The plan
Procrastination is the biggest obstacle to finishing your PhD thesis. But sometimes, we really do take it too far. For example, by taking a 2.000 km bikepacking trip across the Alps with only a rough goal of going to a concert in Nimes at end of June and then somehow getting back home to Ljubljana. Oh well, why not, better than writing that bloody literature review.
The initial plan was very simple - try to follow Neil Young’s summer tour across Europe with the bike, catching as many concerts as possible along the way. OK, let’s quit our job and go on a trip. It was a very good plan until Mr. Shakey decided to cancel his whole tour. What does one do now? Well, there was still this Joe Hisaishi concert in Nimes at around the same time. The plan quickly became to try to catch that, while being a bit more flexible with on the spot planning due to fewer time constraints. In the end, the trip didn't need too much advance planing. The road took me over rainy Dolomites, busy French Alps, boiling Provence, dry Aosta Valley, Swiss mountain highways and Austrian ski resorts. Along the way I managed to catch three concerts, almost crash a future TdF winner and visit some cutting edge experimental facilities.
Week 1 - The Dolomites
The start of the trip was delayed by a severe cold weather front that went across Europe at the beginning of June. At some point, I got tired of waiting and decided to just take a train to Bolzano. As I was looking through the hazy train window, rain was pouring down on the Austrian valleys. But luckily, the forecast for the next day was better. In the morning, I started the trip towards Stelvio. The morning images on the webcams showed the pass at 2700 m altitude still covered in snow from yesterday's storm. In addition, the railways were on strike, so there was no alternative but to spend the morning riding across the long valley into the mountains. By the time I reached Prato, the snow has already retreated from the road. Reaching the top has to be one of the more rewarding experience you can do on a bike. It was also a confirmation that the legs were where I wanted them to be for this trip. From the top, I descended down to Bormio, where I would spend the following few days. Although the weather was still unpredictable, I managed to climb to Torri di Fraele as well as do the Gavia/Mortirolo loop. Climb to Gavia from Bormio is very accessible on a good, low gradient road, with a very rewarding plateau on the top. The descent to the south is on a much narrower road and a bit more technical, but still nice and fun to ride.
On Sunday, I needed to get myself to Milan to catch Big Thief in concert. I combined some cycling with a train ride to cover the more boring parts of the path. On the way, I stopped in Monza. The big park has a Formula One track going through it. At some point, you can go through a fence and drive on the old track circuit. Or you can bikepack it! Something Enzo Ferrari probably never did.
Wake me up to drive (bike), wake me up to drive (bike)
Even if I'm tired, I don't wanna miss the ride
Wake me up to drive (bike), wake me up to drive (bike)
Even if I'm tired, I don't wanna miss the ride - Big Thief, probably.
Week 2 - Into the French Alps
For second week the goal was to cross the French Alps and cover some famous climbs along the way. On Monday, I took a train to Turin to skip the boring suburbia of Milan and cycled to the bottom of Finestre. While the two part climb is famous for it's tendency to facilitate dramas in pro races, it is less know that it is also a gateway to a high mountain gravel road Strada dell'Assietta. Sadly, it was not yet opened for the summer season. This didn't take away from enjoyment of Finestre itself. Usually, long climbs are only really worth it for the last few km at the top where the views open up. Here it was very enjoyable to ride from the start in the shaded winding road through a forest. And after you hit the gravel, everything opens up and the views themselves drive you to the top. From there, I passed Sestriere to finish the day in Montgenevre.
Next way was planned for a little bit of recovery, so I only did a short circuit up to Granon and then descend it on the old military road. The road is quite demanding and sketchy for a gravel bike, but on full suspension it can lead you to several fortresses scattered across the area. After regenerating a bit, I tackled the two day Alpe d'Huez double finish from this year’s Tour de France.
Without a doubt, the descent from Galibier and then straight up Sarenne is a much more enjoyable ride compared to the bland serpentines of the more famous counterpart road. And no, inevitable masses of influencers with their action cameras trying to get themselves up the climb just didn’t do anything for me. I guess sometimes you really do need several hundred drunk Dutch to brighten up the place. Much more pleasant sight were many organised group rides, sometimes related to charities and sometimes just traveling around with support from local guides. And yes, we are taught to live slow and humble lives, but sometimes it really does feel good to pull a group of very shiny expensive road bikes for a few kilometres up a famous French climb while you are in a “I Feel Slovenia” jersey on a full bikepacking setup gravel bike. "In Slovenia, are your hills steeper?" - to quote a newly made friend.
The descent from Sarenne was also the only time in the whole trip that I got a flat tire. As I was changing the inner tube on the narrow road, a group of Red-Bull Bora-hansgrohe riders with a certain Belgian champion among them came rushing down the descent almost crashing into me. I probably should have put the small emergency triangle before the bent.
