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All Good Things Must Come to an End

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Oberursel Old Town Our direction from Stuttgart was Heidelberg  to visit Stefan and then Frankfurt/Oberursel where our friend Heiko lives. Town Centre As the saying goes ‘all good things must come to an end’ and the drive allowed us to extend our incredible statistic of riding in only 1 hr. of rain for 150 days and over 22000 kms. easily over 130 days were over 26C and we never wore our rain/wind liners from May 4th until Sept. 16th. We never wore the insulated liners period. Forever indebted to Heiko for his hospitality we headed back to Frankfurt to take Heiko out for supper before he headed off to Romania for a ‘guys’ dirt bike trip.  "Val", Heiko, Sandra and Brian As he inventoried his trip hardware we set out to walk and see more of Oberursel, a small town of 49000 plus residents. It so happened to be the same weekend as the Autumn fair which coincides with Oktoberfest in Germany . Apple Wine Tasting Contest Fair Crowd While it was a rather cool d

PORSCHE MUSEUM

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Welcome to Porsche 1st Design Concept Back in 2006 we stopped at the Porsche museum in Stuggart. It was old and not representative of the cars they produced. Later the same trip we also stopped in Gmund Austria where Ferry (Ferdinand) Porsche built his first cars during WWII and worked on the VW Kublewagen  later the Beetle for Hitler. Large Exhibit Halls state of the Art Now, Porsche has opened a state of the Art museum in the suburb of Zuffhausen that is far more representative of the cars and models that have been produced over the years. It was very impressive. We couldn’t believe we spent over 2 hours wandering around the new place it was that nice. The displays are first class with many of the cars placed against black backdrops so they photograph much better. If you own a Porsche then a trip here is in order.  Now we just found out from Heiko that the Frankfurt Auto show is on. Stand by for the last pictures of the new vehicles and themes from the ma

“Routes of the Grande Alpes”

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Summit of Col du Bonnet The Route des Grande Alpes is a made in heaven set of linked roads that wind their way through the French Alps. These roads are also always on the Tour de France (Climbing section). And of course you will recognize names like Albertville, Chamonix, Mont Blanc and Val D’Isere, as ski destinations. They are all on this route or within 20 kms. And the made in heaven is because they nearly reach it! Day 1 saw us head up from the coast through Sospel to ride the Col de Bonnet a 2802 M. pass. The day was sunny and warm. The scenery is spectacular even when you aren’t on a pass run but the passes are beautiful. Col De Bonnet once you get above the tree line becomes quite stark and it was good but not the Oh Wow! we had come to expect.  We did really enjoy Col de Vars though, much more interesting scenery from our view though the pass wasn’t as high. Perched Church in Mountains By comparison, we have ridden the highest pass between NA and Europe in t

French Riviera

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Sunrise over Menton The View from Our Room After spending 15 days being residents of the village of Levanto it was time to be on the road again. Our last major riding route is that of the French Alps from the Mediterranean to Geneva Switzerland. Stefan had provided me with some wonderful maps of what is called “Routes Des Grande Alpes”. A good entry point would be Menton, so that is a short one day drive from Levanto, and we get to enjoy one last day on a Med beach. Parasailing Menton is a very pretty place where water activities and people watching are front and centre. The next few days will be in the French Alps and from what we've seen so far the video footage will be spectacular.

Genoa

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Fabulous Church Archtiecture And who do we see? Home of Christopher Columbus   We have tried to stay true to keeping our blog entries event/location driven rather than holiday pics. What he'd sail today With that in mind we had taken a 15 day hiatus back in Levanto and did a 1 day trip into Genoa to visit it. It is such a beautiful city architecturally. Known best now as a port city, it was the hometown of a pretty important guy, Christopher Columbus.  Now while he was raised here, he discovered America for Spain and that is why the 3 ships are on display in Huelva (May entry). But just like good old St Nick, and Marco Polo, everyone wants a tourist piece of that action so Genoa commemorates his birthplace here. Genoa has a large marine basin,  with a lot of  Mega Yacht Ride to shore by Heli please? expensive boats. Check out the heli port on the one. A university that is the 3 or 4th oldest in Euro