Motorcycle Touring - Adventures in Luxembourg Part 3
Part 3 - Through wild woods and fading light!
In the previous posts in this series, I talked about how we travelled down to Dover, crossed to Calais, and got soaked on our way through Belgium, before discovering a problem with Claire and Adrian’s bikes, that needed some attention
Its Friday afternoon, and I wouldn’t be telling the whole truth if I didn’t admit, that breaking down before we’d even reached our hotel and base of operations for the next few days, was perhaps a little more adventure than I’d been hoping for!
But it wasn’t the only challenge we’d have to overcome before finding a meal and bed for the night!
But first, lets go back to Dinant in Belgium.
A loose chain on a motorcycle can be a dangerous thing, it can snap or jump off the sprockets, injuring the rider or creating a hazard for other road users behind, it can cause the wheel or the engine to seize up, or just increase wear on other bits of the bike. In other words… its not good.
But, fixing a loose chain is also not difficult, provided you have the right tools. In fact it’s a standard maintenance job. It just requires loosening the rear wheel, which sits on a axel, then undoing a couple of lock nuts and winding out the axel adjusters, until the chain tightens up, before re-locking the lock nuts, and refastening the rear axel.
But did we have the tools to do this job? No.
We’d each got a basic tool kit, but we lacked the big 32mm spanner needed to loosen the rear wheel axel, and the smaller 12mm spanner needed for the adjusters.
Thankfully, we live in the age of the smartphone, so as the rain returned and we moved the bikes out of the rain under the big road bridge spanning the river, we each took to Google to try and find somewhere to buy the necessary tools.
At home, this would be an easy job, we all know the high street stores likely to stock such things, but of course we were in Belgium…
Next we looked for local garages on Google Maps, somewhere we might be able to borrow the tool we needed, and here we had more luck. There were a few places marked on the map, but we couldn’t tell which were petrol stations and which were service and repair places. Fortunately, the map showed one place on the route we’d followed on the way into Dinant, and I remembered that it wasn’t a petrol station, and seeing some cars parked outside.
It was five minutes away, I could remember the route, and the rain had stopped.
A few minutes later, and we’d not only found the place, but they’d happily loaned us all the tools we needed, and even come outside to make sure we didn’t need a hand.
Half an hour later, and we were sorted, the chains looked good, the tools had been returned, along with a contribution to the mechanics beer fund, even the rain had stayed away.
We were back in business.
But the afternoon had slipped by while we were fixing the bikes, and it was gone 4 o’clock by the time we left the garage, heading east along the N4, N84, and then, as we entered Luxembourg the N15.
We got caught by the rain again, and absolutely soaked to the skin. Even my socks squelched inside my boots when I moved my feet now.
And then disaster. The rain and spray from other road users had reduced visibility, so we’d had to slow right down, adding more time and frustration to our journey, and making it difficult to make out the details on our satnav’s, and when we reached one major junction on the motorway, with Adrian at the lead, followed by Claire and then myself, we made our next big mistake.
Adrian informed us over the comms that according to his satnav we needed to take the next exit.
Mine seemed to indicate otherwise, but the screen was covered in water, my visor was covered in water, even the glasses I wore underneath were covered in raindrops, so we all indicated and followed his lead, while I asked if he was sure.
After checking and realising he’d made a mistake, he quickly told us to get back on the motorway, which we hurriedly did. But then thinking he’d got it right the first time, Adrian pulled back onto the slip road, telling us we did need to get off after all.
Unfortunately, despite having slowed down, neither Claire nor I were able to safely move back over in time, so our little group ended up getting divided. Adrian going one way, Claire and me going the other.
Before he moved out of Comms range we agreed to find somewhere to pull over and give him a call, our standard practice whenever we got separated. But with the rain and the roads, it was another ten miles before we found somewhere to stop.
Now, I had a satnav with the routes loaded into it, as did Adrian, while Claire had a printed map, complete with directions, in a waterproof map case on her tank, we also had phones, and knew we could find our way if we had to.
When we finally got in contact with one another, half an hour later, we discovered that Adrian had been forced to ride in the wrong direction for all that time, so was now almost an hour behind us.
