It was almost 3 months that I didn’t ride with my XR! I didn’t even ride too much Enduro but at least few times… Now it was finally time to do some streetriding and because it was sunday I took also my wife with me! We checked our favorite places Fagervik and Mustio Castle.
First stop at Störsvik sandpit
The autumn colors are simply amazing at the moment so I took lot of pictures and I also had my drone with me. In Fagervik we made the walk through the beautiful area up to the church.
Ironworks area of Fagrvik
Then we stopped in a small hill beside the road to take some pictures. I took the pictures with my drone. The place where we made our stop was about here.
Some dronepictures from Lähdelammentie
Then the last place to admire autumn colors was in Mustio. This beautiful garden aroung old buildings is simply amazing!
Mustio Castle area
Building in the garden
Bridge
@finrin
IronWorks area
Garden
Garden
Mustio Castle
Mustio Castle & Garden
This autumn has been very nice with all the colors in the nature!
The idea was to ride from the south parts of Lithuania to Riga, Jurmala or Sigulda. But the weather forecast didn’t agree with my idea! There was crazy thuderstorm in that area and it wasn’t moving anywhere!! So I choose the route more east.. and the whole day was about trying to avoid the rain! So almost all day we had dark clouds on our left side…
Dark clouds on the west!
It seemed that we would finally enter the Daugavpils (again) and I wasn’t too excited about this! -I didn’t wanna spend the afternoon and night in a same town where we were before! Just before we crossed the Latvian border we at least saw something nice! But this windmill was pretty much ruined already -what a pitty.
Obeliai windmill
There was a chance to choose the road straight north… And we were also talking that maybe we could ride in the rain also to get further… And when we arrived to Jēkabpils I had to stop and fill the tank. This was perfect timing!! While I was in the gas-station it started raining (like crazy)!
So me and my wife decided to stay here if there was a hotel or a nice guesthouse. And there was! Unfortunately this place was the worst in our trip!! It was very old house where they had made somekind of renovation but it wasn’t very good quality! The door was hanging about 1cm and it was difficult to close it. The worst part was the bed… It didn’t have any mattress pad… And in the morning when we wake up we both had some pain in the back! Luckily there was at least something to see in this town and the restaurant was very nice!
So we were already by the same sea where we live and it really felt like home is close. Today we were riding small countryside roads of North Poland. Some of the roads were not in good condition at all!! After one road we had to keep 10 minutes break just to give some rest to our butts!!!
Reszel castle
The northern parts of Poland is beautiful! And also if the road is in good condition it can be very nice ride!
Polish countryside
Then we also crossed the border to Lithuania and it really started to feel that we are going home… Except the weather forecast didn’t look too good for next day!
In Lithuania
We took a guesthouse in Marijampole town and after quite nice dinner we made a short walk in local city park.
Day 14 From Cesky Krumlov we were riding straight north to Bechyně village. And I didn’t read the roadsigns well enough… the road was closed! We had to turn back to the big road and from there turn to west and find this bridge:
Stádlecký Chain BridgeOnly small cars can drive over. And me…
On the northside of Praha it started raining but only for about 30 kilometers. Then we made a short stop at Želízy village and we were climbing to the sandstone hill where we found these:
The Devil’s Heads
Finally we reached the small town of Ceska Lipa and the old town was nice surprise!
Ceska Lipa
You can find some more pictures from here! The route for this day was like this:
Day 15 This day started very grey and it looked like it will rain very soon!Because of this risk of rain I skipped the famous motorcycle cave. Luckily the sandstone castle was on the way and stopped there to take the picture.
Sloup castle
Then we were riding about 60km’s in Germany (12th country in our trip!) and there it started raining. The route for this day was about 310km’s and from that we had the rainsuits on about 170km’s! But we saw at least two nice/ strange buldings on the way!
Chocianów abandoned PalaceThe black Church. St. Francis of Assisi
And when the entered to our destination city Poznan it didn’t rain anymore and we could go walking to the beautiful old town!
And because I had to pay 10€ of parking this hotel was the most expensive on our trip -about 82€. You can see more pictures from this day here. The route for this day was like this:
This guesthouse was one of the nicest places where we spent the night. Especially the breakfast was very nice!
Gasthaus Zum Post
But after breakfast we were riding again. First we took the road 311 down in the walley and then we turned north following the Dientenbach river. This road is very nice as the river runs deep in the walley but it’s not very long… and then we took the “Hochkönig Road” to east. This road was first climbing to Mühlbach am Hochkönig -skicenter & village and then going down with very nice sweeping corners! Then it was road 159 north following the Salzach river (and A10 Autobahn) and then Lammertal Straße to east towards Postalmstraße. This is a tollroad with 5€ payment. The speedlimit is 40 and it’s almost like going back to middle-age… The phone network wasn’t working and there was cows everywhere!
