Munich to Salzburg

It was a two-day ride from Munich to Salzburg. I took a break in the middle too, and I reckon I got some pretty good photos!

I rode out of Munich on Monday the 30th of April- the following day was a public holiday, so a lot of people took Monday off too. This caused a bit of a problem for me, as I was visiting the office of Trimble, another work related company. This was about 20km out of Munich, and I made the mistake of trying to over-ride my GPS, and got there just in time. I met with a couple of interesting guys who work there, and after the formal part of the visit we went to a nearby beergarden for some lunch.

From there it was nice ride along quiet roads and cycle paths through forrest, and little towns.

A large part of the day was spent following a river downstream- it was very nice riding along beside the river.

I’d picked up some new tubes and patch kits in Munich as I was leaving. I was hoping I’d maybe fixed the problem, when I was changing the tubes on the other side of Munich. 2.5km from the campsite for the day I became suddenly aware that I hadn’t, as I got another flat. I fixed the puncture, but it turned into a slow leak again 1km from camp- I just walked the rest of the way. I was now convinced it was definitely something to do with the rimtape, but couldn’t do anything till I got to Salzburg so had to hope I’d make it quickly. Here’s a photo of me waiting for the glue to dry for my patch.

I was really happy with the campsite! It was pretty busy with the long weekend, but the tent section was reasonably sociable. I set up next to a Belgian guy from Antwerp on a nice BMW touring motorbike who was heading to Croatia and Macedonia. I’ll put it out there- I was very jealous of him. I’d love to do some motorcycle touring, but that’s a whole extra level of expense and hassle (in terms of importing the bike between countries). We had some good chats, and he was interested in my gear.

In this photo you can see him working on the bike.

It was such a nice spot- the lake with the mountains in the distance- I took a lot of photos!

Once it got dark enough I got the tripod out and took some quite long exposures.

This one is about 13 minutes long:

And this one is about 10 minutes:

The next morning I woke to some great weather. I was in no rush to get to Salzburg (I’m meeting a friend arriving in town later in the week), so decided to stay another day. Here’s the view from the tent as I was doing some reading:

I spent the day reading, eating, and went for a bit of a walk along the lake through some forest.

Later in the day, about 6.30, I could see some rain showers at the other end of the lake.

It had been a pretty hot day – I stupidly got a sunburnt back from sitting out in it too long- and I knew there was a chance of thunderstorms. About 7pm you could hear the thunder rumbling off to the east, slowly approaching. The whole camp battened down the hatches and prepared for some weather!

Of course I had no-where to shelter other than my tent.. So I sat out some moderate, then heavy rain reading. Then it started to hail which was pretty exciting, with the thunder and lightening going off all over the place. It was weather we don’t really get in mid-southern NZ (at least not that I’ve experienced)- especially not the really long thunderclaps that go on for 20-odd seconds. The whole thing lasted maybe an hour, with the storm cell passing off to the west and continuing to rumble.

The upshot of this was that it made for some great sunset photos- you can see the storm cell on the right-hand side of the photos. The last one has been HDRed.

I knew the following day was going to be a warm one, and that more thunderstorms were possible, so I got up early and packed up before the tent really got a chance to dry.

On the road I made quick time to Lake Chiemsee, possibly Germany’s 2nd largest lake. It was a good ride around the lake, with good walking and cycling tracks.

Getting away from the lake I passed this group of cows. It’s been a common sight through Switzerland and Germany for the cows to be housed indoors. I think it’s almost time that they start getting let out into the fields.

It was mainly nice rolling Bavarian countryside to the Austrian border. I frustratingly got another flat on the ride, grrr.

I rode into Salzburg, a lovely city. The fortress on the hill is really dominant.

They have some great cycling infrastructure, including these bike shelters with tube vending machines (which I’ve seen outside a few bikeshops).

They have some nice gardens here- I think they might’ve been in the Sound of Music (like most of Salzburg).

This morning I headed to a bikeshop (Bike Palace– really recommend them). The mechanic was super helpful, and confirmed it was probably the dodgy rimtape job on the wheel causing the flats. He put some good new stuff on and trued the wheel, and only charged me 5 euro! Big ups to him- I was stoked. So fingers crossed I’ve seen the last of my daily flats for a while (touch wood).

This afternoon I went for a walk up the hill above Salzburg.

It gave a pretty awesome view over the city, and the surrounding area that I’d ridden through and will ride through in the next few days.

I passed some homeless people who appeared to be staying in the watchtowers of the old wall- they seemed to have made them look pretty comfy inside. The woman even sorta posed for my photo…

On the way down I got some good views across to the Fortress.

So another couple of days in Salzburg, then I head towards the city of Linz via some nice lakes. I’ll take a train from Linz to Vienna for a couple of days before heading into the Czech Republic by the middle of next week.
I’m taking this break to catch up on some other posts I’ve been meaning to do for a while, so stay tuned! :-D