I've definitely woken up to worse views than the one from my room in the Hotel Mölltaler.



Breakfast, and I get my bike out of the awesome garage. I could certainly spend more time around here - there were billboards advertising the roads around Lienz - but instead I keep heading south. The destination for tonight is Lake Bled... but first, let's pop over to Italy for a gelato.

Just after Iselsberg the road dips into a river valley and I go up over another mountain pass, this one with barely a numerical designation. This is what people have been telling me on my local forums: sure, you'll want to aim for something famous like the Stelvio, but the real joy of the Dolomites is the scores of unknown, untrafficked roads connecting the various towns and villages. Back down to a river, back up a mountain: this is a pattern I can really get behind.



The Plöckenpass is not world-renowned, but that only increases its appeal. On approach to the summit I dive into a tunnel, then another one, and come out to a Brutalist memorial of a brutal time.



The raw concrete border post, a chokepoint between high mountain walls, stands empty now. Elsewhere this would have been torn down or repurposed into a police station; on this tiny secondary road, it is a place to ponder the grand achievement of a united, borderless Europe. Not without its faults, but certainly better than what came before.

In a different light, or rather with a different filter, and with the Austrians' friendly sign in the shot, the whole thing seems a lot less ominous.



The road surface on the Italian side is decidedly worse than it was in Austria last night, but the weather is decidedly better. The switchbacks are now sort of one-and-a-half lane, no clear markings and separation left over to the good sense and agreeableness of the participants. It's a Monday morning and there are not many people on the road, so I lean and rev my way down the SS52 into Tolmezzo. The regional capital, built at the confluence of two rivers, is surprisingly busy as I roll into the center of town along narrow streets. I back the bike into a gap between two parked cars, make sure my cantilevered topbox is not impeding pedestrians too much, and gear down for a walk around. It's hot enough that I give up on the moto jacket and stuff it under the bungies that are holding the drybag onto the pillion; there are no valuables in it, it's obviously well-worn, and I am making a calculated risk that even on a road with loads of pedestrians, nobody will try to run off with it. It may be the weather, or it may be the atmosphere of Italy - after spending so much of this holiday in stuffy, precise German-speaking lands, I can definitely feel that I am now in a community that is primarily concerned with the pleasures in life.

There seems to be a morning market going on in Tolmezzo, I've lucked out and stumbled onto the correct day of the month - I doubt they have this level of activity every Monday. It's getting towards noon now, and the street stalls are closing up for an extended lunch dictated by the sun in zenith, reaching down into the canyons of ancient streets. I wander around looking for a particular place. I've never been to Tolmezzo before, but I have been to Italy, so I know it has to be here somewhere... Ah, there we go.



I enjoy my elaborate ice cream on a bench, just out of the sun's rays, for once just relaxing in the moment and enjoying the spirit of the day and the place. Has it really been less than two weeks since I started this trip? I am definitely in the travel state of mind now; this is what I would love to continue doing.

My bike is still where I left it, safe and sound, sweaty jacket included. The locals are giving me friendly glances, appreciating the unfamiliar license plate if not the idea of wearing full black gear in this heat. That's alright, signora - while you head off for a post-lunch nap, I will be enjoying some of your finest mountain roads on my own. I'm sure there will be an espresso waiting for me when I need it.

Following the river, I come to an industrial area with a tangle of slip roads; the autopista is above me on concrete pillars. I check my map, circle the roundabouts a few times, and find SS52 again. It takes me across the river and links up with the SS13, which I follow all the way to Chiusaforte. Italy treats me right, and saving the toll fee was an excellent choice: there's nobody on this road, and it sweeps and bends along the lakebed with beautiful scenery in the background. I'm back in triple digits and loving it.

At Chiusaforte I find a bridge and stop to catch my breath, finish my water, and turn on my GoPro. The SP76 is what I was dreaming of when I headed for the Alps: bendy but not switchbacky, devoid of campers and other slow-moving traffic, and utterly gorgeous. I join up with the SS54 and roll on into Slovenia. Even the abandoned border station I roll through is less intimidating. This is the Latin lifestyle.

