Nice Trip (Day 4)

Posted by gozamite on 28.11.2018
Posted in: adventure, BMW motorrad, Make life a ride!, Moottoripyöräily, Serpentine, Travel, Video. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Again they promised rain! But it didn’t look too bad when we started riding. Short stop to take a picture in Col de Eze:

500 meters above Mediterranean

We were riding around in Monaco and checked few places there. But didn’t take any nice pictures. And after Menton we continued to Italy… but there it was raining!

View from Sant’Antonio to Latte village and Mediterranean

So we didn’t stay there too long. We came back to La Turbie and decided to go and check the Trophy of Augustus. Just beside the entrance there is a nice viewing point and a perfect view to Monaco!

All those “poor” people down there…

Then with the fee of 6€ we checked this Trophy that was built 6BC!!!
Read more about the trophy here.

Trophy is just a “small” building with balcony for the Emperor Augustus

Then it was already quite nice weather and we continued riding to the mountains. Right from the La Turbie village starts nice road to Peille village and we chose this one!

Tha Balcony road to Peille village

After Peille it was time for Col de Braus.

Serpentine road to Col de Braus

And right after this Col de l’Ablé.

Road to Col de l’Ablé is very narrow (from south)

Pitty that it was already afternoon and we had to return the bike to MotorBikeTrip. But we had very nice time riding the roads near to City of Nice! We will be back!
In the evening we were walking in the city and we saw this beautiful Church -Notre-Dame de Nice:


Full name is Basilique Notre-Dame de l’Assomption

Next day it was only about breakfast, packing and flight back to cold Helsinki… And my wife made a nice video of this day:

Here is the route for this day:


Nice Trip (Day 3)

Posted by gozamite on 22.11.2018
Posted in: adventure, BMW motorrad, Moottoripyöräily, Motorcycle Tour, Mountain Road, Video. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

We woke up quite early and went to the breakfast. We saw from the News that it had been snowing in France (in northern parts) -There was hundreds of cars stuck in some highway. Weather forecast promised us a beautiful sunny day so I wasn’t worried…
F700GS started after 9am and we were heading west/ northwest. First stop was at Col de Vence. The views to the mediterranean sea were very nice when we were climbing up. But on the top we couldn’t see the sea any more. The nature was interesting -especially the rocks!

Col de Vence (962m)
Strange rocks

Col de Vence has own webpages. It’s because people have seen quite a lot of paranormal activity here. Stories has been collected in coldevence.com.

Soon after this mountain Pass it was time to stop again. This is the beautiful village of Coursegoules.

Even the sun was shining it didn’t feel too warm…
Short stop after Andon, temperature was about +4
Autumn colors and snow…

Few kilometers before our final destination it was about the time to stop again. There was a beautiful view to the village Trigance.

From here started maybe the most amazing 80km’s of my life!!

7 kilometers from this view was another view. This time the road was on the edge of Verdon Gorge! It was about 250 meters down to the river Verdon… At one spot there was a balcony (viewing place) to look down -There I almost fainted! Last time this happened to me in 2013 in Dalsnibba (Norway).

Verdon Gorge (southside)

The Canyon of Verdon is one of the most spectacular river canyons in Europe. On the northside it is 700 meters deep!
On the northside of the canyon there is a looproad starting from the Village La Palud-sur-Verdon. This is about 25km’s of spectacular views -not recommended for those who has the fear of heights!
In one viewing point we even had eagles flying over our heads!!

700 meters above river Verdon!