It was almost 6 o’clock by this point, and we still had over two hours of riding ahead, three for Adrian.
We agreed that Claire and I would push on, at a steady pace to give Adrian chance to catch up, but that we’d stop once an hour to check in with one another.
An hour later, as the light was just beginning to fade, we finally made our way off the motorways and to a petrol station where we could call Adrian again.
He was back on track, but had received another soaking, whereas we seemed to have emerged just ahead of the rain.
We also messaged Colin, to let him know that we were back on the road, but would be arriving late in Vianden.
Before getting back on the bikes, after filling up, we noticed that one of Claire’s headlight bulbs had failed. Fortunately her bike had twin lights, so she could still ride, but that was something else we’d have to fix at some point.
Now, I’d done quite a bit of prep leading up to the holiday, but none of it prepared me for the wonders of the Luxembourg countryside.
So, as we left the big motorway roads behind us, and started winding our way through a deep, heavily forested valley, on a nice quick road, I began to enjoy the ride again.
Forty minutes on nice quick roads, with many a gentle sweeping curve, and as we turn off onto a smaller road that heads up into the dense forest that has lined our route, I’m all too aware that the light is noticeably fading.
This is where the road starts to get far more technical, slower, and more challenging. Its also when I’m beginning to feel tired after our long day or riding.
As such, as the road narrows and we encounter our first set of hairpins and sharp blind turns with tall rock faces on one side and steep drops on the other, I let Claire know that I need to take it easy.
We’re still not slouches, and some of the turns in the road are so sharp, the adrenalin kicks in, making the tiredness and wet soon forgotten, and we both end up really enjoying this challenging, almost scrambler style road.
What’s more, we’re less than an hour away from the hotel now. Adrian has made up a bit of time, and the skies are clearing of clouds.
But Luxembourg has another couple of surprises in store for us before we reach the hotel…
Firstly, after a solid half hour of enjoying the fantastic route up through the forest, we suddenly emerge into golden twilight sunlight, at the top of the valley, which has been cultivated to grow wheat and barley.
It’s like riding into a scene out of Gladiator. The road straightens out into big sweeping curves that wind their way through the fields of maturing crops. Every few miles we slow down to pass through a little hamlet of houses, and then back out into the golden crops
Just as I’ve convinced myself that this country can’t possibly get any more scenic, we drop back down through a stretch of forest, and as we round a big lazy curve in the road, we get our first view of Vianden, or more accurately the giant floodlit castle that towers up over the historic town of Vianden.
It’s like riding into a fairy-tale. The heavily wooded hillsides stretch out toward the horizon, dark now with the fading light, while the pale stone of the castle is illuminated by its floodlights.
We lose sight of the castle and then catch glimpses of it again as we wind our way down the hillside toward the town, and finally we’re there. The castle is now looming massively above us, the twisty road has turned to cobblestones, and is lined with attractive old houses.
My relief at reaching Vianden, our base of operations for the next few days is almost palpable
We slow down of course, as we descend the cobblestone streets, past many an inviting looking cafe, pub and hotel, across a big stone bridge that spans a sleepy looking river, a right turn, a left, and we’ve reached our hotel, Hotel Petry, which has a long line of familiar looking motorcycles parked outside it.
Seconds later and June appears, to welcome us in, and lend a hand with the luggage.
It’s just turned 9pm, the town and nearby river looks lovely, and the hotel have kindly put three plates of food aside for us, all we need now is Adrian.
The hotel is a big old place, warm, airy and inviting, and after checking in and finding my room, I finally get to peel off all the soggy layers of clothing that I feel like I’ve been riding in forever.
It’s only after I’ve dumped all my wet things in the bathtub, that I check to see if my luggage has kept the rain out, which thankfully, it has, and I get dressed in lovely dry things, which feel like the height of luxury.
A few minutes later, with beers in hand, Claire and I start to catch up with the rest of the group, who have just finished their dinner.
Half an hour later, and the unmistakable sound of Adrian’s Triumph Tiger can be heard coming around the back of the hotel.
Having survived our trial by rain, and having reached our new base of operations, we now get to relax into our holiday proper, but more on that in the next episode…
Part 4 - Of castles, caves and vineyards!