#7Countries7Passes Day 6 - Into The Mountains
Last night, I made the decision to alter my route slightly. The last few days have been super long and really draining; I decided a shorter route to get to my rest day in Merano was a better option. Having known that my sister and her husband have driven the various routes back to visit his family in South Tyrol, they seemed like the ideal pair to offer advice.
My new revised route would take me south of Lake Constance, then over Wildhaus Pass and onto Fluela Pass and Offenpass, to get me into Italy.
The first 75 kilometres of the day seemed to fly by; mostly because they were downhill, and I had a great breakfast in my stomach, courtesy of my sister's cooking.
By 100 kilometres, the climb up and over Wildhaus had begun; almost 50 kilometres of gradual and more extreme gradients. Strava routing has thrown me some curve balls over the last few days, but the route up this valley - a singletrack road running parallel to the main one, was sublime.
In the last 20 kilometres, the skies opened, and with the temperature at just 2 degrees Celsius, I'm not sure if it was sleet or rain. It was damn cold either way. I was forced to stop for the world's most expensive Swiss coffee, to warm me up a little.
The descent from Wildhaus into the Lichtenstein valley is steep, and was very wet. The bike seemed to handle it well though, and I had enough feeling in my hands to use the brakes.
Once on the valley floor, the skies cleared, and brought a great tailwind. It was then the start of the gradual climb to the base of the Fluela Pass.
I stopped to grab some dinner at a local supermarket, and then began the ascent.
Because you can't ride up the main road on this pass, the cycle track is a seperate road almost all the way. Great traffic free roads.
At 19:30 I had reached the day's target. I set up camp, cooked in daylight, and I'm looking forward to the rest of the pass tomorrow.
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