It took about 3 hours all together to ride both the south and the northside of Verdon Gorge. Then it was time to ride back to Nice!
On the way back we chose the big roads… But it didn’t mean that we didn’t see anything special… Just it wasn’t as good as that Canyon!
Here is the video my wife made about this day:


The route for this day was like this:

Nice Trip (Day 2)

Posted by gozamite on 20.11.2018
Posted in: adventure, adventure bike, BMW motorrad, Moottoripyöräily, motocaching, motorcycling, Mountain Road. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

After very good sleep and breakfast we took a morning walk in a little bit wet streets of Nice. Rue de Rivoli was the direction about 2km’s away. There was MotorBikeTrip store where I had reservation for bike (3 days) -This was the bike:
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BMW F700GS
I didn’t ride this bike too much before and I have to say that the suspension is not good enought for 2. But I tried to adjust the preload tighter so that it wouldn’t hit the bottom all the time… Then we changed the full riding gear and started riding!
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It was still little bit wet in 500 meters high Col d’Eze between Nice and Monaco.
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In Menton the beach Boulevard is called The Sunny Promenade -but we had a little bit of rain…

We were standing in the mediterranean beach for awhile and I made a video there.
From Menton we started to climb up to the Mountains. I have been riding here before but back in 2016 it was too hot! Now it was quite nice weather.
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This bridge is a part of an old tramline between Menton and Sospel. Tram was in use from 1912 to 1930. This bridge is called “Viaduc du Caramel”.
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We stopped at Sospel to take few pictures. This made me think how sad it is when every place is now closed. No open cafeterias or restaurants… These cities and villages live only in the summertime.
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Climbing up to Col de Turini… Beautiful nature everywhere!
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Up on the top of of Turini it was raining quite heavily and we were inside the cloud.
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The visibility wasn’t too good!
Luckily under the clouds we could see some more… But the rain didn’t stop.
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The steep mountain walls of this area are amazing… even on a foggy weather! This is Col Saint-Roch.

Route for the day 1 was like this:


My wife made a nice video about this day:

Nice Trip (Day 1)

Posted by gozamite on 15.11.2018
Posted in: adventure, Kävely, Matkustus, Travel, Video. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

I made reservation for this trip in August. I was thinking it would be nice to spend some time with my wife when we’ve been married about 1 year… And even in foreign countries! (In the summer we couldn’t go abroad because the residence permit wasn’t ready yet) -So the destination for this trip would be Nice (Nizza).
We took the plane from Helsinki to Nice very early on Sunday morning.
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We landed to this mediterranean city about 10.30 am. Then we took the bus to the city center. It was still raining when we arrived (But rain stopped right after we started walking from the bus stop to the hotel).
This day we dedicated for getting to know the city. And there is one place particularly that gives you very good idea about what is this beautiful city all about: The Castle Hill (Colline du Château). There used to be also a castle but King Louis XIV asked it to be destroyed in 1706. In 19th century they started to design the park and fountain on the top of the hill. Also some parts of the olf castle has been renovated.
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We walked up to the hill from the east side. This side is not so steep and there are a lot of trees so the park looks kind of wild from this side.
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Restored parts of the old castle. This was maybe the inner yard or patio.
But when you finally reach the to of the hill the views are simply amazing!
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View to the east. It’s the harbour of Nice.
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And here’s the “famous view” to the beach boulevard of Nice. The mediterranean sea and the waves are very beautiful!
Ofcourse we took a walk also there…
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We had small but very cozy hotel almost in the heart of the city (Vieille Ville). This area has very narrow alleys with many many restaurants and shops.
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And our hotel room was in the 7th floor with the view to the Tête carrée (Cubic head in the modern art museum)
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I was restlessly already waiting for the next day!
You can check the video my wife made about this first day:

 

1 night mototrip in September

Posted by gozamite on 10.11.2018
Posted in: adventure, BMW motorrad, Make life a ride!, Moottoripyöräily, motorcycling, S1000XR. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Me and my wife did a 1 night trip in 7th – 8th of September. I chose a small cabin from Aurantola and then it was only about how to ride there and back.
The first day ride was like this:


Here’s some pictures from Hyvinkää, Pulkkilanharju, Kalkkisten kanava, Heinola and Aurantola resort.
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This is from Library Square
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Bike parked at Hyvinkää
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Beautiful Pulkkilanharju
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Amazing Canal of Kalkkinen
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Art in Heinola (ITE puisto)
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Bike in Heinola
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Aurantola Cabin
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Aurantola sunset