I finished the week by descending to Grenoble. At some point, two kids on the side of the road stated waiving and pointing to a nearby water fountain. The first sign of the coming heatwave that would set records across the continent. Indeed, Grenoble at it’s low altitude proved to be a melting pot. The only solution was to unscrew the SPD cleats from my cycling shoes and try to find some breezy winds in the mountains. This time on foot, in theory to give the legs a bit of a rest after two weeks of dieseling on the pedals. Specifically, we hiked up to Le Petit Som and Lac de Crop.
Week 3 - Vibing in Provence
One thing you realise about bikepacking is that it makes you blind to things that other travellers are gravitating to, and you rather start to notice and appreciate the more mundane stops along the way that are more in tune with what the locals are experiencing in their day to day. A nice shade in the park, a quiet café stop, a supermarket cola machine. This was the vibe of the third week. I had a week to spend around Provence before catching a concert on Sunday in Nimes, with no clear goal apart from climbing Mt. Ventoux along the way. Did I mention the heat wave before?
There are three main routes taking you up to the top of Ventoux. As a Slovenian I of course had to do all three in one go. To avoid the strain of the heat, I started the first ascent before the morning sunrise. The most rewarding part of the climb is seeing the fast changing of the surrounding flora, as it turns from the fields of lavender at the bottom to the bare Moon-like wasteland at the top.
I highly recommend trying to ascent it in the dark and catching the first rays of sunrise at the top, before the masses start to flock to it. On the third ascent, it was already apparent that many tackle this challenge without proper planning, too little water and bad pacing. The waiter I chated with in Bedoin mentioned she can easily distinguish between diffrerent types of cyclist that visit. The ones that do it three times? Those are just crazy.
For the rest of the week, I took it easy and slowly traversed towards Nimes along the local routes and villages. There I attended the concert of Joe Hisaishi accompanied by the Orchestre National Avignon-Provence. The concert was held in one of the most preserved Roman amfitheaters in the world. It is still used for events up to this day. Hisaishi is most known as the composer of soundtracks for animated films by Studio Ghibli. The first part of the concert was dedicated to his earlier work for other directors, while the second/main part was solely focused on the later work. Main melodic motives from each movie were connected together in a single coherent work, promarily based on A Symphonic Celebration, a 2023 release on Deutsche Grammophon. Given that the music drives the emotional core of these movies, the performance was truly life affirming as it managed to recapture the feeling of experiencing them for the first time.
One small life in this world in the blistering heat
Beaming sun sways in pеace
On your shoulder one summеr's day - from Spirited Away
Week 4 - Back into the Alps
Having reached the main goal of the trip, the question arose what to do next? At that point, I managed to get a ticket to an otherwise already sold out Nick Cave concert in Montreux (thank god that the Swiss love their moneys and have completely oversold the venue in the last week). So I hopped on a train to Chambery and set my pedals towards Martigny. The path took me over the Madeleine and the two St. Bernard passes (the Gran and the Pettit one), connected by a long descent through the Aosta valley. Along the way, I stopped in Bourg-Saint-Maurice and did a daytrip through Val-d'Isere and Tignes up to Col de l'Iseran. While the numerous hotel complexes and good road infrastructure in this region make the high Alpine ranges easily accessible to everybody, seeing it in summer without a snow cover makes one cynically ask oneself just much of the Alps did the French destroy with their huge skiing resorts scattered across every possible mountain range. A tough balance between preserving Nature’s serenity and conforming it to humanity’s desires. The abundance of heavy off-season construction on this roads gave a clear answer to what they have chosen here.
After crossing both St. Bernards over the weekend I reached Martigny, where I took a short rest from climbing. The city itself is intertwined with Roman history, having been on a crossroad of important historic trade routes. While there are many remains of the antique scattered through the city, the main attraction is the Fondation Pierre Gianadda. Part gallery, part museum, part a work of art in itself, it is a must stop when in the city. Currently, they are holding an exhibition showcasing Rilke's relationship with Rodin through their work and private corresondece. Another fun stop in the vicinity is the UCI World Cycling Centre velodrome. It is freely accessible to the public. Apart from seeing the racetrack itself, there is also a really nice tribute to the historic figures of the sport presented around the hall.
But the main point of this short pause was to hop on a train to Montreux Jazz Festival and see Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. From the opening riff of From Her To Eternity, it was a full-gas performance which bordered on a communion between the frontman and the audience. It seemed Nick Cave quite genuinely wanted to achieve a stronger connection between him and his audience. Mainly though words, but also through physical contact. If only he could smell my cycling jersey. But to summarise it in cycling terminology, Mr. Cave performed at quite high W/kg for 2.5 hours.
and my bike seat is burning
and i think my head is smoking
and in a way I'm hoping to be done
With all these looks of disbelief
An eye for an eye
And a tooth for a tooth - Nick Cave while riding Mt. Ventoux, probably
Week 5 - Switzerland and Austria
After only a couple hours of sleep, I headed towards the famous Grimsel and Furka passes. The panoramic road appeared in an old Bond movie. Today the picturesque hotel on one of the road bends serves as the main tourist attraction.