Nose down again, as I blast along Slovenian route 203. At the bottom is a big biker-friendly tavern; I stop to use the bathroom, but it's too early to get off the road. Slovenia is weird; as a native Russian-speaker, I can sort of understand the language if I read it aloud in my head and find a similar-sounding Russian equivalent that would be appropriate for the circumstances. Southern Slavic languages (Yugoslavia literally means "Southern Slavic land") are at once recognizable and charmingly archaic-seeming, though this is not really accurate. They're perfectly modern, evolving languages; but due to the influence of Church Slavonic, the tongue of the Orthodox liturgy, which is a frozen-in-time dialect that originated somewhere roughly in what is now Bulgaria, Slovenian scans to me as Chaucer would to a modern English speaker. Plus, it uses Latin script, not a variant of Cyrillic like Serbia and Croatia. The Slovenians definitely seem to think of themselves as formerly Austro-Hungarian rather than formerly Yugoslavian, an opinion proudly expressed in their license plates, templated after modern Austrian ones. Well, I can certainly relate to the feeling - I come from a country that thinks of itself as once-and-future Scandinavian!

I turn onto the 206 and get to Trenta. My GoPro is recharged and ready for the next leg, another name that's been spoken to me in hushed whispers: the Vrsic pass. Cutting through the heart of what is now the Triglav (Triplehead) National Park, it is a mountain road built by Russian POWs around World War One; at the top is the Russian Chapel, dedicated to those who perished in the construction. The upper reaches of the pass are paved in the same type of stone that I encountered on the way to Edelweiss Peak, and I am apprehensive, with my luggage and my street tires.



I needn't have worried. Yes, it gets chilly as I climb, but the stones are there for a reason: a special type of basalt cut and laid out in a special fanning pattern, they were designed to give iron-shod horses purchase on icy roads. In June, this far south, there's more than enough grip for me. This may be my last big mountain pass of the trip, but I've finally found my groove, knees locked tight on the tank, body forward, throwing the VFR into turns, a silent scream of joy inside my helmet.

Past the summit, I keep an eye out for the Russian Chapel, built to commemorate the dead PoWs - but I miss the turnoff, and keep going down until I reach the crossroads at Kranjska Gora and stop at a strip mall. The town is dedicated to ski tourism; it's still open in the summer, but it's pretty obvious that June is not high season. I check the giftshops for a pannier sticker, but find nothing good; in the meantime, the skies open up. I wait out the downpour under an awning next to the local post office, which advertises that it sells highway vignettes. Fair enough; I'm only here for a couple of days, but then again, I am going to be using very nearly the entire stretch of the country's toll roads. It's certainly cheaper than Switzerland, but curiously enough, more expensive than Austria (but has a longer validity period). My double-bubble now has a vignette triforce now.



I get on the highway eastwards and head to Lake Bled. It being a bit of a tourist trap, there was no good option for cheap accommodation at short notice, but on the other hand, I'm paying East European prices now. The place I booked is a pansion outside of town. I arrive there to a chilly reception from the old lady at the counter; I don't think she's very happy about dirty, smelly, distinctly damp moto travelers traipsing all around her nice fancy lakeside building.



I leave my gear to dry and my various implements to charge, and change into street clothes. It's stopped raining now, so with my headphones and a nice audiobook, I take a look at the village and then head along country roads into Bled proper. It's a walk I greatly appreciate, as I get to enter the town via the back way, through fields and down residential streets.



Lake Bled may be a tourist trap, but there's a reason tourists come here: the scenery is absolutely gorgeous, and not even the communist-era resort promenade can spoil it. The lake sits beautifully in a nest of mountains, accessorized by two whole castles - one on an island in the middle, and another on a rocky outcrop above the shore - and the buoys of a rowing course set up all along its length.



I do some research on my phone, about the castle and the dinner spots. The beachside pavilion advertises the Lake Bled Cream Cake, a traditional pastry that was developed by a local chef and served here throughout the latter half of the 20th century. I ignore the pavilion's claims of authenticity, with a strong suspicion that every eatery in the town will serve me a version of that cake. They even have it in the promenade's grocery store, which is nestled between a cute but closed coffee shop, and a series of distinctly unappetizing pizza-and-kebab kiosks. I grab the local soft drink - always fun to try something more interesting than the usual Cola-Fanta-Sprite. Unfortunately, I have to say, the Slovenian special turns out to be almost entirely flavorless.



