Having got your attention !
Sometimes the road does get a little steep! Here is our motorbike route to get to the petrol station at the top of this part of the Dolomites. It is for experienced motorbike riders only. Diana shut her eyes on the way up !
But let’s go back a bit before we get to the Dolomites.
We have several days to fill in Croatia until the new telelever for the bike arrives so we head off to Plitvice Lakes National Park. We head down the very nice Dalmatian coast
And then the next day is off to the National Park. We have a very nice 8 km walk down past lovely waterfalls at every turn
The other 2000 plus phots Diana and I took are a available on request !
The park is hugely popular and visitor numbers are close to saturation
We of course get the same sort of crowding these days at Mt Cook National Park in New Zealand. How do you restrict tourism?
Then we get the call we have been waiting for. The part for the bike from Frankfurt via Zagreb has arrived at Tomic BMW in Rijeka. Off we go and in an hour the new part is fitted. This is what the old part looked like. It is of course supposed to be straight
And this is the strongest motorbike that BMW make. It was some Mongolian pothole that trashed the best of German engineering. We will get the new front shock absorber in London and then that completes the damage repairs.
BMW Tomic in Rijeka have been fabulous with their service and I highly recommend them. Their workshop is dedicated to BMW motorbikes
It is now 2pm in the afternoon. We decide to make a late afternoon 300km run to “Cortina d’ espresso “ in the Italian Dolomites. The Italian Autostrada system almost defeats us. You have this three lane motorway system with a speed limit of 130 km per hour ( Italian - speak for 170 km per hour!) The you insert some 5 booth toll plazas with only two of the 5 booths working. The traffic backs up for about 5 km before the toll plazas and you inch along at a stop start rate of about 5 km per hour. Your average speed on the motorway is therefore only about 50 km per hour. Would it not be cheaper to just have an ordinary road? And if New Zealand can do fully electronic tolling why can’t Italy ? Go figure !
However any sense of frustration is drowned out by the sheer beauty of the road to Cortina d’ Expresso or as it is correctly termed Cortina d’Ampezzo. Thank goodness the Ford did not call their Cortina cars after the full and correct name of the town! And how many readers can remember that Cortina was the name of a car!
The sun is just setting on the high moutains as we ride into town
Photographs don’t do justice to the sense of grandeur.
We stay at the same delightful hotel that we stayed in three years ago. It was a nice familiar feeling.
Then after a good rest it is time for a superb ride through the Dolomites. It was just vista after vista at every turn. Let the photos do the talking
There were lots of motorcycles on the road. Some where going a little too fast
Diana and I could have done without seeing what appeared to be a dead motorcyclist on the side of the road next to a badly smashed up Ducati. Quite sobering !
It it has been a glorious day. And tomorrow it is over the famed and fabled Stelvio Pass which is one of the iconic high pass routes in Europe and which was immortalised by Jeremy Clarkson of the Top Gear program. And the weather looks perfect for tomorrow. Bring it on !
And interestingly enough not a pot hole in sight anywhere in Europe. Anywhere! And we have not got to Swiss perfection yet.
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