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Ride to Kaunertal Glacier 2011

admin — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 19:51:57 +0000

2 years ago I took the Kaunertal Glacier ride with my friends. This year I treated myself twice: I went once on my own and the second time with the guys. If you ride, then you know, “it makes sense riding the same mountain multiple times” to improve the “time on each corner”.

Here is going up:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdNTol-uq9E

and here is going down (at 17:20 you can see my skills regarding cows handling

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLrLdh8gvD4

Some pictures if you just like seeing the scenery:

Here I was one leg in Austria and mostly in Italy:

And here I was just crossing borders

And yeah, I would do Kaunertal again any time. Obviously.

Col du Galibier ride 2011

admin — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 18:20:37 +0000

Ok, so last year I did the Route des Grandes Alpes from Lausanne to Nice. This year, after spending a week or so with the guys in Austria, Italy ans Swiss Alps, I thought: “Why don’t I take one more week to ride and do the Grandes Alpes the other way around?”. I thought about this, well, around 5 seconds. Then I did it.

I have more videos to show, but I will start with Col du Galibier, because that’s one of the most beautiful:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdINAUy78TE

Enjoy! In the meanwhile, I have 2 more videos in France that I don’t know where they are from. Probably should go and check all these mountains again next year to find out. And yes, this is called “fiding “good reasons” to ride some more”. I’m getting better at this, each year.

Stelvio – riding to the Mecca of any motorcycle rider

admin — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 06:16:56 +0000

Wouldn’t you love to wake up in the morning and ride to one of the 10 most difficult roads in the World? I mean what could be better in the morning than this road?

I’ve been in the area for the last couple of years, but never got to do Stelvio up until this year; it’s been said to me “don’t worry, go see the other things, you’ll surely do Stelvio at some points because any rider should do Stelvio at some point in their life”. And there were the stories how often there are crashes over there (we had 2 crashes from our group alone on the way up) and there it is, I had an anxious “can’t wait to get there” feeling in that morning.

I had to take this picture:

it was on my to do list and I couldn’t have it any other way. 26 minutes of joy going up” (yes, it includes waiting for a red light, but I didn’t cut the video so you could participate to the entire excitement and feeling).

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrA3tbM6ET0

and 25 minutes on the way down:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgC8ykei0pk

Then, of course, if you didn’t get enough of Stelvio, you could do it the other way around: going up from Bormeo:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8BW3UpBKbc

then taking the Umbrail pass:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0cpMJozxCY

Pictures and video from 2011 Passo di Gavia Ride

admin — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 15:38:44 +0000

Right, so that part of the year when you can only check pictures and watch youtube videos on motorcycle rides has just begun and I already feel the parked motorcycle syndrome (and my accident probably ads some more to it). So what better time to look on the hard drive and take some more pictures out from the summer rides than now?

Just by looking at these pictures and videos I put on my shopping list a Honda S2000 -- 241CP, man I just need to have this to compensate the need for riding during winter (so more work for me in 2012!). Let’s have a look at my 2011 ride to Passo di Gavia in Italy. Stelvio it’s known as being one of the 10 hardest roads in the World, but truly I enjoyed more Gavia because of the beautiful scenery.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymiUOSbJFsQ

Since the first few km you could notice that the road is very narrow -- at the top is VERY narrow. Listen to my engine. I did, and I felt alive; just for this sound alone I felt my autumn crash was a bit of bad luck; I’m still a rider and I will ride the hell out of my bike next year. And yeah, if you wonder I wasn’t going very fast on this one. I was enjoying and feeling the best time of my life. So I had no rush finishing off.

The last part to the lake is where scenery changes:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=AX4YkMzuJvk

I know some of you might be dreaming of this and it might look so far ahead and impossible to accomplish. But look, I did this and so could you. And while you’re doing it, you might just get there a new meaning to life. You might be that humble person saving any penny for the rest of the year, but you can feel like being blessed by the Gods while riding here.

Riding down get’s to be even narrower. Truly an unique place to ride!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBYDu1WKYqA

Nice weekend ride!

admin — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 07:15:09 +0000

With some friends I’ve got on the road on Friday evening. We’ve got to the Zetea lake (amazing, I wasn’t there before):

www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPTB_wCkOiE

And some pictures:

Passo Pordoi, Italy

admin — Sat, 16 Jul 2011 19:01:39 +0000

After the first few days of my touring in the Alps we got to Arabba -- a nice mountain resort in the Dolomits in Italy. The very nice thing about Arabba is that it’s surrounded by 9 or so high altitude passes -- a Nirvana for every biker. To get there we got over the Pordoi pass . From Wikipedia: Pordoi is a pass in the Dolomites in the Alps, located between the Sella group in the north and the Marmolada group in the south. The pass is at an altitude of 2,239 m (7,346 ft), and the road crossing the pass connects Arabba (Livinallongo del Col di Lana) with Canazei (Fascia Valley). It is the highest surfaced road traversing a pass in the Dolomites.

Here are the videos (at return):

Getting up:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-n0-kCKwBo8

Getting down:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBoUA8ShznM

Amazing scenery in the Dolomits:

Col du Grand Saint Bernard ride

admin — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 05:35:45 +0000

Col du Grand Saint Bernard is an amazing pass between Italy and Swiss. Here is the ride up:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQP5_D4LgQs

and the ride down:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SU-UXopd044

Some pictures from the pass itself:

Grossglockner ride

admin — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 20:46:49 +0000

Just returned from my 7243km trip to the Alps. I’ll start with the Grossglockner ride:

There is an easier part to ride uphill:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=docqSB7jjNU

and the last part to the bikers point:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrnJ2Sh192s

And some pictures:

Biborteni – video

admin — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 06:30:41 +0000

Biborteni is a small village in Transilvania (around 850 people live there) and it’s home to the “Biborteni” mineral water. From their site: “The first analysis of Biborteni natural mineral water is performed in 1871. On the grounds of its excellent contents, we have to consider Borhegyi mineral water as ranking among the most valuable fizzy waters.”

Ever wanted to know where your mineral water comes from? Here is a video that shows the village and the blue water factory at the end:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbv_HlQx4D0

Trip to Vatra Dornei

admin — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 19:26:09 +0000

Last week I rode with one of my biker buddies to the other side of the country to Vatra Dornei. We spent the night next to a very peaceful lake with amazing scenery:

The next day we started with a wonderful ride to “Pasul Tihuta”: Enjoy:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vt--4OYAo0E

and