A hotel near Mont Ventoux

I have noticed the authors of other blogs receive gear and other goodies to test. This doesn't happen to us, but we do get the occasional eMail giving us info about bike hire or places to stay. This hotel is in Provence and we have walked nearby at Christmas. We could have cycled on most days as well, though whether our aged pins would get us up Mont Ventoux is debatable. The hotel looks like it is worth checking out.

LES GERANIUMS
Hôtel *** Restaurant
Place de La Croix
84330 Le Barroux
TEL 04 90 62 41 08 FAX 04 90 62 56 48
RCS CARPENTRAS B 448 394 577
les.geraniums@wanadoo.fr
www.hotel-lesgeraniums.com

An excursion from Kleve

We have written about knooppunts, a grid based navigation system for cyclists in the Netherlands, in the past. We mentioned as well that some of the German communities on the Dutch borders have invested in this type of waymarking. These include Emmerich and Kleve both of which are on the Lower Rhine. Kleve is well known to the British because of its connections to Anne of Cleves, one of Henry VIII's wives. However the town has connections to another European blue blooded family: Orange Nassau the Dutch royal family.
The tourist office in Kleve has laid out the 53km circular Oranierroute starting in the Tiergartenstraße  following: knoopunts 26 - 4 - 3 - 88 - 86 - 80 - 81 - 80 - 85 - 10 - 25 - 32 - 31 - 6 - 30 - 96 - 81 - 94 - 5 - 26. If you follow this tour you can visit the Huis Bergh chateau, one of the biggest  in the the Netherlands, climb to vantage point to look across to Kleve, take a barefoot walk, have a short ferry trip to Millingen aan de Rijn before returning to Kleve. There is no shortage of cafes along the route. There is a website: www.kleve-tourismus.de where you can download a flyer in German about the route. A word of warning though the map is rather indistinct.

Bike Hire in Cherbourg, France

The area around Cherbourg is an excellent place to cycle. On a recent trip through the city we found a bicycle hire company: Location de velos, Port Chantereyne, Cherbourg, Tel: +33 (0)2 33 03 76 75. 2013 prices for touring-city bikes were:

• Half day €9
• Day €15
• Two days €25
• Three days €32
• Four days €39
• Five days €46
• One week €56

Safer tram lines?

One of the more exciting aspects of urban cycling in continental Europe are tram lines. Judith's knee still bears the scars she received when she fell off her bike, after the front wheel jammed in a tram line, some years ago. Tram lines are cunningly designed to take and hold a bicycle wheel. Whether it is front or back you will suddenly find sideways motion is impossible and the bike stops moving, all at once, with embarrassing results. They also offer a surprising wide flat area of metal which is slippery in wet weather and can lead to breakaway of the back end of the bicycle. This is interesting, but to be avoided.
VBZ, the Zurich traffic authority has started a pilot project to see if  tramlines can be made safer. It has filled a short stretch of tramline with rubber. The tram compresses this, but cyclists can ride over the filled section without the unpleasant effects mentioned above. The first results of this test phase are due in spring 2014. For more information in German see: www.stadt-zuerich.ch/masterplanvelo.

An idea for cycle clubs

The ADFC section in Ottersweier, a village south of Karlsruhe in the Rhine Valley, organises free bike parking for the annual Dorfbachfest, a typical jolly German weekend fest with grilled sausages, beer and umpah bands. The village council supplies a car park and galvanised wire builders' fencing. The ADFC supplies volunteers to guard the bike park, organises a ticketing system and has an information stand. The chairman of the ADFC group and the organiser of this action wrote that cyclists are overjoyed to find secure parking and it is a good way to acquire new members.
I realise that do's with umpah bands and beer are few and far between in Britain, but there will be large numbers of cyclists to watch le Tour next year in Yorkshire and there will be more mass cycling events in London, so CTC local groups could help themselves and the cycling community by laying on bike parking at various events.
5 January 2014: I suppose it could even be seen as one of the ideas supported by David Cameron in the Big Society project.

e-Bike Holidays in Switzerland

Over the years we have cycled a lot in Switzerland. When we talk about these trips with friends and acquaintances both cost and the mountains are mentioned. "Too expensive and we can't climb Alpine passes!" However I have recently picked up a Swiss national tourist office brochure with details of an eight or nine day trip across Switzerland from Lake Geneva via Interlaken and the Jungfrau region to Heidiland and the River Rhine through the mountains but over them. In 2013 the cost was about £1000 including e-Bike hire, luggage transfer and, bed and breakfast stopping in normal hotels. A similar trip stopping in youth hostels would have set you back about £825.  The e-bike flattens out the passes. Check out the trips in 2014 on http://www.swisstrails.ch/.

