Day 2, 15 July

We slept like lambs last night, our hotel was comfortable and quiet. I got up around 7 feeling pretty good and we went down for a nice breakfast spread. We were to meet Gabe and Rex at 10, but they weren’t quite ready so I caught up on loading the blog.

Our sightseeing today consisted of riding a train to Dachau to the memorial site and back. There’s not a lot left of the original site, but enough you could see the enormity of the process. It was a very sobering trip.

We lighted the mood after with a lunch of a Gyro like sandwich close to the traing station and missed a train back to Erding which made us late for our meeting at five, each of us pointing fingers at the others placing the blame, in a light hearted manner, of course.

When we got back the briefing had started, but we didn’t miss a lot. We were able to catch up quickly and Rex soon became a target, being the only Harley rider in the group.

The group is pretty varied, in riding experience, age, locale, and just about everything else. After the briefing, those that didn’t take the Alpine riding course picked up the bikes. The Harley hadn’t made it from the shop, so I wired in the GPS and looked over the GS for the paperwork. It has an accessory port on the dash area, and the RAM u-bolt mount went right in place.

We ride out at 8:30 in the morning.

July 15th

Landing in Munich, we got off the plane and grabbed a taxi to the hotel. We loaded some taxi drivers little station wagon to the roof and headed out to Erding. I don’t think we took the most direct route to the hotel, the meter rang up about 50 euros. That won’t be our first bite on the exchange rate, things are going to be expensive on us flatlanders this trip.

They let us put our stuff in the rooms as they weren’t ready yet. So we got a chance to walk around and look at Erding. It’s a beautiful area, with lot’s of corn, wheat, and I’m guessing barley and hops fields. I’m not sure how they get the harvest equipment in the field, everything urban is mixed in as well. We hoofed it around Erding and checked out the brew houses an shops for later. We met Martin and Justin Wenzel from Boulder checking in with their gear at the hotel, they’ll be joining us when the tour starts.

When we were finally able to check in, we grabbed a shower and headed to the train station to go to Munich. The train system is clean and efficient. You buy a ticket, but no one ever looks at it or scans it. Gabe told us they’d fine you if caught riding without a ticket on a random check. It’s an interesting system. Business picked up closer to Munich and getting off downtown, we walked into a mass of people. We were hungry and headed to the Hoffbrau Haus and ordered some liters of beer and some food. The service was slow, but we enjoyed the oompa band with the rest of the tourists. Walking out, we ran into Martin and Justin again. Justin’s 18 and rides a KLR, and it pumped up to make the tour. They’d made the BMW museum tour and enjoyed it.Landing in Munich, we got off the plane and grabbed a taxi to the hotel. We loaded some taxi drivers little station wagon to the roof and headed out to Erding. I don’t think we took the most direct route to the hotel, the meter rang up about 50 euros. That won’t be our first bite on the exchange rate, things are going to be expensive on us flatlanders this trip.

They let us put our stuff in the rooms as they weren’t ready yet. So we got a chance to walk around and look at Erding. It’s a beautiful area, with lot’s of corn, wheat, and I’m guessing barley and hops fields. I’m not sure how they get the harvest equipment in the field, everything urban is mixed in as well. We hoofed it around Erding and checked out the brew houses an shops for later. We met Martin and Justin Wenzel from Boulder checking in with their gear at the hotel, they’ll be joining us when the tour starts.

When we were finally able to check in, we grabbed a shower and headed to the train station to go to Munich. The train system is clean and efficient. You buy a ticket, but no one ever looks at it or scans it. Gabe told us they’d fine you if caught riding without a ticket on a random check. It’s an interesting system. Business picked up closer to Munich and getting off downtown, we walked into a mass of people. We were hungry and headed to the Hoffbrau Haus and ordered some liters of beer and some food. The service was slow, but we enjoyed the oompa band with the rest of the tourists. Walking out, we ran into Martin and Justin again. Justin’s 18 and rides a KLR, and it pumped up to make the tour. They’d made the BMW museum tour and enjoyed it.

Trip over

We had a very enjoyable evening with Rex and Gabe. Tuesday afternoon, we made good time and got to Decatur around five. Rex, Gabe, and their youngest, Cameron, were hanging out at the house and getting things together. Rex grilled some massive steaks and Gabe had some nice things to go along with them. Ther middle daughter, Stephanie, joined us after she got off work, and we all had an enjoyable time.

Rex and Gabe had to leave at about 0400 to catch a flight on American, using some of Rex’s miles. We took off about six, and it took about 1.5 hours to get to DFW, with a lot of construction on the freeways.

The flight over was not without a little pain. Checking in at DFW was an adventure. The long term parking had one or two spaces left out of thousands and we found the one at the very back of the lot. Checking our baggage proved to be the second hassle of the day. We were about lbs over on one bag and close on the other. We finally fixed the problem by me putting on my motorcycle boots and carring our Gerbings jackets.