Enduro autumn 2018

Posted by gozamite on 17.10.2018
Posted in: adventure, adventure bike, BMW, BMW motorrad, dirt bike, enduro, Extreme ride, gravel road, helmetcamera, kawasaki, KTM, Moottoripyöräily, motorcycle, motorcycling, Off-Road, videocamera. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

On august 17th I bought a new enduro bike! This time I chose BMW G650 XChallenge! It has the same 1-cylinder 650ccm Rotax-engine than in many many other bikes. It is known to be very trustful and you don’t have to make service all the time.
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I rode the bike from Lappeenranta to home and I really was enjoying enduroriding again!
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During this autumn I’ve been riding few times with friends also and I’ve had videocamera with me. Here are some nice videos:

This was 2nd of september. We were riding mostly quite big roads/ easy roads so everyone could join the ride!

The roads in Kiikala area are very nice!! You really can enjoy the speed and essence of Finnish nature and adventure motorcycling!

This one is from Vihti/ Karkkila/ Lohja area (Rausjärvi). It is also a part of Trans Euro Trail route that I planned last spring. In this video there is a scary moment in 06:45 when a car comes from the yard straight in front of me! Luckily I had enough time to ride aside!

In the end of september we had a little bit different ride. This time mostly OffRoad. This was already in the beginning of the day… The most difficult parts! I can say that I was sweating like a pig… or a horse!

This path is quite well known route in Vihti. Not too difficult, almost quite ok for ordinary roadbike too.

This is one sandpit near Lohja. There is also nice small pond and we are riding around it two times.
And the last route is an old railroad (without rails) in Pikkala. The railroad was built by Russians when the area was part of Russia after the WWII.

In this video there is short break to take pictures under the bridge and then riding over the log. This log is not that difficult anymore…

Tour around Finland Day 16

Posted by gozamite on 16.9.2018
Posted in: adventure, Make life a ride!, Moottoripyöräily, Motorcycle Tour, motorcycling, S1000XR, videocamera. Tagged: , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

This is the last day of our tour around Finland. We didn’t try to follow borders as close as possible. It just came like this… We went north from the east side and came back from the west side. We tried to check nice places on our way but certainly there was many places that we didn’t see. So there will be many nice spots to visit in the future.
Quite soon after we started riding we had this road. The route has a very nice ridgeroad going through small lakes 2 times! These are very beautiful places to make short stop and take pictures.
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These pictures are from Rantalansärkkä wich is the more beautiful one… or at least it is easier to stop the bike there.
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When we arrived to Ruovesi area we rode to the forest. With this bike and this load (maybe around 450kg’s) it’s not easy to ride on the forestroads if there is soft sand. We found this interesting “monument” or a memorial sign anyway.
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They put the sign because some war-veterans were planting this forest long time ago (I think it was 1972).
Couple hours later we took a short walk in the museum-bridge in Teisko.
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It’s called Aunessilta. It’s nowadays for walking only. Usually here you can see also some boats.
Then we checked one of the most famous place to have a coffeebreak (for motorcycle riders). It’s the Vehoniemi car-museum and cafeteria. This is located in a beatiful high ridge in Kangasala. The place is more than 40 meters higher than the lakesurface just beside the ridge! There is also a viewingtower.
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After this we didn’t make any stops anymore… We just ride back home!
Video of this day made by my wife:

The route for the last day was like this:

Tour around Finland Day 15

Posted by gozamite on 15.9.2018
Posted in: adventure, BMW motorrad, Matkustus, Moottoripyöräily, motocaching, motorcycling, S1000XR. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