I walk uptown to some of the recommended restaurants, but nothing looks particularly appealing, so I return to the lake and decide to trace the shoreline for as long as I can be bothered. Which, turns out, is all the way. On the back end of the lake is a rowing club house, complete with bleachers on the hill for spectators; just past it is a fairground. I head back down the other shore, past the dock that rents paddleboats to go out to the island castle. I'm in an odd mood - since I've escaped the expense of Old Europe, I am loathe to spend the extra few euros on the boat, and it's not a matter of being able to afford it. Partially it's the tourist-trapness; Bled is unambiguously beautiful, but it's Disneyfied in the same way (if not to the same degree) as Neuschwannstein was, and I object to that on philosophical grounds. Leaving as little money as I can in this scene is a statement. I am also enjoying the challenge of seeing how much I can enjoy the place without spending a penny.




Calculating my timing exactly, I recross my path and end up at the foot of the high castle just as it's meant to be closing. Internet reviews suggest there is a window after they stop selling (and checking) tickets, but before they close the doors. I figure that even if I can't be clever, I'll enjoy the view from the top of the stairs anyway. In fact, there's a whole crowd of people up at the top landing who got the same tip as I. The ticket booth is indeed closed, and entry to the courtyard is indeed open; it seems that the ticket mainly applies to the castle interior, as there's a restaurant in the courtyard, and all the outside bits are accessible. That works perfectly for me. I take a bunch of sunset pictures, including a few of the mid-century communist ugliness across the water. I suppose the cream cake pavilion is a popular tea room for the exact reason that from inside it, you can't see its exterior.



I'm mindful of being far enough south for the Sun to go down quickly, but it's still June. I make it downhill and to the grocery store just in time to get a box of cream cakes and a couple local s before they close, and walk back through the town, the fields and the forested hills to the pansion. My H&M slip-ons have certainly earned their keep today.



---

Day 13: ~250 km in the saddle, ~20km on foot, many hundreds of meters vertically.

Breakfast is included, and I am shown downstairs to the pondside restaurant by a younger and much friendlier male receptionist. I'm nearly ready to leave Bled, but there is one more thing to see here: the Vintgar gorge.



Running for more than a kilometer through the mountains just outside of town, these stony rapids are so remarkable that the very concept of a waterfall is named after the place in Slovenian.



I set my nav and keep my eye out for street signs. They lead me down a bunch of back streets, to a crossroads: both ways lead to Vintgar, but one of them is for pedestrians/hikers only, and cars are directed in the other direction. I follow the flow of holiday traffic and the street signs, for what feels like a surprisingly long way. Finally I reach the parking lot, squeeze my bike in at the trailhead, and pay the entry cost. I'm still in the same mood as yesterday (the cream cake was fine but not as good as the strawberry tarte in Sarreguemines), and I bristle slightly, but it's only a couple of euros.



The air is damp and overcast, so while my gloves and helmet go in the topbox, I am happy to have my rainsuit on as I walk along the footpaths and bridges, dodging the umbrellas of Asian tourists. The gorge is impressive, and I keep wondering if the stream is passable. It's June, which in Estonia is long past snowmelt season, but here you have Alpine snowpacks to contend with; the gorge looks too narrow for a whitewater raft, but a small competitive kayak, at high water, with way more talent and skill than myself? I bet it could be done!



The pretty riverside path, which was constructed in the late 19th century as the first dedicated tourist-accessible gorge in the country, terminates in a waterfall and another ticket booth - this one empty. Apparently, you only pay for access if you park at the western trailhead; if you walk the four kilometers from Bled town, you get in for free. This is a philosophy I can approve of.



For me, it's another walk back along the trail to the bike, and then I'm weaving through the back streets towards the highway. I have tonight's accommodation booked, but I'm not going there quite yet; first, I'm going to check in at the southernmost point of this trip, the capital city of Ljubljana.



As I leave the highway, I forsake any hope of using the nav and rely on the flow of traffic and obvious street cues to take me into the heart of the city. On the outskirts, Ljubljana looks like any communist-era city you care to name; I am aiming for the heart of the Old Town. In close proximity to it, the arterial roads stop making sense, and the traffic is bad enough that I am in the mood to find a parking space. Remembering Lucerne, I look for large congregations of scooters and motorcycles in which to hide, hoping for safety in numbers. Patience runs out near the Radio-Television Building: it's surrounded by parked vehicles that look like they belong there. I find a spot between two cars, but too narrow for a third because of a protruding bit of wall, and dismount. As I am putting my helmet, gloves and tankbag into the topbox for the second time today, I assess that my foreign license plate and stickered panniers should provide enough benefit of the doubt, even if this part of the road is reserved for the TV station's vehicles. I could very easily be a visiting reporter or here to appear on a show, and authorized to slip past the barrier! I'll be gone before anyone is sufficiently annoyed to go about finding out.