After we met up with Rex and Gabe in Atlanta, it felt like we were finally getting our vacation started. After grabbing something to eat, we finally boarded the plane, and began sitting on there for over two hours while they tried to shut a sticky door, and reconsile a discrepancy in the fuel on board.

The flight over wasn’t too bad. KK was able to sleep almost the whole way. I listened to some Union Station, Zack Brown, and Ray LaMontaine, and watched a movie called the Adjustment Bureau.

Packed and ready

Well, I don't think there's anything left in the house to pack. The camera back pack looks like we looted a Best Buy. This may be the last update until we get to Germany unless we have some airport downtime in Atlanta, so I'll catch you up when get there, or Thursday in Munich.

Tomorrow we'll kick off our trip with a drive to Decatur to meet up with Rex and Gabe at their house. We'll spend the night there and leave out Wednesday morning. They are flying the first leg to Atlanta on American, he had some miles on it. The are flying non revenue (read standby) from Atlanta to Munich. Rex says if all the seats are taken, he can ride the jump seat in the cockpit. They'll let him use the pilot's lounge for the first 1.5 hour or so and the last 1.5 hour, but they'll kick him out when the plane's cruising so they can rest. Seven or so hours in the jump seat might be a little tough.

I did the last of the cleanup on the camera SD cards tonight, and finally put the helmet bags together for the last of the setup.

Counting down, gas prices in Germany

We spent a lot of this weekend packing up our stuff and putting together the finishing touches. Karan can get more stuff in a suitcase than you'd think possible. We're allowed 2 each on the tour, but we have it down to 3 total plus a camera backpack and our helmets to carry on.

I've done a little looking at gas prices in Germany, and it looks like we are going to see about 1.55 euros per liter. With the exchange rate, that's about 8.20 per gallon. It looks like it'll cost just short of $50 to fill up a GS. I'm guessing some of the remote parts of the Alps it will be higher. Oh well.

View Edelweiss in a larger map

I loaded the GPX file to Google maps so you can take a look at the points we are going through. Google maps won't load the routes, but it's fun to look at.

Sedated, laptop

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlFL2E2SFqY

This little ditty kind of sums up the last few days before you fly out.

We'll be taking a laptop along with us, so if you want to Skype, we'll be logged in on my ID, dgnewsom. I'll try and keep the blog up and the laptop should allow us to load some pictures while we are there.

Routes are done

We finished the last of the routing tonight and I built the maps and loaded them to the SD card in the GPS (Zumo). The map files are pretty detailed, it took about 20 minutes to load. I posted the GPX files on: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/12185321/Edelweiss.gpx

You can load a GPX file to most GPS' and it will load the routes and waypoints into your GPS.

One of the cool things you can do is open the GPX file in Google Earth, and "fly" the route. I haven't tried it with these, but I've done it before. It's a cool way to see the scenery before you even leave.

The weather still looks nice and cool on the first few days.

Peeking ahead a the weather

Looking at the weather forecast from Munich and around the routes for the next 10 days it looks like it's dry with lows in the mid 50's and highs in the high 70's. Sell my clothes, I'm going to heaven. Zurich has a bit more of a shot at rain, so I'm sure we'll see a little in Switzerland. I've washed the Aerostitch in Nikwax's TechWash, and TXDirect, a waterproofing agent for high tech gear. KK's liners are waterproof. I'm only afraid that if it rains, we might get hauled in for mental illness for laughing and playing like little kids. For our Edelweiss friends who don't know what we are talking about:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/drought/

Routing from hell

This evening (6/30) Karan and I spent over 2.5 hours on routing days 5 and six on the GPS and the paper map. In MapSource, the easiest way to route is search the towns in order, add them to the route and go to the next town. I just found out there is a boatload of Egg's, Au's and almost every other little town you can think of. Mapsource will show the state or province of the town, but that does us little good, since it doesn't show up on the paper map. Also Saint might show up as St.,Sankt, or any other version they feel like. I'm thinking the hundred bucks I spent on the Euro version of MapSource will be well worth it when we are wandering around the mountains.

Making new friends

Edelweiss sent a list of the tour participants out in our tour package a few weeks back. The list had emails on it, and I thought about reaching out to some of the group.

This afternoon, I got beat to the punch. Eric Salin from Montreal sent out an email saying hi to everyone. He's already had responses from Bob Dale in Toronto and Russ Chan from Oakville, CA.

This will add a lot to the trip to know what others are looking to get out of the trip and we'll know a little something about each other before we get there. Kind of adds a little to the fun factor too, I've never hung out with Canadians that I didn't have a hell of a good time.

