and the length of the holiday.


Radissimo GmbH
 http://www.radissimo.de/en/bike-holidays/self-guided-tours/
This company is preparing information in English. It is based in Freiburg or Hinterzarten. Price per person sharing a double room is from €429 for up to a week. If the photographs of the Black Forest Cherry cakes shown on the website are anything to go by you may end weighing more after a few days cycling than before you started.