Still in my riding pants (complete with black gorilla tape on the butt), jacket and boots, I walk over to the Old Town. Past a smattering of dive bars and tiny coffee houses, I come out on a shopping street and am drawn in by a bookstore. I figure there may be pannier-friendly stickers in there, so I can buy something for the outside of my luggage even if there is no room for paperbacks on the inside. No luck, but they do have one of those ingenious gadgets that bookstores and museum giftshops sell - in this case, a beautifully crafted piece of wood that goes on your thumb to keep a book open with one hand while reading it. It's clever, it's locally made, and it's small enough to go in my riding jacket's pocket. Sold.



I stop at the Triple Bridge to take pictures, and feel the need for a public convenience. I'm waived off from the door, in a brusque but not hostile manner, and am told the gents' is on the other side of the bridge. Fair enough; and there is no charge. This speaks volumes of attitudes towards visitors, and endears me further to Slovenia.



Up the thoroughfare to the base of the crag upon which Ljubljana Castle sits. The weather is lovely and I have time, so I check Google Maps and start up one of the hillside paths towards the top. Textiles and tall boots are not the perfect outfit for this sort of sightseeing, but at least I am working off those cream cakes! Close to the top, under the curtain wall, I climb onto the remains of a bastion for a panorama shot of Old Ljubljana. While I'm not too upset about only having a short stopover here - you've seen one Germanic town center, you've seen them all, and I grew up with one of Europe's best-preserved ones - I can definitely see the charm. Shame about all the post-Communist stuff just outside. Maybe it's because this is far South - the locals are not quite as obsessed with renovation and insulation to reduce the cost of heating in the winter - but it feels odd to me that Slovenia, the most economically successful of the former Eastern Bloc countries and the first one to join the Eurozone - looks less Western than Estonia.



I walk around the curtain wall to the castle entrance, and discover a dedicated, free motorcycle parking lot. Well, crap; I'll take that as a lesson for the future, but to be quite honest, I would not have cared to try and find my way up here through weekday afternoon traffic, in the hot sun, even with nav. The castle courtyard is free as well - much like in Bled, you only pay for access to specific museum components. I walk around, take pictures, and giggle at the name of the office where you can arrange to have a wedding ceremony at the castle; Slovenians may use the Latin alphabet, but the name reads in Russian as "Sinful Writers' Quarters".



I take a moment to appreciate what this is: the absolute southernmost point of my trip. It feels like I'm more than half done, but then I've frontloaded my travels based on ferry dates, commitments to friends, and the idea that I will be more exhausted toward the tail end of my trip and will want a few days to relax and just walk around. Anyway, this is the furthest I'll go geographically - Ljubljana is to the south of Bled, and my bike is parked marginally north of here. I've ridden a motorcycle up to Nordkapp, and I've ridden this motorcycle to Andenes - the furthest road-reachable point in the Lofoten Archipelago. This castle will be the south extreme of my pure-overland travels.

For now.



Back down the hill, a different bridge across the river and along the shopping promenade; ah, there's the Radio-Television building. My bike is undisturbed, and I take my time gearing up for the next stretch. I have one more ride left for today, and it's northeast, highway all the way: Maribor.



I'm sweaty and hot as I ride into town, and stop to figure out my path. I'm booked at the onsite-parking-sporting Hotel Orel, which Google Maps tells me is right in the middle of the Old Town; but the road signs say traffic is prohibited. I find a barrier and an intercom that I'm supposed to ring if I am a guest of that particular hotel, but nobody answers. I shrug and squeeze past the barrier, then cut across the main square to the hotel, a mid-20th-century building taking up most of a city block, but courteously tucked away in an alley. I squeeze in between two support columns - where no car would fit and where I am not obstructing traffic - check in, and have what is undoubtedly one of the most sorely needed showers of my adult life.



It's too late in the day for most museums, but the weather is lovely and it's still light outside. I go out for a walk, and it's not long before Maribor endears itself to me. On the sidewalk outside a tapas bar, a local flamenco school is having a rehearsal; the passersby applaud in appreciation. As I approach the riverside promenade, I stumble across a still-barely-open craft shop.



I head for the section of local produce; there's a particular dark porter of which there is only one bottle left, deep inside the shelf, which is normally a great sign. The cashier compliments my choice and asks if I know the story of the guy the is named after - apparently an early 20th century astronomer and pioneer of spaceflight physics, who was originally from this area (but lived mostly in Vienna). According to the urban legend, his notes were stashed away after his death and found by Nazis in WWII, then got taken to the United States as part of the whole rocketry technology grab, and remained a desktop reference for NASA scientists well into the 70s!



