Morning ride

My vest chat­ters as I zip it up all the way to my chin and keep ped­al­ing. The cold is in­tense. I may have made a mis­take…

A street light near a little Swiss bakery looks in­vit­ing. My rain jack­et is along on the ride, just in case… and it seems this is the case where every lay­er mat­ters. I ad­just the jack­et, and peer at the bakery. Is it Swiss, or Ger­man? I can’t tell. Doesn’t mat­ter. It’s not open yet. I’m out be­fore the bakers this morn­ing.

The GPS tells me to keep rid­ing on this nar­row road through this little town. Some­where out ahead in the dark, my path jogs to the right, then keeps go­ing north, climb­ing slowly but stead­ily… My tires chat­ter along on the cobbles as I start up again.

The little town fades away be­hind me. The bike path fol­lows a stream, flanks a field and then - wow! I’ve nev­er seen this be­fore on a bike path! - it takes me past a coun­try bor­der sign. “Deutsch­land.” That an­swers my ques­tion…

Shivers over­take my arms. My fin­gers are go­ing numb. I want to ride harder to warm up, but then the pre-dawn air would get even colder… plus I’ve no idea where this road goes.. so I ride cau­tiously. And keep shiv­er­ing. There’s no go­ing back to the city at this point, so I re­fuse to check the tem­per­at­ure. I just don’t want to know.

This route is geni­us, though. Who­ever cre­ated it seems to know every bike path, every quiet road, every hack to avoid in­ter­sec­tions. The un­known rider leads me along a river for a mile or two, through a tun­nel un­der a high­way, then up the val­ley on a one-lane road, head­ing to­ward who-knows-what. I send a men­tal note of thanks to that rider, the demi­gods of the In­ter­net, and the gang be­hind Ride­WithG­PS… without them, I’d prob­ably be try­ing to find my way out of Basel on the dull, busy roads… or maybe I’d still be sleep­ing peace­fully in my hotel room.

An in­dus­tri­al zone takes the land back from the farms. Folks in blue cov­er­alls are at work in­side brightly lit factor­ies, re­mind­ing me to be happy I’m on a bike. Even if I’m freek­ing cold.

Whoa! Route fail­ure… I’ve missed a key turn, some­how. All of a sud­den, I’m rid­ing on an over­pass, with no shoulder, be­ing passed by trucks mov­ing at 80kph. Huge mis­take, and there’s no go­ing back. Click, big­ger gear, crank, go go go… whew… off the over­pass now… I do a little cyc­lo­cross man­euver and cut across the fields in the dark, work­ing my way to­ward the GPS track way off the right. Amaz­ingly, I don’t ride in­to a ditch. I find the little path I should have been on. Phew.. quiet again. The miles pass.

Now I’m in a tiny little vil­lage. Town square. Frozen foun­tain. Clock tower. Crazy steep hill. Need .. smal­ler.. gears… wrong bike for this hill… ohmy­god… ow ow no please, not cobbles… does it crest up there by the church? … AUGH, NO… keep­ing go­ing… ok, I’m warm now… tiny road to the left takes me to the top of this little moun­tain ham­let. A farm that’s been here for hun­dreds of years cov­ers the top of the hill.. the route goes through dirt, past hay bales, around the sheep pens, then climbs again in­to a forest.

Fi­nally, the top. I stop to take in a gel and the view. Wow… just gor­geous. Mist rises from the hills and forests in every dir­ec­tion. The sky says that the sun is near. Go­ing to be a stel­lar day. Enough wait­ing. Click­ing in­to fast gears, I hit the first down­hill of the day. The farm road is paved, so I max it out… then a huge tract­or, big­ger than the path, rounds the corner be­low, head­ing right at me. I brake in time and roll off in­to the grass. Holy moly. Pause, breathe, wait… It’s quiet again… I get back to speed, carving through the hills on this thin as­phalt line, drink­ing in the forests and the fields of the high val­ley as they go rush­ing by.

Too soon, I’m back on real roads. Still des­cend­ing, mov­ing at the speed of the oc­ca­sion­al car, I fly through small town after small town. So cold again. Can barely steer, but I’m hav­ing a blast.

The road ends in a busy town. The smell of fresh bread…. mmm….. too bad I have to rush back to make it to work in time. Now oth­ers are awake, com­mut­ing, and the traffic is slow. The route thank­fully takes me off the main drag onto a tiny side street. Sud­denly I’m nav­ig­at­ing a con­struc­tion zone. Uhoh… this is where I should be cross­ing the Rhine. Is the bridge closed? Looks like it….? Not good. A wo­man yells some­thing at me in Ger­man, ges­tur­ing wildly. Am I tres­passing? Or maybe she thinks my kit looks fant­ast­ic? No wait… she’s point­ing at this nar­row gap in the fence. Ah.. I can ride my bike through there and un­der all sorts of heavy ma­chinery to a little walk­way they’ve kept open over the dam. Amaz­ing. In the US, we’d just say “screw the ped­es­tri­ans while we re­build this thing”…

Back in­to forest. Dirt roads. It’s fi­nally get­ting a bit warm­er. I crank up the pace and merge onto busier roads again. Hmm. The road sign font has changed. Ap­par­ently I’m back in Switzer­land. So that dam back there was also a bor­der. Cool.

The trip back in­to Basel fol­lows the Rhine. The vil­lages turn in­to little towns. A bike path ap­pears on the side of the busy road at just the right time. The bike com­muters eat my dust. So do a few folks on mo­tor­ized scoot­ers. Bwa­HAHAHA!

Too soon, I’m back in the city. I fol­low fa­mil­i­ar routes through the maze of an­cient build­ings, one-way streets, and tram tracks. With­in minutes, I’m back to my hotel, mar­veling quietly that have the op­por­tun­ity to do these sorts of road, and to learn my way around this par­tic­u­larly pleas­ant corner of the world.

Ahh. Awe­some ride. Ex­plor­ing new places, find­ing new ex­per­i­ences, … that’s one of the best things about cyc­ling. And I’m back with just enough time to drink an es­presso, eat a crois­sant, and thaw my feet. Per­fect.