I'd be laughing...

if I didn't feel like a human popsickle!

(Oh, to be cradled in the arms of my favorite woman... :)

The riding from the French border, bordered on the spectacular. Excellent paved highways, little traffic, well marked signage.

Swiss Route 11 led my Diversion and I through Zweisimmen, Boltigen, and Interlaken, via several lengthy tunnels to Meiringen. How those Europeans LOVE to tunnel. I couldn't tell you, oh loyal reader... how many tunnels I'd been thru with the little girl. We're not talking "Rogers Pass" type snow sheds here, nope... we're talking everything from a hole blasted thru a tongue of mountain... to full blown, autobahn swallowing, kilometer chewing, well lit, warm, curving, climbing, falling, precision made, tunnels.

The kind of tunnels a very sophisticated (and LARGE) gopher might be doing, if he was a construction engineer... and had access to a tunnel boring team! I meant to remember the longest ones and their locations, but seriously... I didn't. I do know that some I'd ridden were more than a few kilometers (Germany, CZ, Croatia) and the longest bordering on 8, maybe 10k. In any case, the longer tunnels would have regular emergency pullovers every few hundred meters, and turbine like ducted exhaust fans were giving me the impression I was testing some new swept wing fighter plane for the Luftwaffe!

I was in many regards "pushing my envelope", this was such a flight of discovery for me.

The countryside was just as one would imagine a Swiss countryside to be. Verdant green valleys, farms, small villages and towns, cows with cowbells* on their necks, languishing unperturbed in the coolness of the day, munching on lush grasses. The houses were made of wood on stone foundations, a departure from most of Europe's stone walled, tiled roof housing I'd seen everywhere else.






All around me peaks towered into the sky, slicing thru clouds like a Mongol horseman! When the sun shone thru... the blue was so startlingly vivid, akin perhaps to an Earth Ocean viewed from the port of the Space shuttle.

I paid for my fuel in Swiss Francs via credit card. While chomping thru a bag of potato chips, washed down by the pre-requisite Coke, a very sweet looking red Divvie pulled in to gas up. I went over to the rider who by this time was lubing his chain, well the Divvies chain... and attempted to strike up a conversation. Unfortunately my "Cherman" was limited to nein, ja, and auf Wiedersehen, and his English was limited saying "Es tut mir leid, ich nicht Englisch sprechen" so the conversation was... ahem, rather brief. However, we did smile a lot!!!

His bike had on a very neat and tidy, appropriately sized set of German made, detachable luggage that I would have loved to have had on Piroska! I wandered back to my bike and as he was leaving back to his home in Luzern, he finally understood what I was telling him, when he double taked at my identical red Yamaha 600. Although a brief encounter, I was gladdened to see such a well kept twin sister to my own ride.

Once past Meiringen, I was into the Alps proper. Up till now, the wide valley I'd been riding, had only tempted me with distant views of the highest peaks, but from here on in, I would be riding at the very top of the European Continent.

Winding roads and so-so weather delivered me to Innertkirchen where the number 11 climbs up towards Wassen. I was going to ride over the 2224M Sustenpass.

The traffic thinned considerably as I climbed steadily, until there was no traffic at all. How serene and surreal this was... up and up and up. Past the tree line, over ravines with rushing clear streams, thru tunnels one after the other... and always up. Ever up. The altimeter was changing constantly, the gearbox shifting from 4th to 3rd to 2nd, sometimes first gear, and then a tap dance back again.

Dropping temperatures were beginning to be of concern.

5000 feet.

6000 feet.

7000 feet.

Not a car or bike in sight, "keine"

Only me, the road, my bike.

By this point any standing body of water was completely frozen, along with my outer extremities I'm afraid. I passed thru a tunnel, with a partially frozen waterfall, cascading over the top!

The road was slicing thru 10M high snow cuts, the water trickling across under my tires as they rotated slower and slower the higher I got. I was getting rather frigid!

Nearly fifty kilometers in, over the final set of switchbacks, another series of gear shifts passing 7500 feet and I'd reached yet another tunnel. This one was short. To the right stood an impressive wooden

hotel with a few BMW's and Mercedes parked in the lot. The tunnel was short, perhaps 100 M in length... but blocking my path was a gate. And in clear view opposite the gate, it was obvious the road was no longer plowed. A massive snow drift higher than the tunnel exit barred any further progress to the east. The summit of the Sustenpass was over there, beyond that tunnel and that mountain of snow... sigh... so near, and yet so far!

No wonder the traffic was nil. I was only 10 0r 15 kilometers from Wassen but this day, June 8th... I may as well have been on Pluto!

There was no choice but to turn around and head back down the mountain to Innertkirchen where I would need to find a place to sleep. It was nearly a hundred kilometer boo-boo, but such are the many Mis-Adventures of Dr. N.

The foray/adventure up the hill? had chewed up valuable time and it would be dark relatively soon, especially since old Sol was well hidden in the clouds.

Not to be discouraged (although it made me wonder how I would fare elsewhere on the route thru CH) I enjoyed my descent from the heavens, stopping for photos in several spots. Back amongst first running water then trees then traffic, however slight, I turned left on the intersection I'd passed thru a couple of hours before.

I was very cold. Even with the advantage of the heated vest, the ride up and then back down, had cooled my body substantially, I needed to find a home for the night. To welcome me back to lower levels... it began to pour yet again. At Guttenen I found the Hotel Baren for 74 Swiss Francs (50E) and boy was I happy to get off the road for the night. The proprietress stood, well towered over me. I swear she was 6' 13"!! Very curtly and very formally, without a smile, she arranged my sleeping accomodation, showed me the garage where I could park my bike and checked me in at the Inn. The village was tiny and there was absolutely no where to go even had I wanted to. I broke into my emergency road rations after a blessedly long hot shower and then rewarded myself with a Snickers bar.

It had been an incredibly long 340km day...

*Have I ever mentioned the "Kowbell" story?