For cycling, the road is probably best experienced in combination with surrounding passes and in early season when traffic is still at a minimum. To end the day I descended to Göschenen on a very unusual and slightly uncomfortable bike path, built on top of the road gallery. From there I took a train to Zurich, where I visited some friends at the Paul Scherrer Institute. Among its many facilities, I got a tour of the muon and proton accelerators. They use these particles to study different fundamental properties of matter. For example, [NERD ALERT] measurements with muons are spin polarized. After the interaction with the sample, an electron will be released. This signal will be effected by the magnetic fields in the sample. This can then be used to study material properties related to magnetism [NERD ALERT OVER].
From Zurich, I took another train to my final stop in Innsbruck, a city made for people who love mountains and sports. A bit less known is that this also one of the birthplaces of modern quantum physics, with many ground breaking experiments being performed here from the 80s to this day. [NERD ALERT STRIKES BACK] One of their main focuses is trapping individual ions in a trap of oscilating electric fields. Each trapped ion is locked in space and cooled down with laser beams. By sending additional sequences of laser pulses one can then manipulate quantum states of these ions and harness their computational power. This is one of the more promising pathways towards building a working quantum computer [NERD ALERT OVER]. My stay here was split between visiting the institute and ticking off some cycling routes I had already wanted to do several years ago when I was living here.
I wanted to finish this whole trip by riding the route of the Ötztaler Radmarathon. In Ötztal I stated the ascending towards Sölden and Obergurgl through a network of cycling paths scattered across the valley. In my memory, Sölden was always a very touristy town, with too many apartment complexes, fancy restaurants and discos. However, after experiencing the French Alpine resorts, I have to say that even Sölden seemed very pleasant and laid back in comparison. Even with the sea of mountain bikers around every corner. Anyway, from there the real climb started up to Timmelsjoch. After probably the nicest descent of the whole trip down the Italian side of the mountain, the second climb of the day started. This road up to Jaufenpass was a sign that I was coming close to the end of the trip. Apart from the tiredness that has accumulated in the legs, the bike itself started to give up. Occasionally, the hub in the back wouldn’t even response to the applied torque, the brakes were almost gone, the tires were starting to loose traction and there were even some additional sounds coming from the bike I was not able to identify. I lost confidence in the bike under me. All this lead me to decide to skip the last part of the circuit across the Brenner pass and just take the train instead. To be honest, I didn’t really feel bad about skipping the night descent on one of the most busy transit passes in Europe. Next day, I boarded the train and headed home towards Ljubljana.
Epilogue
As I took the train ride home, the story of the trip seemed to have reached its natural conclusion. However, as you should know, no journey with the Slovenian Railway Company ever finishes before you reach your final destination. The train was completely overcrowded with young backpackers, mainly going to the Croatian coastline. Completely expected and usual for a mid-July long distance train ride. However, in Jesenice, of all places, a young girl entered my coach and tried to find a free seat. I did not put too much attention to her until random people started to visit our part of of the train to say hi to her and chat. It turned out it was Greta Thunberg. First Remco and now Greta! Again, in Jesenice of all places! Some things in life are just beyond human comprehension. As the train reached Ljubljana, I put on my cycling helmet, tightened the Boas on my shoes, said goodbye to Greta Thunberg and exited the train. I think this was a somewhat fitting conclusion to my low carbon-footprint trip.
The technical nerd stuff
All together the route covered 2.162 km and 45.890 vertical meters.
I used 30/48 + 11/36 gear ratio on Rene Herse Manastash Ridge 44 mm tires with Pirelli TPU inner tubes. To carry luggage, I used a combination of a Bags by Bird Piccolo 15 L front bag, 18L Restrap saddle bag and an Apidura 5L frame bag. I could probably reduce the overall volume, but I prefer the convenience compared to some small weight saving. All together the bike and luggage weighted around 22kg.
While I had some some of the routes already sketched out beforehand, I mostly just used the map on my head unit in combination with RideWithGPS app on my phone to plan the route on the spot.
For accommodation, I tried to find relatively cheap places that were able to store the bike inside overnight. I had practically no problems in arranging this by reserving the places a day or two in advance.
Along the way, I managed to make pictures of 32 different cats. They are available to the reader upon reasonable request.
(*The main title is a reference to an album Fork in the Road (Reprise, 2009). You should be at least a level-seven Neil Young dork to even consider listening to it. Maybe try Greendale (Reprise, 2003) first.)