Bicycle Parking in Bensheim

Bensheim is a small town (about 40 000 inhabitants) in our county lying in the Rhine Valley between Heidelberg and Frankfurt am Main. The railway station has excellent bike parking facilities including bike boxes and bike racks.  There appear to be difficulties in the main shopping street, but there are moves by shops and stores to install more bike racks. In addition the council has set up a working party to investigate a bike parking garage. This might well use the model in Strasbourg. This would not be free of charge. I have my doubts about how prepared German cyclists are, to pay for parking, but we will keep our eye on matters and report. 

Cyclist friendly accommodation in the Netherlands

We are beavering away trying to get our updated, revamped Rhine 2 Cyclists' guide from Basel to Hook of Holland finished. For various reasons it is unlikely that we will be able to cycle from the German-Dutch border by Emmerich to Hook of Holland to check the route this year, unless global warming means that November is very warm and lack of global warming means the month is gale free. What we have decided to do is to prepare the book by working out a route using the knooppunt system. Dutch cycling facilities are so good that we don't need to go there to check the route.
We still need accommodation lists and were pleased to find the Fietsers Welkom! website published by Fietsplatform (Dutch cycling platform). This is an  “umbrella-organisation” (public-private partnership, foundation)bringing together the Dutch tourist’ union ‘ANWB’, the Dutch cyclist’ union ‘Fietsersbond’, the Union for cycle-touring clubs ‘NTFU’ and the national organisation for the cycling industry in the Netherlands ‘RAI’. With the support of the national and regional authorities Fietsplatform tries to improve the facilities for recreational cycling/ cycle tourism in the Netherlands.
The Fietsers Welkom! website is very similar to the German Bett und Bike website published by the ADFC and the Luxembourg bed + bike website published by the LVI. Landlords agree to the following conditions:

• Open from May / September, at least five days a week from 11:00.
• Campsites set aside an area for cycle tourists.
• Hotels, B&Bs and campsites accept guests for one night.
• The hotels, B&Bs offer a locked bicycle garage.
• Simple tools and puncture repair outfits are available, as is obviously, a first aid kit.
• Cyclists can refill their water bottle for free.
• Bike maps are available for inspection and/or on sale.
• Batteries of electric bikes can be recharged for free.
• Wet clothing is no problem. The hotels,  etc. offer a dryer or drying rack.

On first inspection the Fietsers Welkom! website is the greatest thing since sliced bread. It offers a searchable map of the Netherlands with accommodation, knooppunt and the Dutch long distance cycle routes. It is in Dutch, but it is obvious how you use it, just go to 'Kaart'.

I am not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, but the search engine could do with tightening up. It is possible to search an area by entering its name, but if the name of the place you are looking for, comes in the title of the accommodation or in the address, one is overwhelmed by a flood of several hundred addresses, most of which are false. Try looking for "Hoek van Holland", for example. One finds 860 addresses. Cut the search item back to "Hoek" and you still find 60 addresses. If I remember rightly "hoek" means "corner" in Dutch. In such cases you will need to look on the map and click on the hotel or campsite symbols. You can zoom in and out of the map. It would be a good if there was a scale on the map to estimate distances.

If you are touring in the Netherlands you can download an App from iTunes for €2.69 both for navigation and finding accommodation. I haven't tested this because we don't have an iPhone. 