I choose a direction at the riverfront and walk along the Danube, past the wine museum sporting the world's oldest living and producing vine. There's a museum inside, with a little tasting room. I make a note to get some of the local riesling, then remember I've got panniers, not a suitcase.



Further down, past medieval turrets and the remains of trade piers, I come to a wonderful footbridge. It's a span of wooden planks laid in an arch over a large truss, designed to easily allow bicycle and baby-carriage traffic, but also to allow people to sit on top of the central beam and watch the sunset over the Danube.



As I walk back along the opposite bank, I keep glancing back at the bridge. It's really getting to me. Whoever commissioned that bridge and signed off on the design made a real effort, put genuine thought into the well-being of the city's population. I check Google - as expected, Maribor features a prominent university. I guess university towns of around a hundred thousand people, with a historical center and a river running through them, are just my favorite format of human settlement.



I drop off the at the hotel and head for the high point. There's a roughly Rio-style memorial cross overlooking the city from a hill, and the path towards it starts on the other side of a large formal walking garden. The path itself winds up the hill between vineyards. As I sit on top and watch the sun set and the strings of lightbulbs come on across the entire slope, I remark on what a great decision it was to come to Slovenia.



And the stout was excellent.



---

Day 14: 200 km on the bike, probably 20 km on foot, way too much of it in full gear.

Interesting read! Thanks for sharing. I like the subtle irony of your approach.

Time to continue with this thread to keep it on the front page. And time to leave Slovenia!

Overnight, the tiny piece of asphalt across the alley from the hotel entrance has been filled up by Harleys. I go down to breakfast and find the riders there, old guys in leather vests pretending to be a hardcore gang. They're self-absorbed and not friendly at all; I don't know which stereotype to attribute it to - their choice of lifestyle vehicle or their German plates. It's a bit of an odd departure, considering that for most of this trip, I have met with very positive attitudes.

I leave Maribor and head north. It takes me as long to get out of the city as it does to reach the Austrian border, which is the first (and last) time I see actual overland border guards anywhere on this trip; they are scanning plates and vehicles, but moving people on without stopping traffic altogether.



My plan for the day requires me to cross the entirety of Austria, this time south-to-north, at its thickest point. This means highways, and on approach to Graz, I have two choices. The easiest, most obvious and fastest one has me going east, via Vienna and Brno. But this is the way I came a few years ago, when me and a friend did a non-stop run from Tartu to Florence over 30 hours; I remember the road being fast and convenient, yet it involves doubling back on a track I've already done, and I take my chances on something more interesting than Vienna ring-road traffic. Unfortunately, there isn't much there. Not only do I spend the next few hours bored on the A9, but twice I'm forced to pay a road toll. Isn't this what the vignette is for?

Past Linz, I turn off the highway and head out across fields and over rolling hills, towards the Czech border. Past Freistadt the scenery gets wild; I remember reading about this - the European Green Belt. During the Cold War, this was the border between East and West, and both sides were very sensitive about keeping the boundary secure, banning most industry, farming and other human activity within a certain distance of the separating line. The consequence is one giant long nature reserve, which has been kept as pristine as possible even after Europe's unification. Not only does this make for a cool national park, but it provides a green corridor for migrating birds and animals to make their way up and down, from the Baltic to the Balkans, with a minimum of human interference.

The first building across the border is a casino. So is the second and third. Back at home, the old border station between Estonia and Latvia has been turned into a cash-and-carry alcohol warehouse; here the vice of choice denied to law-abiding Austrians is gambling. Interestingly, fuel is not appreciably cheaper, and there is no obvious infrastructure to cater for cross-border fill-ups, but I am running on fumes anyway. I stop to fill up and am once again lost: I've barely been out of the Eurozone since leaving Denmark, and the Swiss frank was close enough to parity that I could convert prices in my head - but I have no idea how many korunas it is to the euro.



The other thing that tells me I am back in Eastern Europe is the road surface. This is what I was afraid of when I chose to skip Poland: broken asphalt and roads meandering through every village, solid traffic both ways alternating between heavy-goods vehicles and old passenger cars driven by elderly locals, and no opportunity to go faster than 50 km/h. I remember the eastern road past Brno being a lot nicer; as it is, I'm forced to sit back and endure all the way through the center of Ceske Budejovice and beyond.