The staright road home would be about 500 km’s -but not yet. We will still ride the small roads and explore this beautiful country.
On the southside of Pietarsaari is one of the most “Swedish” areas in Finland. Here we saw this:
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This “Klacken” is a big party place in “Lillby” (Small village). Most of these kind of places have died in Finland but this seems to be quite active!
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Right beside this partyplace was the local shop. Seemed like an ordinary “K-Market” but actually it was more like a mall!
They had clothes, tools and almost everything you can imagine you will need while living in the countryside -even agricultural machinery!
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Soon after this “Lillby” we stopped at “Ilveskivi”. This is one of the biggest boulders in Finland. To get to the stone you have to walk almost 1 km and we didn’t change any clothes. It was still quite hot day so walking in riding gear was not a good idea!
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Luckily the place is very beautiful and the stone is huge! It rises 16 meters up from the groundlevel and they’ve even built the stairs there so you can climb to the top of the stone!
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After this stone we found nice beach to take a swim in Lappajärvi. And soon after the refreshing swim we checked the area full of war-machinery and trench in Menkijärvi.
This area is not actually a museum, but still it gives a good point of view how it was 75 years ago!
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Just before we arrived to our next accommodation in Töysä village it was raining. Luckily it was just a short shower so we didn’t get totally wet. We just removed the bags from the bike to our room and changed to a little bit lighter clothing (it was still very hot after the rain) and we went to the small village shop…  We did some shopping and enjoyed the dinner in one of their restaurants.
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In the evening it started raining again but luckily it wasn’t heavy so we could take a short walk in totally dead Töysä-village. We saw maybe 10 people in the village (saturday evening 8pm).
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Töysä beach is in Lake Ponnenjärvi.
Video from my wife about this day:

The route for the day 15 was like this:

Tour around Finland Day 14

Posted by gozamite on 10.9.2018
Posted in: adventure, BMW motorrad, Make life a ride!, Moottoripyöräily, motocaching, motorcycling, S1000XR. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

This was about to be quite short day… (if you think about how many kilometers we made). But we saw many nice places anyway!
First was Kalajoki!
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It’s a huge sand-dune area and quite a lot of holiday activities around it. We were there very early in the morning but we took the swim anyway.
Then there was Ohtakari Island at the end of Vattajaniemi -area. These are the biggest sand dunes in northern Europe, the area is about 40 square kilometers wide! Here you can also park your bike beside the sea!
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I swam also here, my wife didn’t…
In Kokkola we stopped to check the longboat that was taken from the Royal Navy when they tried to conquer the city in Crimean war (quite a lot of the fights were at the coast of Finland).
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This is the Royal Navy longboat from Halkokari fight.
There is one abandoned lighthouse in the northside of the city. This is very interesting place! It would also be quite spooky place in the dark (I guess)…
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It’s called Harrbåda lighthouse.
Around 10 years ago there was quite nice motel, beach and restaurant and I spent quite many nights in this place long long time ago…
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But then slowly they didn’t have customers anymore, they should have renovate the place and make it modern but they decided to sell it (or it went to bankruptcy?). I think the price was something like 10 million euros first… but quite soon the price went down. The place was so terrible condition!
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2015 there was news that they have new owner and there will be totally new hotel and restaurant… But it seems nothing happened there yet!
Then we stopped at Öja fishing village and this beautiful cafeteria in the harbour. It’s called Bryggan café.
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Here you can easily spend many hours just sitting in the café and enjoying the atmosphere!
Then finally we arrived to Pietarsaari -this is one of the most beautiful cities in Finland!
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But the hotel we had was totally opposite to all this nice surroundings!
We had Hotel Vega with quite nice price but there was simply nothing good the place!!
– Reception was totally dark when I went in
– They had lots of strange toys and items everywhere. And when I say “lots of…” I mean like hell of a LOT!
– There was dead bird in front of our door
– Room was dirty, there was sand in my wife’s bed
– The yard was dirty, I think it was cleaned maybe 10 years ago
– Breakfast was not fresh! There was lots of canned food!
– It was like the hotel from the movie “The Shining” but in small size… very spooky!
Here’s some pictures:

But at least I got one nice picture of my wife just outside our room!
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She’s the one who makes these videos:

The route for the day 14 was like this: