The planning was driven by our way through the Alps. Which passes did we want to ride? What cities to visit? My heart had always been set on Grimselpass. The pictures from the summit I had seen were very stunning. The peaks, the lakes, and the historic hotels all seemed to draw me. Selecting Simplonpass then seemed natural, especially if we were headed for Milan. It is also on a historical route through the Alps.

I have to admit, I've been thinking about this for a long time. My first trip to Germany (in 2010) was originally going to end in Milan, passing through Basel, Lucerne, and then over Grimselpass. So that influenced my thinking as well. On that trip, I had visited Strasbourg and Freiburg, so a trip west from Paris through Alsace-Lorraine had some appeal. More mountains!

We briefly considered passing through Annecy, a city Mark wants to visit, but it meant approaching by a more south-easterly direction from Paris, probably through Dijon and Geneva. But that would have been more of a trip through the French Alps, and my heart was set on Switzerland! So I promised Mark that if this goes well, our next trip will be to Annecy!

And lastly, Mark had never been to Paris, and I have friends there to visit, and it was easy to fly to, and from there we could bike east and south as discussed above. So that set our start point. And it will be fun to revisit the Lake District, which I last biked in the late 1990s or early 2000s. And the approach through Simplonpass and the narrow Gondo Gorge to Lago Maggiore will be stunning. It's the most beautiful pass through the Alps, according to the Swiss! So, in a sense, that set the end point!