Suddenly I come across a brand-new, German-grade motorway. I punch it, but my joy is short-lived: this is one of those weird Eastern European things, which I've seen in Poland and later in Romania as well. Some combination of local political horse-trading and disbursement schedules from European cohesion funds have resulted in an autobahn that starts in a field and ends in one, and is intermittent on the way, to boot. It reaches neither the capital nor the border, for no reason that an outsider can ever hope to understand. Still, it lifts my spirits a little as I claw my way through the last kilometers and roll into Prague.



For all that I've traveled around Europe, this city has escaped me so far. It's my last Habsburgian capital, and it has quite a reputation to live up to. I'm giving Prague a nice handicap in the form of posh accommodation: on the back end of my trip, with road-weariness setting in and the prospect of a friend's free couch in the immediate future, I am willing to shell out for luxury in a cheap country. My AirBnB is a large apartment in a shiny, highly extroverted new-build apartment complex right on the south bank of the Vltava, to the northeast of the old town. I find the place, and complex is indeed the right word. There's underground parking; I cheekily squeeze past the barrier and spend some time looking for the right elevator shaft, as the basement is shared by several buildings, and I don't (yet) have the radio key for the elevator. Finally I make my way up to reception, pick up the keys, and offload the bike. Because the owners have been a bit pissy in the description regarding an extra fee for underground parking, I move the bike out onto the street (sans luggage), just in case they go down and check.



The apartment is definitely nice, but it's an obvious buy-to-rent affair, furnished with all the personality of an IKEA catalog. I giggle to myself, because what the place resembles most is the set of a low-budget porno. Not that I would know, ahem.

It's still light outside, so I shower, change, and go walkabout. I have plans for the evening; a good friend of mine used to live here for a couple of years, and she's activated her dormant social tendrils on my behalf. I have a meeting arranged with a couple of Americans, long-term university-adjacent expats, at a pub a few blocks from my apartment. By happenstance, a completely different friend is also in town today - a French Canadian, the husband of a girl I knew years ago, mostly through other friends, but they were both very welcoming when I'd been to Montreal for work the year before. I text him the info on the pub where I'm told to meet up with the Americans; he's got work commitments in the afternoon, but promises to make it later.



I follow the riverbank, getting my bearings and making plans for the next day's exploration. I only have one full day in Prague, but I am armed with endurance, experience, and significant familiarity with the two prevailing local architectures (ornate Austro-Hungarian pathos, and Eastern Bloc brutalism). I reach Charles Bridge, the sine qua non of Prague selfie spots, and cross it just to say I did; then I head inland, taking the opportunity to get some korunas for my euros. After three years of Eurozone membership, this feels positively quaint. With a Google Nav bearing towards the pub, I happen to pass the Astronomic Clock and the Black Tower, two more key Prague landmarks. I'm ticking them off at an efficient pace!



I find the pub. It's called, literally, The Pub; a chain that originated here, but has expanded across central Europe, and is taking full advantage of that fact. Every table has a quartet of taps sticking out of the center, serving Pilsner Urquell - they'll sell you something more exotic from a bottle if you ask, but much like buying IBM, the default is never an indefensible choice. The taps come with touchscreens; you can use them to order food and cocktails, but the primary parlor trick is to list yourself as a member at this table, after which you can select yourself and pour your own pilsner freely. It may encourage competition with your tablemates, but as a drinker with considerable self-control (which is related, but not equivalent, to moderation), I am very impressed with the ability to refresh my mug at a precise dosage. Down with the tyranny of one-pint increments!

The Pub's other key feature is a chain-wide competition. Screens on the walls cycle between consumption figures for different tables, sum totals of this pub versus other locations throughout the city, and Prague versus other metropolitan areas. Our table is a relative lightweight, but I am proud to say that collectively, we are kicking Berlin's ass!



With my Quebecois friend joining us, the night goes on - between gossip about mutual friends, getting the real versions of adventures I'd previously heard described by parties not in attendance, and the inevitable cross-cultural ribbing, we never run out of topics, or indeed, of Urquell. Eventually we run out of time; The Pub closes for the night, and I stumble back to my rental, collapsing into my porn bed.

---

Day 15: 530 km on the bike, way too many tolls, way too many trucks,
just the right number of pints.

