Hello there! It’s been a while since we posted here but for good reason… We’ve been out riding our bikes! Lucky us. But it’s been tough! The last two weeks were no pony camp… 🐴 We left Cochem and traded the Eifel hills for the German highlands. And they didn’t disappoint!
Let’s take a quick step back. We’re currently following the EDT - an off-road bikepacking route that crosses Europe from North to South. We hope to follow it down to Portugal, with some of our own detours along the way.
So that’s what we’ve been up to! Leaving Cochem, we were soon traversing the Pfälzerwald (Palatinate forest) - a stunning and wild natural forest that’s the biggest in Germany. Honestly, we’d never heard of it but we were amazed by the trails we got to ride there. A magical place, truly. To be sure, there wasn’t much flat riding. Everything was either up or down, but that’s what we signed up for. We slowly threaded our way along these parts in our trusty granny gear.
We crossed into France following one of those little trails. A real milestone for us! We were looking forward to the Vosges mountain range from the very start of the trip and now we had reached them. The mountains slowly turned into bigger ones and the climbs grew more sustained. We reached the highest point in the route yet at over 1000m.
All the while, the route seemed to turn into a rather diverse mix of trails, including hiking and fire roads - some of which a bicycle probably had no business being on. We slowly pushed our bikes up some of these climbs, sweating and puffing and questioning our life choices. The prolonged rainy weather made things even harder, turning the trails into more slippery or muddy ones.
However, it’s remarkable how soon you forget about the pain. One moment you’re swearing your heart out in a desolate forest, wondering why you’re doing this, the next you’re giddily recounting how great the day had been in your sleeping bag. It’s a strange thing. The rain would typically stop after a few hours. The thunder would stop roaring. A gruelling climb would be followed up by an exhilarating descent. And we’d pass through incredible places no tourist would find. So, while we suffered at times, we’re pretty sure we wouldn’t remember things as fondly if we hadn’t.
We bumped into some other people doing the trail and it was fun catching up. They’re mostly solo travelers and we’re typically the first couple they’ve seen so far on the trail. Not sure what that says about us but we’ll take it as a good sign anyway.
We’re currently taking some zero days in l’Isle-sur-le-Doubs, a little town between Besancon and Belfort, eating Ice cream, drinking Picon, and swimming in the Doubs River. Next up are the Jura mountains and border hopping with Switzerland. We’re excited! Stay tuned.
