Germany/Switzerland Stage 7 - Freiburg to Basle 78km (29-Jun-2018)

Wow! the end is almost in sight, it was perfect day to end the tour; a mild breeze, a little cloudy but dry. After a healthy breakfast of mixed fruit, muesli with milk, I got going at 8.37am.  

The ride out of Freiburg was very pleasant and definitely hillier than what I had experienced for several days. I was used to long climbs out of and into towns. This was more rolling through the foothills of the Black Forest. And most of it was on bike trails, occasionally passing through villages and small towns. The scenery of the landscape was quite something, shame about the cloud cover; the photos don’t do it justice.

I was feeling really good and thinking how lucky I was, to be able to enjoy this ride as I pedalled effortlessly towards Basle. I was determined to ride along the Rhine for one last time on this tour even though the Swiss side of the Rhine is not the prettiest. Finally saw the sign pointing me towards the Rhine and luck would have it, a local passing by was able to capture this moment for me.

The path along the Rhine on the Swiss side is gravel, all be it pressed gravel so I could maintain a steady speed. I stopped at a lookout to read about the work being carried out to regenerate the Swiss side of the Rhine and luck would have it again, 3 senior citizens with similar intrigue as me were there to capture this moment for me.

There was a complete change of scenery as I entered into the suburban sprawl of Basel

by now a hot and steamy day; I was feeling the heat. Basle is not the prettiest town (old town excepted). With all the road works going on, the route in my Garmin was proving to be ineffective so I followed my instinct to get to my destination, Arlesheim on the outskirts of Basle where I was staying with my brother in law, Peter and his lovely family. My instincts based on previous visits proved right, by now the Garmin and I were both in sync. The last 3km to my brother-in-law’s home is all uphill with the last 500m an absolute killer with an 11-degree climb. Finally there, rang the bell and there he was, a smiling Peter with a warm and welcoming greeting. After a bit of rest, I gave some love (cleaning and washing) to my bike; followed by a walk with Peter to the village of Arlsheim to buy some tucker for the barbie that evening. Pete does cook a mean barbie and mine was a bratwurst and an early night.

It’s been a remarkable first solo tour covering approximately 920km at an average of 78km, a riding day. It would be unfair to Denmark Germany, France and Switzerland to pick one highlight as all countries offer remarkable hospitality, beautiful landscapes

and safe cycling infrastructure making it an absolute pleasure to ride. Remarkably, it didn’t rain once during the riding days. The toughest stage was the shortest, 34km from Rorivg to Molslingen in Denmark. That was ball breaking into a 40km head wind all the way when I questioned myself, why am I doing this?  I met some interesting characters along the way like this huge guy fishing on a bridge somewhere between Aarhus and Horsens in Denmark catching the smallest fish (a delicacy) possible and the Kiwi, James, inventor of drones trying one out somewhere near the Rhine in Germany, the bagpiper in the farmland also in Germany and the people who hosted us/me at the various AirBnb’s we stayed at. It was fun having Ursula follow me by public transport until Hamburg and also friends’ encouragement via Facebook and WhatsApp. My mate, Ellwood always made himself available to have a chat and support me with my Garmin issues, which was a source of comfort and most importantly my Ursula without whose encouragement and support, this tour would not have been possible.