On days like these when skies are blue and fields are green
I look around and think about what might have been ......"
For some years I have been looking at riding the Alpine passes of the French and Swiss Alps, and reading quite a few articles, books and magazines featuring some of the great Passes you must do before you die (or die while riding them, can't remember which). These include the famous Furka (James Bond Goldfinger), St Bernards (Italian Job), Col de L'Iseran (Tour de France), Sustens, Grimsell, St Gothards ... and loads more.
Back in 2010 I joint-planned a bike trip down to the Swiss Harley Days rally in Lugano. This trip with Peter (who no longer rides motorcycles) , on our Harley-Davidson Dyna's was a first attempt at planning a motorcycle trip with someone else. Prior to this, I had been on several very good organised bike tours in Northern France, Belgium and Luxembourg with Brettours - the official Harley-Davidson tour company. On these tours I made a lot of good friends along the way, but fancied the challenge of plotting a route and planning stop-overs, perhaps camping some of the nights with the odd hotel thrown in too.
The trip to Lugano was a great success, we made it to the rally unscathed and had a lot of fun, but not without the usual niggles. One such niggle I remember was the duration required for such a trip being too short and we missed out on some of those fantastic Swiss passes because Peter had to get back home for his wedding anniversary. We skipped the Vosges mountains on the way back too, in a race to get back to Calais for the channel crossing but I do remember on the way down marvelling at the top of the St Gotthard pass, but the main focus was on getting to the rally, so later on the return, we were forced through the Gotthard tunnel to get home in time for his anniversary. At the time I did feel slightly cheated since after all, I ride a motorcycle for the twisties. I ride a motorcyle because I enjoy riding a motorcycle, and I wanted to ride my motorcycle on those amazing famous Alpine roads I have read so much about - but couldn't.
Top of the St Gotthard Pass - Summer 2010.
The Gotthard Tunnel at 50mph - The return home
After last years very successful and enjoyable joint-planned trip to Spain and Portugal with Lindsay, my thoughts turned back to riding the Alps in 2016. Lindsay decided to arrange a tour with his retired mates who have more time available to them, and intend to ride down to Croatia taking in the Grossglockner and Stelvio passes of Austria and Italy over a much greater three week time-frame than I have available so in the meantime I decided to hook up with Mark to arrange a self-planned trip to the Alps settling on early to mid September. I collected all of my information on Alpine rides (Ride Magazine supplements and John Hermann's excellent book 'Motorcycle Journeys through the Alps') and found myself pondering over how I would fit all of the passes I would like to ride in the seven days agreed between myself and Mark. However, it quickly became apparent to me there would be a lot of riding to cram the passes in, and do the usual sight-seeing. The more I thought about it having to pitch tents in the mountains, carry all of that gear, stop off and sight-see would eat into the time I should be enjoying riding the mountain passes I so desire. I started to realise there would be a whole load of compromises similar to those we made in 2010 and I suddenly lost enthusiasm for it. Should I risk it? I thought, hope I can make it work somehow? To answer that, I needed to start planning for real, working routes out, finding camp sites, finding hotels with adequate safe parking for the bike, booking the accommodation, chasing people up, trying to get a feel for what is acceptable and what is not, and trying to satisfy each of our ideas of what we both see is a good trip and trying to shoe-horn my expectations with his expectations.
With a few weeks of loose planning similar to how I have planned in the past under way, I started to hear Lindsay's tales of woe while organising their trip. The ride to Croatia over 3 weeks now morphed in to two weeks somewhere completely different e.g. the Rhine and Mosel all because the folks involved couldn't agree on the kind of roads to ride. The planning I was doing all started to seem like a hard day at work knowing I was likely to encounter the same problems as it looked like I would need more days than the agreed seven we intended to take to complete the passes. With all this in mind it all started to make me think, wouldn't it be nice to simply 'Rock Up... and Ride' just like I did on a Brettours tour and have a laugh? After all, other people expect to do it ... other people expect other people to do the hard work and planning, turn up and take advantage of the hard work right? Someone else could do the hard work for me and I just turn up, panniers packed, GPS loaded with routes given to me by someone else and I just ride my bike. Simple. But then didn't this go against the whole Adventure Ride thing e.g. planning your own route is the freedom of adventure? Perhaps, but why should it? Every motorcycle trip I have ever been on has been organised by someone. Even Sam Manicom organises his trips up to a point, so who am I kidding, there is no such thing as a true adventure without some effort of planning the route, trying to find the best route, the most interesting route before you set off, where to stay, where to park the bike, even with some people - where to park the bike when having lunch!! It became obvious, the time I should be spending with my family I'm spending planning not only for myself, but planning within parameters imposed by others. Why should I spend hours and hours satisfying someone else's expectations at the expense of my own expectations and my own family time only to end up with a trip full of compromises to suit other people? Sounds a bit selfish I know, but why be the fool when the cost of a self-planned trip doesn't come that cheap? You might save financially, you may enjoy the planning activity up to a point, but you won't save any of your own time doing it. All things considered you will almost certainly end up failing to satisfy expectations along the way - including your own.
So... to conclude, quite simply, I've booked a place on a highly reputable organised tour this year. After speaking to a good friend I have known for some years (I met on an organised tour) about the kind of organised tour I was interested in and why, I've decided on the following Tour Itinerary provided by the tour company:
- Breath-taking riding of the Alps, Vosges, and the Ardennes
- Revised routes for 2016 but still retaining some of the unmissable roads
- 3 and 4 star hotels throughout
- Some of the best roads and riding in Europe
- Two nights in Meringen
- Two nights in Courmayeur
- Lots of famous passes mixed with some of the less well known and quieter routes
- Expert Riding Guide
Looks good doesn't it? Of course, not everyone's cup of tea, some would disagree with the price of an organised tour and convince themselves they can do it cheaper by self-planning, using cheaper hotels and eating cheaper food and it's true they could, but why sacrifice quality just because you can? Also, some would argue it's not for them as they prefer the 'freedom' to go where they like, when they like, but this time I know exactly where I want to go and don't want to go anywhere else, don't have limitless time, so why not go with the tour company who are going there anyway and it's pre-planned for you? The other benefit for me is budget. I can now budget for the trip because I now know all of the costs up-front and don't have to get the costs signed off by someone else. As I have found out, the only way you can avoid compromise is if you ride alone, otherwise you might compromise the quality of some of your ride as I did in Summer 2010. Riding alone is something we do anyway, it's what motorcycling is all about - a very personal activity, but compromising company in the evenings and rest stops is not ideal so at least with an organised tour you are with like-minded people who are equally as enthusiastic about what you are doing too.
Is it really much better to Rock Up And Ride for this year? I really do think so.
