Day 5

August 23, 2021

Hoch auf den Ritten

What would a bike tour be without some drama right? Oh, you thought I’d had my share? No no. Fate has a much different opinion. But first, no one was injured in the production of this entry so you can read it without covering your eyes.

The plan for today was to take the seilbahn up to Oberbozen as ride on the Ritten (that’s the name of the mountain) through a series of small villages to Barbian and then descend back to the Eisacktal and repeat roughly 3/4 of the ride from yesterday.

The Seilbahn starts from just down the street from the Youth Hostel. Very easy to get to. Since this ride was only 30 miles I took my time this morning. I enjoyed a nice breakfast conversation with a grandma that is here on vacation with her grandson. There are from the more northern part of Germany. We covered quite a bit of ground, I’m sure much to the boredom of her grandson. She had been up on the Ritten before and had very fond memories of it. When we exhausted the topic of that and the Ötzi museum we moved on to climate change (the melting glaciers led to the discovery of Ötzi) and that led to politics. She wanted to know what I’m the world possessed Americans to elect Donald Trump. I told her I still wonder that to this day, but that the US is pretty starkly divided right now. She said the far right is also gaining a following in Germany and she finds that very concerning. She also wanted to know how an American came to speak good German. I told her a lot of practice and watching German tv.

View out front of the Hostel this morning which is conveniently right across from the train station

The Seilbahn ride was an interesting one. This is a cabin Seilbahn which seats around 30 people. Covid numbers are low around here so they pack you in. My bike and I ended up crammed in with a family and a group of school children. The family was well-behaved, but the school kids I could have done without. I did not take any videos or photos like I normally would. I can report that it was a scenic ride and that there was one spot where a large amount of rock had broken of the face of the mountain and crushed part of what I can only assume were once very expensive condos. I don’t think that counts as an avalanche, but that is also a problem in the mountains. Natural disasters seem to be an unfortunate part of living very scenic places.

I would like to report that I easily found a restroom right at the Seilbahn station. Only two toilets though so I had to wait in line. There is also the old train line that used to run from the valley up a cog rail line and then several kilometers across the Ritten. They still run the part of the line up top, sometimes with modern trains, sometimes with vintage ones.

My route first took me a bit south and east to Wolfsgraben and the little lake there. Not a bad lake, but I’ve seen more interesting ones. I’m sure the hotel there is a swell place to stay, though probably out of my budget.

Leaving Oberbozen and getting some of the first spectacular views into the Eisacktal

Looking across the lake at the mountains the other side of the Eisacktal

The Wolfsgraben See also brought my attention to the first of two concerning personal oversights. I don’t recall why now, but I thought to check my rear tire to see if I was getting any signs of derailleur run on the tire. I had checked that before leaving home and was certain it would be fine. Ah, no. It was not. I’ve got a groove in this tire sidewall as well. Not cool. I was able to determine that it happens only in the big ring in the back, but unfortunately for me it happens no matter which ring I’m using up front. That meant I either needed to use 8 of the nine gears in back, or swap the front and rear tire pronto. I opted to avoid the big ring in the back. Totally my fault for not testing that out better at home or when I reassembled the bike back in München. I think the rear tire will be fine. I’m not see any signs of it wearing through into the radial belt, but I do need to keep an eye on it and I definitely need to swap the front and rear tires. I’ll also likely switch to shimano Sora rear derailleur when I get back home because it has a short enough cage to stay clear of the tire sidewalls. Hopefully someday I can find a shifter to run the derailleur as well. That’s why I didn’t do that before leaving. Big parts shortage right now.

From Wolfsgraben my route took me along the mountain to Klobenstein. The scenery along the way is pretty fantastic. It’s hard to concentrate on biking and dealing with curvy roads and sometimes a lack of guardrails while also looking around at scenery. Admittedly I spent quite a bit more time stopped taking pictures during this part of the ride than I did riding.