Hiring e-bikes

We have a problem at present. We want to finish our new e-book version of "Rhine 2"covering the Rhine from Basel to Rotterdam. Our printed version is now both out of date and print, but does still attract orders via older versions of the website (www.bergstrassebikebooks.com) which can be found on mirror sites in the Internet. We do have the upstream version "Following the Rhine gently upstream Rotterdam to Basel, a Cycle Tourist’s Guide" available from Smashwords and Amazon, which will be updated this winter.
The problem is that we need to cycle about 280km across the Netherlands from the German border to the Hook of Holland. We cannot do this until the middle of November.  In the Netherlands November means gales from the west, the way we want to go. To be sensible, we need an e-bike each. We can hire them, but of course when we are done we will need to return the bikes. This means a train journey with changes. Do the operators on the Dutch railways offer accompanied transport of e-bikes? Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could hire a bike in Arnhem or Nijmegen and drop it off in Rotterdam? It is possible to hire bikes in cities in Switzerland and drop them off elsewhere in Switzerland. We have two possible cures:

• We could persuade Batavus or Gazelle to lend us a bike each for the publicity.
• We could buy a couple of Dutch e-bikes from the Gazelle Outlet Shop. These bikes in the Netherlands are cheaper than in Germany. The problem then is our local bike shop owner would probably scrag us and rightly so.

Czech cycleways

We went to a lecture last year at our local bike shop given by an employee who had cycled alone from Viernheim to Istanbul and returned via a different route with his girl friend. She described the return journey though the Czech Republic and mentioned the difficulty they had cycling on the rough paths there. We were surprised to hear this, but our experience is similar, although we only walked along a few km of Czech cycle route a few weeks ago. The tracks were bumpy, covered with layer of 1" sandstone pebbles, more suitable for the robust bikes the continental Europeans call trekking bikes than the thin tyred Audax road bikes many Brits and North Americans use for touring. Signposting was very good.
We did however find a new EU sponsored cycle- and footpath running from Doubrava, Czech Republic to Bad Elster west of the Bily Halstrov/Weiße Elster river as part of the Elster Cycleway from As (Czech Republic) to Halle an der Saale (Germany) which had a smooth high class tarmac surface. Maybe things are looking up.

Czech cycle route signposting on a minor road

City Hire Bikes in Heidelberg, Mannheim and Ludwigshafen

In April of next year the cities in the Rhein-Neckar metropolitan region, i.e. Heidelberg, Ludwigshafen and Mannheim will set up a joint bike hire system à la Barclay Bikes in London or the velib system in Paris. The VRN, the regional transport authority has been authorised to issue a call for tenders. It is planned to incorporate the new bike system in the present combined payment system for public transport tickets and car sharing.
This move has perhaps initiated one major change: From 1 January next year cyclists will be able to buy a €1.80 bicycle ticket allowing them to take bicycles on local and regional trains before 09:00 on weekdays. Up to now one needed to buy an annual season ticket to travel with a non-folding bicycle between Mondays and Fridays in the morning rush hour which ruled out occasional transport on trains.

Le Tour - a book review

I was  checking what is available on the Smashwords e-book website on cycle touring in Europe, last night and discovered that  Selwyn Parker's "Chasing the Chimney Sweep" can be bought there.  "Chasing the Chimney Sweep" is an account of four friends who followed the route of the first Tour de France for a month during one summer about a decade ago. The book was originally published as a paperback by Penguin in Australia or New Zealand. Friends who visited NZ, brought back a copy and lent it to us. It is an excellent description of a long cycle tour through the French countryside, including what can go wrong. The history of the early Tour de France is recounted in fascinating detail. Those early cyclists make the rest of us look like milksops and the bikes were definitely instruments of torture.

However the book should come with a health warning. The author has strong opinions about various matters and some of these almost caused us to throw the book across the room in disgust. (We too have strong opinions!)

• He thinks, for example, that using panniers is "uncool" for stylistic reasons and he and his partner cycled with heavy rucksacks. Unfortunately they happened to choose the hottest summer since records began and so cycling wearing a rucksack was very uncomfortable. They needed to send some stuff back to the Antipodes by post. The other couple camped and used panniers. They appear to have fewer problems. 
• He then moans about the cost of using the French Postal Service.
• Unfortunately he doesn't agree with the idea of "When in Rome…". He dislikes French coffee, because he likes to drink a very weak milky coffee at breakfast and the French hotels don't offer exactly what he wants.