After a long period of riding every day, and on the back end of my trip, I'd scheduled a full day off the bike in Prague. After a light breakfast in the fancy apartment's kitchen, I head across the river for a fun walk I'd found in my research about the city: getting into Prazsky Hrad via the back way.



It's a wonderful walk through Letenske sady, and I follow the small streets past a botanical greenhouse to walk out onto the plaza of the grand castle. It's full of tourists, including a highly involved production of a Chinese couple taking wedding pictures, featuring a full lights-cameras-makeup crew.



I marvel inside the cathedral and keep walking downhill. After a brief pause for a tubular cinnamon pastry, I spot the Estonian embassy in a cute little medieval cottage in a surprisingly central location. As I reach the river, I walk through the endearingly weird David Czerny sculpture park, with its sphincter-headed babies and other oddities.



I cross the river and spot Frank Gehry's Dancing House, then continue inland through the Old Town. It's lunchtime, and research tells me there is a well-reviewed ramen place on the pedestrian street leading up to Wenceslas Square. I'm a connoisseur, so with no other preference - and no desire for heavy Czech farm food that is the -fueled nation's preference - I sit down and enjoy a surprisingly good bowl.



Wenceslas Square is a pleasure to walk down, under the old king's gaze. There is a cluster of museums at the far end, but the main one seems to be under renovation, so I continue wandering around, more or less aimlessly. Eventually I make it back to my apartment, having stopped into a shop for supplies; the Czech national drink Kofola is a lot more palatable than whatever the Slovenes had cooked up, even if it's a far cry from my favorite, Malta's Kinnie.



It's time to meet up with another friend-of-a-friend. This time I take the tram. Czech trams can be a bit of a nostalgia item; in the old Communist days the local factory supplied the rolling stock for Tallinn, where I grew up, although these days most of the Skodas hogging the rails are shiny and new. I hop out at the statue of Frantisek Palacky, evidently the premier meeting point of the city, with many tram lines intersecting at this little plaza between the old town and the river. It's a beautiful summer evening to spend having astoundingly affordable s on the Vltava embankment. I learn from my new friend the funniest fact of the day: that in the Czech Republic, they had to pass a special law that restaurants must offer a non-alcoholic drink option at the lowest cost on their menu - because apparently would often be cheaper than water!



As I am on the tram heading back to the apartment, I scroll through my Facebook feed and see a post from the guy from Montreal. Apparently he's discovered a place in Prague that serves poutine! I search for it; it's close to where I am going, but its opening hours suggest it's closing pretty much right now. I decide to make a dash anyway, and get there just before they close up; my take-out order is the last one of the day.



The rest of the evening is devoted to potatoes under curds and gravy, and a nice, long, hot soaking bath.

---
Day 16: 0 kilometers on the bike, enough kilometers on foot, surprisingly few s.

I'm not in any terrible hurry to leave Prague - this is the most luxurious bed I will sleep in for the entire trip - but I'm not dawdling about, either.



Over the couple of days, the bike has mysteriously migrated from the street to the underground garage that I was not supposed to use without an extra 10 euro fee, so packing up and putting my panniers on is a piece of cake. So is getting out of Prague, since now I'm heading north and it's just a matter of crossing the Vltava and staying on the highway.



I'd perused the map and initially decided to go for a back-road blast up to the German border, but I quickly realize the folly of that: it's still just local traffic. So I get back onto the main freeway and sit there until I see a sign for the town of Usti nad Labem. Here I grab my last tankful of cheap Czech petrol and head off down the gorge that follows the Elbe river. It's not a traffic-free road, but certainly a picturesque one. My aim is something recommended by forward intelligence: a turnoff at the village of Hrensko, another one of those Western Slavic names that both makes vague sense and sounds extremely funny in Russian.



Hrensko is named in the same way as Riksgrensen, the town deep in the Scandinavian mountains on the way from Kiruna to Narvik: a border post so old and so historically significant as to be simply called "Border". These days it's a handful of restaurants and hotels standing slightly back from the road to make way for a tourist market. Remembering Schloss Disney, I press on in hope of finding room at the furthest parking lot from the turn-off. I'm not entirely sure what it is I'm aiming for, just that there is something spectacular there: a massive rock formation of some kind. But while the parking lot does indeed have space, it also has a human attendant with a visible intention of actually extracting a parking fee for my motorcycle; and a sign indicating that the Thing Worth Seeing is a few kilometers up a footpath. I might have bitten the bullet on the money, but at this point it is absolutely pissing down, and I am not inspired by the prospect of a muddy hike in moto boots and rainsuit - especially since to stay meaningfully dry, I would also have to keep my helmet on. Nah, screw this.