Postalmstraße Mautstelle
Right after this panoramic road we had Traunsee…
Lake Traunsee
And then the mountains were gone! I had little bit sad feelings even we had quite nice countryside roads after the mountains. I was thinking: “Ok, we will see Tatra mountains in the north part of Czech republic but that’s about all…” Luckily there was some nice places still to make a short stop…
Nice views (without mountains…)
I had made the route to go over Vltava river in a ferry (Frydava-Frymburk). This was 4€ (Euros were just fine to use as payment!)
Ferry in Czech
Then we arrived at Cesky Krumlov and I had made a booking in the middle of the old town!! It’s not very wice because you can’t ride there at all! But after few tricks we had our stuff in our room and the bike was parked outside the old town… Here’s few pictures of the beautiful old town (Click any of the pics to see them bigger!):
There is absolutely enough of restaurants in this city! We didn’t choose the best one but it wasn’t too bad either… This town I can easily recommend to anyone. You should visit there! Our 288km route for today was like this:
The most amazing riding day in our tour! We started by climbing to Passo di Giau From the west.
Fedare in 2000 meters
Passo di Giau is well known about the views at the top!
Giau southwestGiau northGiau east
From Giau we rode down to Cortina d’Ampezzo and from there straight up to Passo tre Croci (at 1809 meters) that doesn’t go down very fast on the east side! There you will have first beautiful Lago di Misurina at 1754 meters and then Lago di Landro at 1400 meters. Beside these lakes there are also many hotels and restaurants. We took a short pause at Misurina with some sweet roll and lemonade.
Lake Misurina
Then it was time to ride to the next country: Austria! Almost right after we crossed the border I took the left-turn to a “secret mountain road” that not too many know about! Usually everyone is riding straight from Toblach (Italy) to Lienz (Austria) and then choosing the Grossglockner. But we took this “Pustertaler” first.
Amazing views
Then after riding a quite long way from the city of Lienz to the south-end of Grossglockner -We were finally there! I’ve been here twice before… (almost). 2014 we took the road from south and it was raining until Hochtor tunnel. Luckily from there we made the northside in good weather. In 2017 we came from north and it was raining too much! We decided to turn back. But now the weather was perfect!! Maybe it was little bit cold (about +10 celsius near the Glacier) but it didn’t bother us at all!! We got many nice pictures there!!
Click any of the pictures to see them bigger! We found a place to stay from Taxenbach village. The guesthouse was nice but we didn’t find a good restaurant from this small village. Our 240km route for this day was like this:
Luckily in the morning when we woke up it didn’t rain anymore. In the evening and during the night the rain was very heavy. So when we started to ride the road was wet and air was fresh…
Val Raccolana
The road in Raccolana valley starts from about 1300 meters in the east and it goes all the way down to Chiusaforte village (or town) in 391 meters! From there I wanted to ride north and check Passo del Cason di Lanza. But when I turned to that road there was a sign that it was closed. The alternative road SP112 from Pontebba to Moggio di Sotto was very nice too!
One of the many bridges over Torrente Aupa river
Then we were riding little bit north again. The route was about to climb to Monte Zoncolan from east. But I didn’t have routepoints in my GPS so it chose “the shortest possible” road to the top. This shortcut is not even a full road in google maps! But I did the whole road… with many rocks, fallen trees and lots of stuff and holes in the pavement! XR was totally ok with this road too. The actual road that climbs up to the mountain is not much wider. It makes the curves and corners in the middle of the skiing hill and it’s very steep in many places. At the top we had still cloudy weather and even few drops of rain fallin so we didn’t get nice pictures.
Monte Zoncolan
We made a short break in Ampezzo village. Found very small local shop and bought something to drink.
Ampezzo
Took a small mountain Pass called Cibiana. It climbs “only” to 1530 meters and there are restaurants and trees on the top so not much about nice views there. Then finally started the climb to Passo Staulanza. This I did back in 2017 but it was raining like hell then. Now the weather was nice and I could nicely enjoy the road and the power of S1000XR! I didn’t have any booking made for the night because I knew how it is around here. You can easily find guesthouses from every village! I made my first stop in Santa Fosca village in a small guesthouse called ” Albergo La Rondine” and they had a room for us. Plus there was a nice car parked outside -never seen it before!
