i simultaneously think this is really cool (especially for the mainstream media) and ripe for a few FOA style responses:
I think mine would have to be the day I rode in the Austrian Alps, or Salzkammergut, past Traunstein (a mountain I had been named ‘Traunie’ after, due to a wild beard), Gmunden, and then over the range from the Traunsee to the Attersee. I know, I could have just gone around on a virtually flat road, but I was bored with traffic, so I went “over the top”.I was delayed until all the vehicles in a vintage car rallyhad gone. During the descent, however, I caught a motorcycle. I waited three hairpins until he saw me. All in all, I overtook 7 motor vehicles, always carefully, and took the hairpin at the bottom of the straight at over 50km/h, getting a standing ovation from the crowd. I waved away people trying to stop me. But after a kilometre, I realised that descending a mountain, accelerating between hairpins on a loaded touring bike probably generated a lot of heat from braking. I stopped and felt the rim. Burnt my fingers. Lucky the tyre did not explode from pressure. The ride around the Attersee from Weyregg passed towering cliffs into cloud, tunnels, and blue/green clear water , and on to St Gilgen for a bed and a deserved bath.
A year later, I met a fellow who said he was the “Austrian/Australian cultural ambassador”, and asked "had I been to Osterreich ? '. I said I had, on a bicycle in '99. He then proceeded to tell me about a fellow who flew down a hill in the middle of a vintage rally. When he finished, I replied dryly “yah, that was me”. His jaw dropped, his eyes widened, and he said “You are an idiot”. I knew he had indeed seen my descent.
waddaguy
Man, I am gonna have sooo many of these “best days on bikes” this trip WEEEEOW!
I once upon a time,
Rode through a city with narrow streets and tall buildings on a bike with no brakes, i was whip skidding just like on mash.