Maudlin

Jamie

Living Legend
Joined
Mar 7, 2006
Messages
2,352
Location
Geneva Switzerland
Was enrolled in the TransAlps tour, organized by a French Rocket III owners group, together with 10 or 12 Rockets. The journey?: Crossing Switzerland from West to East, using mountain roads as much as possible (I love doing that, as you all know). Well... my green Rocket went south on me last Monday (as already reported)... I plan (and have been permitted-) to use the Daytona instead, although a long distance cruiser it ain't... the local temp dropped by 2/3 last night... it's raining like hell here... and it's actually SNOWING on the St Gottard @2000 meters, which is (was?) on our way to the Italian-speaking part of Switz:( .

Appointment is in Chamonix, up in the French Alps, in 3 hours. Am on my way. Jamie:cool:
 

Jamie

Living Legend
Joined
Mar 7, 2006
Messages
2,352
Location
Geneva Switzerland
Back home, 10 hours later. Done with TransAlps phase #1. Weather has been godawful all day long. Pouring rain non-stop for over 200 miles. Cold. Like riding within clouds. And with all due respect to my French neighbours ( a few of them lurk in here), including the brave organizer, they just don't seem to have quite master-minded mountain riding yet. That is: unexpectedly terrible weather and expectable August tourist traffic aside. They look up a map of Swiss mountains, they read 100 miles on it and they translate it, whether spontaneously or with an Internet travel-aid site, as one and a half hour of... leisurly riding time. Wrong. Am barely exaggerating. Fact is, they were all one hour late for the Chamonix rendez-vous and when I said goodbye to them at 17:00, they were close to three hours behind schedule (THEIR schedule, no longer mine). Phase#2 to central Swiz and phase #3 to Italian-speaking Switz will thus be without me.

Regretfully:cool:
 
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Baggage1

Baggage1

Turbocharged
Joined
May 26, 2006
Messages
995
Location
NW Fl
Ride
2006 Rocket III
Wow Jamie,sorry to hear you had such a bad time.I'm sure the weather had a lot to do with the slow pace.You on the real fast machine compared to thier bigger slower Rockets,I can understand your frustration.:(
 

Jamie

Living Legend
Joined
Mar 7, 2006
Messages
2,352
Location
Geneva Switzerland
All is well...

It was OK, in hindsight. Good people. And, again, hat off to the organizer, Alex, from Dijon, France:bch:

The irony is that even if I had decided to carry on with the jaunt, dreadful weather and ill-assorted Daytona 675 notwithstanding, I'd have ended up homeless: Following the Rocket III gearbox problem, I had cancelled my hotel reservations (I had not figured I would eventually use the Daytona). And they've just told me that there was NO room left in/around Gstaad (even @ USD 400 a night !!! ), where I'd have spent the first night.

I'll try to post a few pics. They'll probably look to most of you (Americans) as having been shot on an off-season, rainy and gloomy day in a deserted Colorado ski resort.... and one of you (have forgotten WHO) might recycle his earlier repartee upon seeing pics of an earlier Rocket outing in Southern France (I was not part of it), which was:

Is France only B&W?:D

Best. Jamie:cool:
 
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Toystoretom

Living Legend
Joined
Feb 25, 2006
Messages
2,449
In case someone reading this is lost (and... why wouldn't you be:D).... I think it was Trackerjack who posted quite a few pics of a ride he took through France and they were all in Black and White. Very nice pics, by the way... Being the smart arse that I am and since I have never been to France I asked him if France was only in Black and White. He replied in French (which I don't understand) and I am sure it wasn't a compliment, and curiously he hasn't posted since. I always thought he liked me.....:D
 
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