However we recommend the book highly with some reservations about rucksacks and coffee.

Everything runs like it's just been oiled.

The city of Mannheim, Germany offers free bike checks in the summer at various events and it is an excellent way of showing folk who don't cycle much how make their cycling easier, by pumping up tyres, oiling chains, adjusting gears and making sure brakes work. It's a very popular service. The queues can be very long. When I first saw this I was impressed, although the ADFC Bergstraße has organised a stand for years at the biannual closure to motorised traffic of the Bergstrasse between Heppenheim and Darmstadt. We have even helped on the stand. I was also impressed to realise that the CTC had organised a similar service at the Prudential RideLondon weekend. This is obviously something that meets a public need.

Safer ways to school on a bike

Cycling to school is a good way for children to improve their fitness, build self-confidence and gain experience in traffic. However until they have gained some experience it can be a risky business, Parents can cycle the routes with their children, but this is not always possible. The ADFC is the German cycling club interested in touring, cycling as a means of transport and cycle paths rather than the sporting aspects. The Heidelberg section of the club has offered training courses for School Cyclists for the last three years.  Twenty fourteen to seventeen year old youngsters in Heidelberg have recently completed a twenty-eight hour training course. The youngsters then lead small groups of younger children to school and act as pilots. They check the bikes before the trip; make sure the younger  pupils know how to switch their lights on; discuss the critical areas of the journey; say where it is necessary to check the traffic behind the group and how one can utilise cyclepaths to best advantage. Two kids from Mannheim joined the training group this year and it is planned to offer the course in Mannheim next year. It strikes us as an excellent idea.

Grocery Deliveries by Bike in Vienna

I was pleased to see that the Merkur supermarket on the Hoher Markt in Vienna offers deliveries by bicycle in the centre and inner suburbs of Vienna. The company uses a pedal-powered Bullit cargo bike. The original plan was to use an e-bike, but the lads doing the deliveries on the basic Bullit found it was up to the job without pedelec assistance.

The best longer cycling routes in Germany and Austria? ADFC Quality Routes

The ADFC is, as regular readers of this blog know,  the German cycling club interested in touring and cycle paths rather than the sporting aspects. The Germans are, of course, great classifiers and the ADFC is no exception. It grades cycle routes into 3 classes using the following criteria. This service is not free, the trail organisations pay most of the costs of the assessments. The weighting for the overall rating is shown after each criterium in brackets.

• Rideabilty: width, current barriers, bollards, steps, hazards (15%)
• Surface: material, number and distance of sections where it is necessary to push the bicycle, transverse grooves, pot holes (15%)

  

   Surface is important....

  
  
  
  

  

  because this can be the result.

• Signposting: type, signposts showing the wrong direction, missing lettering, illegible writing, signposting contrary to the Road Traffic Acts (15%)

  

  Information overload, but who cares?

• Route: noise, smells, dust, detours, altitude, monotony (5%)
• Density of motor vehicle traffic: car-free - heavy, dangerous crossings (20%)
• Tourist infrastructure: accommodation structure, campsites, catering, Bed + Bike accommodation, tourist information office, information boards, bike parking, bicycle box, playgrounds, bad weather shelters, picnic areas, (15%) 
• Access route to public transport: Frequency of bike carrying long-distance trains with bicycles, Frequency of bike carrying regional public transport with bicycles, bike buses (5%)

  

  Ferries can also be useful!

  
• Marketing: Existing maps and information, website (10%)

In addition the route should have a clear name and/or be well known. This probably means that the “Black Pudding Route” would not be accepted whereas the “Gelsenkirchen Black Pudding Route” would be. On the other hand the Romantic Road would be allowed because the route name has been used since WWII. These rules does not always seem to be taken too seriously.
The nonappearance of routes like the Rhine, a particular favourite of ours does not mean that it cannot meet the standards required. There is probably another more mundane reason for this. The ADFC charges over €800 to check 50km of route, which is cheap in view of what the club delivers. The advice given in their reports can be used as way of improving the routes. The costs to have a longer route checked are quite prohibitive especially in these days of belt tightening by public authorities. The Rhine Cycle Route, for example is 1230km long.
The Five Star Routes

