TRAVERSE 88
Dawn came at 05:30 and I had slept a bit , it was no great hardship . I re-sprayed the chain , put my waterproofs on and was riding into the heart of the Schwartzwald that same hour . The weather was reasonably bright to start , and I wound my way up and through the forested hills .
The road that took me into the depths of the cloud-hung forest made me feel as if I was entering an exciting new land ; this was the beginning of the adventure and it wasn ’ t raining , yet . It was uphill pretty much all the way , along the winding tarmac and through the tall , dark green pines , where darkened passes led me between the hills . The road climbed a steep curve out of Treberg and then straightened out onto a bit of a plateau , with open meadows and good views , before descending smoothly and merging with the autobahn .
Unfortunately , the weather caught me up by the time I reached the Bodensee ( Lake Constance ), and I could see the rain in the sky as I looked across the lake to Switzerland .
The constant drizzle on the way to Lindau persuaded me to cross into Austria earlier than I ’ d planned and ride it out to get as far south as I could on this day . The funny thing about riding through the mountains is that you often find different weather on the other side of an alp . I was getting wetter and wetter all the way up into the grey clouds , then , I went through one of those long road tunnels and when I came out into the Austrian Tyrol , the air was clear , I was surrounded by snowy mountains , and it wasn ’ t even raining . The Arlberg tunnel was closed , so I took the mountain pass , which certainly was worth it . I got myself south to the
Reschenpass ( Passo di Resia ), and into Italy way earlier than I had planned on and was quite shocked by the sight of the vast , empty reservoir bed that had been the most glorious picture postcard mountain retreat the previous times I ’ d passed that way . The spire of the medieval church tower was still preserved as the evidence of a sunken village , but it was walled in to retain only the spring water , and the rest of the whole valley was a bone-dry wasteland from mountain to mountain . It looked like a scene of devastation , with diggers and gravel trucks driving around in there , generating clouds of dust .
My new plan was to ride south to Lake Garda , via Bolzano and Trento . The side-route , away from the main roads , from Trento towards Riva del Garda was bliss ; the sun was out and with every few kilometres that I clocked up it was all feeling that much more like Italy . I stopped at the
TRAVERSE 88