Day 10 Flims to Zurich

To our surprise, by daybreak all of the nasty weather had cleared out and the sun was drying things up quite nicely (to the dismay of Squirrel & Garbanzo), because today's ride included the Oberalp Pass again!

After packing and cleaning the camper we finally got rolling at 11:15 instead of 10! We made pretty good time reaching the top of the Pass. However, due to the cold front that passed through on Friday, it was clearly quite a bit colder than the first time we climbed it. Since we already had all the pictures we didn't spend much time at the top. We all looked forward to the long descent, but after about 1 mile from the top we picked up some very strong headwind, so we actually had to work instead of coasting (I never reached more than 35mph, even on the 10% slopes!). The descent lasted for about 28 miles or 1.25 hours.

Once we reached the bottom we travelled along the Vierwaldstaetter See and into the town of Schwyz. Schwyz is one of the 3 original founding states, that formed a pact to free themselves from the Habsburgers. It has a very nice cobbled town square with lots of old buildings with murals depicting the historical events. We decided to take a quick break to chow down and refuel (mile 85, 30 to go).

After a short climb we passed along the lake of Zug. About halfway through we stopped so I could show the guys the old lake house my grandparents use to own. For me it was somewhat of a trip down memory lane. The next 15 miles were quite uneventful. We had one more climb, but compared to the true passes this was just a small hill! Once over the top we headed down to the lake of Zurich, where we took the ferry across. One more last climb of about 3 miles, but this sucker included the steepest climbs we encountered all trip, 2 sections of 15% for 1/3 of a mile! One last descent and we reached my parents house.

Total was 115 miles in 6:37:00, and 9491ft of climbing.

The overall total was 600 miles in 6 days or 35:42 hours of riding time and 51,400ft of climbing.

I just can't overemphasize how lucky we were with the weather. Except for the one day were we had rain for about 30 miles, it was simply fantastic!! This is almost unheard off. I guess the old Swiss saying is true: When angles travel the skys will smile upon them!

Sunday is packing day and Monday Squirrel heads to Karlsruhe by train, while Garbanzo & I will do some shopping for our Honeys (no, that will not include you Kyle)!

A huge thanks goes out to my parents for lugging all of our baggage around and to my sister for letting us stay at her camper in Flims.