• River Main (Germany) 600km from Bischofsgrün (Source of the White Main) E of Bayreuth or Creußen (Source of the Red Main) S of Bayreuth – Mainz, confluence with the Rhine).
• Lake Neusiedler See (Austria, Hungary) SE of Vienna 121.5km, circular

The Four Star Routes
Germany

• Albtäler 187km SE of Stuttgart on the Swabian Alp, circular
• BahnRadweg Hessen (Railway Cycle Route Hesse) 245km on former railway lines in Middle Hesse ENE of Frankfurt am Main
• Bischofstour (Bishop's Tour) Havelberg to Wittstock 108km NE of Berlin
• DahmeRadweg Berlin S to the source of the River Dahme near Kolpen 123km
• Deutsche Fußballroute NRW (German Football Route North Rhine Westphalia) 800km Aaachen to Münster
• EmsRadweg (River Ems Cycle Route) 375km from Hövelhof to Emden
• Fulda-Radweg (River Fulda Cycle Route) Gersfeld to Bad Karlshafen 260km
• Ilmtal-Radweg (Ilm Valley Cycle Route) 125km, Allzunah am Rennsteig  to Großheringen/Kaatschen-Weichau
• Kyll-Radweg (Kyll Cycle Route) 130km from Kronenburger See, Dahlem (Bhf.), Losheimer Graben to Trier
• Lahntal Radweg (Lahn Valley Cycle Route) 244km Netphen (Source of River Lahn) – Lahnstein (Rhine confluence)
• Märkische Schlössertour (Chateau in the Oder Valley Route) 180km Circular Route SE of Berlin
• Oderbruchbahn Radweg (Oder Railway Route) 133km from Fürstenwalde through Müncheberg, Seelow to Wriezen, E of Berlin
• Oder-Neiße-Radweg (Oder Neisse Cycle Route) 628km from Nová Ves near Jablonec (Czech Republic) to Ahlbeck
• Oder Spree Tour 250km SE of Berlin
• RegnitzRadweg (River Regnitz Cycleway) 85 Kilometer (Valley), 75 Kilometer (Canal) Nürnberg – Bamberg/Bischber
• Rhönradweg (Rhön Cycle Route) From Bad Salzungen to Hammelburg, 180km
• Radrouten Historische Stadtkerne - Route 2... (Cycleway through historic towns and cities) NE of Berlin
• Ruhrtalradweg (Ruhr Valley Cycle Route) 230km, Winterberg – Duisburg (Confluence with the Rhine)
• Saar-Radweg (Saar Valley Cycleway) 98 Kilometer, Sarreguemines (Frankreich) through Saarbrücken to Konz (Confluence with the Moselle)
• Spreeradweg (River Spree Cyclepath) 410 Kilometer, Eibau – Berlin
• Südschwarzwald-Radweg (Southern Black Forest Cycle Route) 240 Kilometer (+ 69 Kilometer variations) circular route. See this blog 2 March 2013.
• Tour Brandenburg A cycle tour around the province of Brandenberg. 1111km, Circular Start, for example, in Potsdam, Berlin or Cottbus.
• Tour de Fries (Friesland Tour) Circular tour from Wilhelmshafen 287km
• Von Main zu Rhön (From the River Main to the Rhön) 263km Circular

Austria

• Danube Cycle Route 629km Passau to Vienna
• Drauradweg (Cycle route along River Drau) (Austria) 366km from Toblach/Dobaccio (Italy) to Marburg.
• Murradweg (Cycle Route in the Mürr Valley) S of Salzburg to Croatia 457km
• Tauernradweg (Tauern Cycle Route) The route follows the Salzach und Saalach Rivers from Krimml to Passau. 308km
• Traisental-Radweg (Traisen Valley Cycle Route) Traismauer (Donau) to Mariazell. 111km

