Day 7 - Feldkirch, Austria to Arbon, Switzerland - 9/17/2016 - RAIN in the forecast!

We geared up in the morning in full rain attire, ready to ride in the storm. Were we finally going to get soaked?

Leaving Feldkirch was a bit dicey as we had lots of traffic for the first 5-7 miles and light rain. We were on a narrow two lane highway with cars zipping by us, thankfully most of the drivers were pretty gracious. 

I still am amazed how anyone could do these routes with just paper maps without a Garmin. My hat is off to friends  Carol and Ron who toured like that just a few short years ago. As it was, we only had a few glitches. 

We were grateful to finally get to the lovely country roads, gravel or paved. Today was our last day and promised to be a flat and easy ride. This allowed us to savor our experiences and just meander along, have coffee and stop when we saw something interesting. We rode approximately 61km/45 miles on mostly paved roads, we still had some gravel, but is was pretty hard packed and in pretty decent condition.

 

And did I mention it stopped raining? When we arrived in the small town of Alstatten we were treated to a local bike race with cycling events for tiny racers in training, They certainly could possibly be future Tour de France competitors. We were amazed at their skill and determination as they worked the course.

We then found a cafe that had coffee AND gelato. All of us coffee except Sandy who indulged in a 10:00 am snack of mocha gelato - way to go Sandy! 

More pics in Alstatten, what a storybook looking town. While we are still wearing our rain gear, it had pretty much tapered off.

We got a great photo of farmer Steve with his beloved corn. He sad this was some of the tallest corn he had ever seen. Note the fashionable shower cap on his head - definitely helped to ward off the rain. 

We crossed the border from Austria back to Switzerland and even though the crossing stations are closed the buildings are still there. Note the flags on the glass with Austria on one side and Switzerland on the other. 

As we got closer to Arbon our route took us along picturesque Lake Constance where we spotted these very cool sculptures. YEP another photo moment. Hey, I said we were meandering! Note the sunny skies.

This road took us right to the front door of the hotel and we were at the end of our riding journey - and what an adventure it was. We watched fellow riders as they arrived, and of course had a celebratory beer.

Time for a group photo and then we had to take all of our belongings off the bikes and walk them across the street to the train station. Steve and Stu were quite the troopers as they helped with the packing and wrapping duties for transport back to Geneva.

It did start raining around 5:30 this evening, how lucky we were to skirt the storm once again. Many of us opted to have dinner at the hotel. I had the local fish - absolutely delicious! I also had a well earned slice of Black Forest cake, but I ate it all before I even thought of taking a photo.

Tomorrow we take the train back to Geneva, with a three hour stop over in Bern to do a bit of shopping. Big rain is forecasted for tomorrow. We all feel blessed and lucky that we had such clear skies for most of our tour. 

I will post one more Blog, so I hope you check back. Thank you all for following along on our journey.