More Routing, Shoei Helmet

KK and I have been working this afternoon (6/25) on getting the maps marked and the GPS routes built in MapSource. It's getting highly complicated. Some of the points Edelweiss puts on the tour route are just tourist attractions that don't show on the maps or on the software. Plus, there are multiple towns of the same names. You can build a route with a small town as a routing point and all of the sudden the route goes a long way out of the area. You can tell when the mileage spikes. After day one, there are options on the routes you can take. Route 1 is the shorter, more stops, more culture. Route 2 will be more mileage, more seat time. I'm sure we'll sample either based on the guides recommendations.

On Monday, my Shoei helmet came in from MotorcycleGear.com (formerly NewEnough in Shallowater). Putting on a Shoei's like the first time you slept on sheets with a high thread count. It's nice. I installed the Sena and it went together nicely. I took it to Damron's this morning to get the opinions of the consigliere (a mafia term for the smart guys). Jim Davidson and Callum McCasland are helping us

out on the trip with some GPS mounts that should fit on the GS. Jim's loaning us some helmet carriers, MotorcycleGear.com has them on terminal backorder, and we can't get any. We'll carry the helmets with us. No telling what would happen in the luggage compartment.

TiVo Desktop

We recently upgraded our cable box to a TiVo with Suddenlink. I like the TiVo a lot better than the old box.
Recently TiVo came out with a product called TiVo Desktop plus that allows you to move items recorded on your TiVo to your desktop or laptop computer. Once they are one your computer, you can convert them to different formats for portable devices like IPads and smart phones.
I've converted a couple of movies and moved them to my Sony PSP go so we can watch them on the plane. LifeTime has a big Nora Roberts marathon coming on Sunday, so I've got the TiVo set to catch all of that for Karan, she's a fan of that kind of stuff. Once they are stored and converted I can move them over to her IPad, which is kind of cool.

https://www3.tivo.com/store/accessories-software.do?WT.mc_id=PS2005&gclid=CMmflpC1wKkCFYxL2godNAnLfA

Bluetooth Headsets

The Sena Bluetooth headsets KK let me order for Father's Day came in yesterday, and I've had time to charge them and install them in her helmet. I ordered them from RocketMoto and they are very slick. http://www.rocketmoto.com/index.php/brands/sena-bluetooth/smh10-dual-pack.html

We both use custom earplugs from EAR Inc.( http://www.earinc.com/p2-music-competition.php) so I ordered the baseplate for the headsets that you can plug in the earplugs. The setup was easy to put in the helmet. I am going to order a new Shoei next week, so I put an extra plate on my old HJC helmet that I use when I ride the dual sport Suzuki. We easily paired the two helmets and talked on the intercom and they paired with my droid. You can listen to music from the smart phone and switch over to the intercom to talk. The controls are big and easy to use so they won't be a distraction when riding.

Rex is going to order a set so we'll all have the same set up. You can pair up to four headsets, but only have a conversation with one at a time. We'll have to figure out a signal system so we can let each other know when we want to talk.

Planning the routes

I built the Day 1 route, Erding to Rothenburg Ob Der Tauber in MapSource and imported it to Google Earth for the image.

Everyone rides the same route on day 1. The following days you can choose the short route and see the sites, or the long route and have a more active ride.
The guide calls attention to a lot of historic sites.

Less than a month away

We are less than a month away, and already things are starting to get moving. Edelweiss sent an additional package with a lot more info. It had maps and tour guide books with a lot of information. I'll do a future post with the cities and routes in the near future.

I ordered a set of Bluetooth headsets from RocketMoto yesterday, the Sena SMH10. This should be a neat setup. They provide intercom and and any other audio source that's Bluetooth. MP3, cell, and so on. RocketMoto's service is outstanding, they shipped same day, and they gave me a nice discount for being on the AdvRider board.

The packet has arrived

We received the packet from Edelweiss on Friday via email. They've sent the basic info and some recommendations for gear, etc.

We put in for a BMW R1200RT, but they've assigned us an R1200GS.

Rex and Gabe will be on a Harley Softail.

We're going in a day early to let our clocks catch up and catch some local culture.

The plan is in place.

Well, it looks like we are set to go. Karan and I have been planning to go to Europe for several years to tour on a motorcycle. We have some friends that have toured with Edelweiss Tours (www.edelweissbike.com) years ago and loved it. We've wanted to do it for some time and finally have the time to do so after getting both our grown kids out of college in married off.

The plan is to pick take the "Best of Europe" tour. We are going to go with our friends, Gabe and Rex Keese. The Keese have a big event in June with their daughter's wedding, and we'll all be leaving July 13th. Rex flies for Delta, and Gabe speaks fluent German, so we have sophisticated travelers to tag along with.

I'm going to start the blog and do a little at a time, so it doesn't become too much to keep up with and boring to read. But I'll try and keep up with our plans and preparations, and hopefully will be able to update it daily while we are there. Thanks for checking in. Any comments are welcome.

Darrell