Three Star Routes
Germany

• Alte Salzstraße (Old Salt Road) Lübeck to Luneburg 116km
• D-Route 3 / Europaradweg R1 (D Route 3/European Cycle Route 1) 960km, Vreden – Küstrin-Kietz across Germany from W to E or E to W
• Fürst-Pückler-Weg (Fürst-Pückler-Cycle Route) 500km, circular route SE of Berlin through the Lausitz
• Grünroute (Green Route) 358km, Düren – Hasselt (Belgium)
• Gurkenradweg (Gherkin Cycle Route) 260km through the Spreewald
• Kohle-Wind & Wasser-Tour (Coal, Wind and Water Tour) 250km circular route SE of Berlin through the Lausitz
• Die Niederlausitzer Bergbautour (Lower Lausitz Mining Tour) >500km circular around Cottbus
• Radweg Berlin-Kopenhagen (The Berlin Copenhagen Cycle Route) 648km total, 260km in Denmark
• Radrouten Historische Stadtkerne - Route 1... (Cycleway through historic towns and cities No. 1) N of Berlin
• Romantic Road from Würzburg to Füssen
• Saarland-Radweg (Saarland Cycleway) 362km, Circular route around Saarland
• Seenland Route 184km in the Lausitz SE of Dresden
• Der Uckermärkische Radrundweg (Uckermark Route) circular 260km ENE Berlin almost on the Polish border

Where do I find a bike on a city bicycle hire system

Finding where there are bikes to be picked up on a city bike system with many stations can be difficult. Fortunately someone has written an iPhone App to help you. The good news is it is free. It shows where which stations have how many bikes and if you tell the system which are your nearest or most used stations the phone will automatically display the information when you get close to favourite stations. The app can be used perhaps but not worldwide but in over 80 cities in Europe, in the USA and Canada. Check out http://www.bicyclette-app.com/en/ for more information.

Cycling on the left

My own feelings are that cyclists prefer to cycle on the left. I am however wondering whether this is true, having seen the London Triathlon this afternoon when the whole cycling route was laid out so that the cycling was on the right. Was this a disadvantage for cyclists for the countries of the world where one cycles on the sensible side of the road?

Bike Hire in Freiburg (Black Forest)

At the moment the only shops we can find are:

Radhaus GmbH  Harry Bieker, Bea Galgoczy  Münchhofstr. 4  79106 Freiburg  Tel. 0761-280832  UStID DE 142111755  Amtsgericht Freiburg HRB 4216 Opening Hours :  Mo-Fr 9.00 to 13.30 und 15.00 to 18.30  Sa 10.00 to 16.00 Freiburg Bikes Fernando Schüber Kandelblickstr. 10 79108 Freiburg Tel: 07665-9471021 Fax:0761-2023427 e-mail: info@freiburgbikes.de

http://www.radhaus-freiburg.de/mietrad.htm

Blog post modified on 11. September 2013

Vienna as a cycling city

Earlier in the year we wrote: "We are hoping to spend some time in Vienna this summer and intend to hire bikes for a few days". We have just returned from Vienna and we must be honest: We failed to fulfil our intention of hiring a velocipede or two to make the odd trip out into the woods and fields around the city. The friends we met there are not cyclists and so we decided that we would shelve our cycling plans in the interests of harmony. However we made some enquiries and kept our eyes open.
The city has 1200km of cycleways, 30 000 bike park racks and over 100 City Bike pickup points. Obviously Vienna is not yet a cyclists' city like Amsterdam or Copenhagen, but it is well on its way. Without being unpatriotic it is farther down this road or cyclepath than London for example. However the city is not as flat as the two forerunners mentioned above.
There is an excellent cycle map available free of charge from the tourist office, which is much better than the general city plan also given out by this organisation. There is a navigation app for cyclists which can be downloaded from the city's cyclist website: www.fahrradwien.at (in German, of course). The website also offers a route planner, a list of events and hints for cycling in the city.
Public transport in the city is so good that I think if I l lived in Vienna I would be using this a good deal rather than cycling.
If you are visiting Vienna in the next few weeks, it is worth nipping into the MAK to see an exhibition of classic bicycles called "Tour du Monde". You need to be quick though it closes on 6 October 2013.

Neil discussing cycle routes in the city centre with two touring cyclists.