It rained last night. Over the course of the morning the clouds cleared out giving incredible views across the valley

The Dolomites finally ditch their cloud cover

Beyond Klobenstein and Lengmoos comes in interesting view of what are called Erdpyramiden. They are rock formations that look kind of cone-shaped. It’s a mix of harder and softer materials. I’ve time the softer material gets washed away and when a period of drought hits, the harder material left behind solidifies. Over time things eventually erode and the whole thing falls down. Probably not a good area to build condos under. I think there was a somewhat similar type of rock that tumbled down onto those condos I mentioned earlier.

This cabin/house had a really nice view, though I could see the high volume of tourists walking by all day being a potential frustration

This particular Mountain View followed me all day and will probably end up in a lot of the photos I upload. Sorry, not sorry.

Bit of a steep path back up. I opted to leave the bike at the top.

Allegedly there is a restroom near the Erdpyramiden on the north side of the road. I never found it though. Instead I found an actual signed restroom in Lengstein on the backside of the school/library/fire station. It also had a real nice view into the valley. The signage to the toilet could have been more clear and frequent though. Things like “look at the back of the school” would make it easier to find. That was really the highlight of Lengstein. It’s pretty small.

Oh, so you’ve seen this mountain before? Well now you can enjoy it again.

This house had a nice view into the valley too

No idea what this chapel looks like inside, but it had a good view too

Nice public restroom in Lengstein, if you can find it

The public restroom view in Lengstein plus some of my finger

Beyond Lengstein things started getting adventurous. When I plotted this route in gps I was watching for climbs. I knew there were a couple reasonable ones, fortunate given I can’t access my lowest gear right now with the derailleur clearance issue. What I did not stop to think about was that I would be atop a mountain which would mean at some point I’d need to ride DOWN from the mountain. My little folding bike has rim brakes. I did not really want rim brakes and I tried to talk the company into selling me at least a front fork with disc brakes but they insisted that would be a bad idea because the discs could get bent during the folding process. If you’ve read all of my journal you’ll know I had a flat rear tire when the bike was sitting in the driveway in the hot sun shortly before I left. I replaced the rim tape and put in a new tube before I left. Given that hot sun was enough to pop the tube, I was not at all thrilled to discover that there were multiple very steep descents on this route. We’re talking 15% type grades that were not entirely short. That heralded in the part of the ride where I stoped frequently, not for pictures, but to cool my rims back down. That the spots also could double as photo opportunities was an added bonus. I also was very thankful not to be riding the route in the opposite direction! Somewhere along in here I also noted that my hinge seemed to be squeaking a lot more than normal. When I looked down I discovered that had forgotten to tighten down the top screw after loosening it in a failed attempt to separate the two sections of frame for easier packing. Not a catastrophic oversight. Yet. But a default forehead slap. Clearly I was neither in my right mind nor observant when I reassembled the bike. It should have been readily apparently during assembly that I needed to tighten that back up.

The following are a series of scenic rim cooling spots

Shortly before Barbian and the final descent to the valley is a pretty high waterfall. I think there is a trail that gives better access to the waterfall, but I’d had enough adventure for the day so I just got out my big camera and used the zoom. Unfortunately for you, dear reader, I won’t be able to access those photos until I get home and have computer access. Please accept these meager photos as a taste of how scenic it was.

I promise if you zoom in there is a waterfall up there. It looks bigger in person. I swear.

That brought me finally to Barbian. At this point I was pretty hungry so I hunted down the one bakery in town. I wouldn’t say they had a large selection, not that I expected much given the size of the town. I was pleased to discover that they did offer my favorite thing though: Obstschnitte. They had a raspberry one and a mixed fruit one. I tried one of each. I regret there was not also and Eis parlor.

Barbian also has a public restroom (sorry, we don’t offer soap) located by the football pitch at the Grundschule just up the street from the bakery. I found the football pitch to be possibly the most scenic ever.

