Hey guys, I hope you all are well! I can't wait for this cold weather to go away, and I'm already thinking about the summer... Speaking of which, I'd like to go back to Italy for a couple of weeks (my family lives near Lake Como) and I was thinking of riding my Ducati down there. I'm based in London, has anyone ever done that? Any advice (i.e. train/ferry?), routes, or anything that might help, please? Also: if, for whatever reason, I decided to do a "one way only ride", have you ever used any company that can transport and deliver the bike? Thank you all!!
Your lucky being so close to mainland Europe there. We did a round trip, but via Ijmuiden (as we are NE based) and came past Lake Como from St Moritz direction. Loads of choices. From London probably Dover Calais ferry as its so frequent and easy. Could look at the tunnel but the ferry crossing doesnt take that long anyway. If your wanting to make a proper trip with great roads then through the 3 national parks in France; Scarpe-Escaut, Avesnois, Ardennes. You could then head East in to Eifel National Park, across and down through Black forest. Then plot a route via Andermatt possibly taking in Susten Pass, Furka Pass and Grimsel. Pick your poison. If you want fast and boring with Autorutes etc. then that would probably still be via Andermatt...rather poke my eyes out with a blunt stick though.
Thank you so much J!! Another stupid question: do you plan in advance and put your itinerary into (say) Google Maps, or do you use/recommend a particular app for "touristy/twisty" roads? Thanks again!
motogoloco.com is a route planning site, can download saved routes to sat nav. Take care though and maybe a bit practice as its a bit strange with waypoints. This year I plan to break a days route/ride in to maybe 3 parts. At least then if an issue, the whole route is not buggered. Maps or just an idea of place names enroute certainly a help. google maps, absolutely. (its what motogoloco seems to work on..) You can zoom in and drop the man (corner of screen) and get street view. Works UK, France, some of Switzerland, Italy. Not Germany/Austria, must be privacy issues. For Germany its a case of zooming in and avoiding towns/villages as much as possible. This means in most places you can tell if that twisty road on the map is a goat track or Gods own bit of tarmac! Found some great roads last year by doing this, so instead of just 'get me there roads', we had fun between stops. We plan accommodation in advance, maybe 250-300miles apart in the good twisty bits. More if needing to put distance in on motorways. that will depend on you/the bike. Booking.com is handy, can change/cancel until fairly late as well. So if weather is not playing nice an alternative may be possible. We cut short our stay in St Moritz from 2 to 1 night a few years back due to bad weather, then headed through Italy, past Lago di Como, an overnight in Aosta valley, and on to Bourge St Maurice a day early. Gave us a day of sun/heat that we would have lost. Smart phones are your friend, make sure fully charged and with data! 'Twisty roads'. See above. But dont be tempted by Tomtom and its 'twisty roads' sales pitch, as the operating system is a POS, insanely difficult to navigate through options and twisty roads means dead ends and farm tracks (in Spain at least).
Motorails I have use it one way and ridden back from WDW2016 and both ways for WDW2014 but rode the coast road to Bari over to Naples, Rome etc etc... You could ride to Dusseldorf to get the motorail... Another motorail site
I had a look at it, but it looks like the closest delivery point is Geneva (which is still 500 miles from where I live ha!). As much as I wouldn't mind the ride, with the price of the trip plus the delivery I might as well do the whole trip Thank you so much, though!!
I can see that going via the St Gotthard tunnel would be boring but not going over the pass via Andermatt, surely...
That does sound like a nice option!! Especially if I'm unlucky and get stuck in bad weather halfway through germany. Also, it looks like they only do the Dusseldorf-Innsbruck line, now (which is 200 miles of twisty roads and alpine passes - yeeeey!!). How was your experience? Was the bike secured and treated properly? Thank you so much!!!!!
That does sound like a nice option!! Especially if I'm unlucky and get stuck in bad weather halfway through germany. Also, it looks like they only do the Dusseldorf-Innsbruck line, now (which is 200 miles of twisty roads and alpine passes - yeeeey!!). How was your experience? Was the bike secured and treated properly? Thank you so much!!!!!
Best trip advice I can give is never go in a pub and start trying to play pool when your coming up. Gets really messy. @chizel probably more of an expert though. Apparently vitamin c helps calm things down if there getting out of hand but I find once you've dropped your along for the ride. Try to just keep telling yourself it's not real and you'll probably be OK in a week or 2. Enjoy!
To be honest ive never had a problem on either motorail ive used, they strap it down and use some large locking chocks ie Taking my BMW R1200GSA on the ÖBB Nightjet train <not my video Another video sleeper cabin, Autozug OBB - Cant remember if this for booking the cabin or the vehicle, they are on seperate sites
Here is the other booking in site DB Autozug Nightjet good luck booking in it quite confusing booking online... on that link read carefully the tabs below... you need to book vehicle on one of the sites given and book sleeper cabin on the other...
