another 3 nation tour

I just arrived back from my tour to Venice from Augsburg! I left on Friday afternoon, and shared a train ticket with Bodil. She continued on to Munich to visit our friend Candyse, and I began my trip. I was able to camp in a real campsite every day except that first one, where I found a clump of trees in the Bavarian countryside to set up my tent in. Here are a couple of pictures that Bodil took of my departure.
Watch out, this bike means business!There were quite a few other bike tourists on the train, and like the vast majority of trains in Germany, this one had a car that was dedicated to holding only bikes. The other people were starting their tours in Munich.
Just about to leave the trains station on my trip! I packed light enough that my tent, and helmet fit inside of my panniers in addition to clothes, tools, etc.

I'll be developing my disposable cameras soon, and I hope the pictures came out okay. More stores from the tour then. It rained for 3 of the 8 days I was riding, and of course I didn't bring any rain gear despite having a lightweight gore-tex shell, and a rain cape. I also didn't bring a sleeping bag, opting instead for my wool bag liner. I was cold almost every night! Other than that, the trip was a blast, and I was very impressed with the infrastructure for cycling in Italy. I rode on a bike trail that could have been built six months ago, and was obviously cleared regularly. Every couple of kilometers, there were picnic tables and bike racks for taking breaks during a tour.

On the last day, it was raining, and there were no campsites between the lake I was at and Venice, so I just rode all the way there. I left at 8am, and didn't get across the bridge to the city until 10:30pm. It was a total of 160km or so (102 miles), which I am very proud about riding with panniers. It was a pretty miserable ride, and my clothing was soaked all day, but my bike didn't let me down, except for a bent tooth on the small chainring during an extremely rough mountain bike section of the path.

I spent the night in a campsite near Venice, and they were kind enough to store my luggage and bike on Saturday when I went to explore the city. I caught a night train back to Munich, and eventually arrived back in Reutlingen at about 12:30.