Speaking of being buried, now came the fourth serpentine curves down to the valley. I’d already nearly wet my pants descending to Barbian and I was NOT looking forward to the final descent. I did not video this experience on my GoPro. It would have bored you to tears, that’s if you weren’t already misty eyed from laughing at how much I alternated riding my brakes and...walking. Yes walking. Downhill. Now before you start mocking me, remember that I ride a recumbent, the nature of which is to reduce air drag. It takes very little time for me to cross 20mph on a 15% grade. With wimpy rim brakes and that sort of compromised tire, I was in no mood to take a chance. I stopped...a lot. In fact, between pictures and slow descents, the 15 miles from Oberbozen to Barbian took me a ridiculous 6 hours. I shall now dump the rest of the photos taken during breaks for my brakes while descending the 4 curves from Barbian.

And then I was at the last curve and the short but down to the bike path along the Eisack that I rode yesterday. That path is also downhill, but it’s at the friendly grades of 1-2%. Yesterday I coasted down it because I really really needed to go to the bathroom, but today I was able to blast down it at 16-20mph, roughly the speed I was descending the mountain at while riding my brakes. We will not discuss the speed at which I walked down the mountain.

Just in case you think I’m overreacting about how steep the descents were, check this out. Clearly I did not think this ride through. I would advise against riding it with rim brakes.

Italy has a habit of letting building decay rather than knocking them down. Here is a classic Italian decayed building.

Back on the Eisacktal Radweg. Same views as yesterday, but with more sun and a much higher riding speed.

In summary, the scenery was great. There were moments when traffic on the narrow roads was somewhat unnerving. The occasional bus had me pulling off the road when they came by. The elevation loss was way too unnerving and I would not ride it again without a good set of disc brakes. So, with the right kind of bike, this is a definite great ride. But do a better job of thinking it through than I did.

I’m pleased to report that the ride back to the youth hostel along the Eisacktal was quick and pleasant. It took maybe an hour, a small fraction of the time it took me to cover the same distance up on the mountain. Tomorrow I head up the mountain on the opposite side of the Eisacktal, but this time with an e-mountain bike clad with proper disc brakes. The planned ride is relatively short and we’ll see; maybe I’ll opt to add on to it. I’ve rented the bike for the whole day. Part of it will depend on how well my back handles a traditional bike. That mountain I kept taking picture of will be more up close and personal tomorrow and I should have some good full views of the Dolomites and the Rosengarten. Also, I have yet to find a good place to eat supper here in Bozen. Tomorrow night I might just raid the grocery store and buy a lot of salad and fruit.

Same view as this morning except now the clouds are gone

Today's ride: 32 miles (51 km)
Total: 117 miles (188 km)

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Mike AylingRim brakes and disc brakes.
Yes you can overheat rims under prolonged braking resulting in tyres blowing off the rims with potential dire consequences but rims, even your 20 inch ones provide a much better heat sink than a 140 to 180mm disc rotor which means that a disc can easily overheat and provide no braking whatsoever which is another problem.
IMNSOHO rim brakes are just as effective as discs in the dry.
In the wet you do have to allow for extra braking distance but for old timers who started off on steel rims this is an instinctive reaction.
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2 years ago

Ben ParkeTo Mike AylingBased on my previous experience with disc brakes and my experience on some prolonged quite steep descents today with disc brakes, I find disc brakes have much better stopping power than rim brakes. I don’t like how fussy discs are as far as avoiding excess noise, but I just am not impressed with my rim brakes. I’m more inclined to push discs to the limit than rim brakes. I tend to stay under 20mph descending so I would notice a drop in braking power and could stop before they dialed I think. With rim brakes I’m not so sure I’d get a warning pint before things blew. In my case I’m more worried about the tube popping than I am about the tire blowing off the rim. Again, I had a tube pop just sitting in the hot sun in my driveway. I’m risk averse as a general rule. I’d rather err way on the side of caution than have my vacation end on a very sour note that I could have prevented. We all have our own levels of acceptable risk.
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2 years ago