The Saxon Switzerland doesn't observe anything so arbitrary as a national border, of course, so the landscape stays interesting some way into Germany. At a riverside intersection, I could go left and continue on to Dresden, but instead I turn right and climb gradually through fields until I loop back to the riverbank, this time high above it. This is Bastei.



It may not be as stunning as Switzerland proper, but this stark landscape of karst pillars on the banks of a river valley has attracted some of modern Europe's earliest tourists - who left some early defacement in the soft rock walls around the walkways.



With my fill of vertical views, I trudge back to the bike and head on down to Dresden via country roads and back streets. I don't know much about Dresden, other than it being one of the big cities of East Germany besides Berlin, and having been significantly bombed in WW2. I expected something similar to Cologne - one or two bits of history surrounded by drab 60s brutalism - but I am wrong: the central cluster of Dresden is pretty damn impressive.



I roll in with my audio nav pointed to the center of town, which in this case is Marienkirche; the first underground parking lot I try has a sign that prohibits motorcycles from entering, and a guard who points me towards a different entrance - where motorcycle parking fees are expressly waived. Okay, I like this town already. I take some unassuming stairs and come out right in the middle of the main square, with the church - a smallish square-plan building with a huge dome, very recently renovated - right in the middle, and all kinds of chocolate & marzipan shops around the perimeter. The nearby riverfront is entirely taken up by Saxon grandeur, and with the sky still overcast, my camera's Dramatic Filter really comes into its own.



I spend some time walking around, noting particularly the trams on the bridge across the broad river; they are still the old Skoda types, similar to what runs back in Tallinn, and the biggest sign that this indeed used to be the DDR. Finally, I go back down to my bike, and leave Dresden for the last two-and-a-half-hour blast up the Autobahn to Berlin, where I'm staying over the weekend with friends.



They serve me asparagus.

---
Day 17: 390 km on the bike, and a hell of a lot of rain.

While I'm procrastinating with the tail end of this story, here's a little video from some Christmastime riding in the mountains of North Vietnam.

Curious if you were traveling Vietnam recently?
Rental bike I assume?

So how was it? What is there to do once you get to your day's destination?

I've toured Thailand north and south, roads you show look similar to some of Northern Thailand. Looks like light traffic.

How are costs now? I know the influx of tourism has had some effect ... and looks like City traffic is worse than ever, jammed with motorbikes. I've been to Saigon and around bit working ... that was 20 years ago.

Would love to see narrated videos of town life in Vietnam.

Loved your Euro Germania report! One tip: Captions UNDER photos ... Also, many of your pics from 2016 and '17 GONE ... if you use a different host maybe you can restore them? I use SmugMug (not free). Pics I put up 10 years ago are still there (for most part).

Who ever taught you English should come to the USA to teach at University level. Most Americans have no where near the literacy you display in your reports.

I used to own a 2000 VFR800 ... had forgotten what a great Sport Touring travel bike it is.

Thanks for doing the report ... looks like HUBB is pretty dead, no response to your Ride report.

Only the Ha Giang Loop (and rented a scooter in Hue later to go to the abandoned water park and the tombs). Yes, a rented Honda XR150 from qtmotorbikesandtours.com.vn, which I can recommend.

On the Northern Loop? Mostly have some food, drink with the others at the hostel, and crash out. It's still very daylight-dependent, basically everything is closed by 8pm and everybody is in bed by 9. But you start riding at 8am the next day.

The rental was 145 euros for four days, including added insurance. Put about 70-90k dong worth of gas in per day (3,5-4 euros). A meal in a local place, something like pho ba or bun cha, with coffee, is about 80-120k. A nice ensuite hotel is about ten euros a night, but this was somewhat in the off season. (Note: even nice hotels have very small hot water boilers and often no heating.)

Motorbikes are why the cities work. Without them, if it was all cars, there would be no way for it all to function. That said, can't wait for them to follow China's lead and force everyone to switch to electric scooters - the air pollution in the cities is quite bad.

Thanks. I write the text first, then sprinkle the photos throughout, so they do not necessarily follow the story - I will often have a lot to say about something I did not take pictures of, or many pretty pictures of something that wasn't worth many words.

It's not so much that they're gone as that the ones I linked directly from Facebook stopped working. Most of them are on Flickr. Tbh none of the hosts are satisfactory.

Everyone is hibernating.