Munich to Venice following Via Claudia Augusta

This year's trip is in 3 parts.

In the first half we fly into Munich, put das bike together and begin our ride to Venice.  We head south from Munich through the Tyrolean Alps, then at Trento (after a 1 day diversion to Lago del Garda) we turn east into the Dolomites.  Our route generally follows the famous Roman road known as Via Claudia Augusta.  We hope to camp most nights along the way, depending to a degree on weather, but some nights we will get a hotel or hostel or B&B or AirBnB, or whatever.

For the second half of the trip, we fly from Venice to Paris where we will stay for a few weeks in an apartment on Ile de la Cite.  We both plan to catch up on work while we're in Paris, but it won't be all work because we are taking one trip to Saint-Gervais-les-Bains to watch stage 19 of the Tour de France, then back in Paris for the final of the tour on the Champs-Elysee.

 The third half of the trip is in Iceland where we'll have a 1 week layover (thanks to Iceland Air's generous layover policies).  We will have a base at a hostel in Reykjavik and ride a 5-day loop around the interior of the island.  We will probably stay in hostels along the way, but if the weather cooperates we may camp -- the weather likely will present some challenges and we hear that the wind can be brutal.  Should be great fun!

Here's a map of the first part of the trip from Munich to Venice.  This is just an overview; our daily legs will be featured on a daily post that includes a map showing that day's route in detail.  Each of the maps is interactive -- you can mouse over the route and the elevation profile shows where you are.  Or you can trace along the elevation profile and see where the point on the route that corresponds to the elevation is found.  Play around with them -- they're kind of fun.  You can also highlight a section of the elevation and the map will zoom on that section.  I am particularly looking forward to a special day in northern Italy when we will strip the bike of all its panniers, then ride up the east side of the Passo dello Stelvio, which I have wanted to ride, well, forever.

Passo dello Stelvio

 Our daily rides will probably deviate from this route, and we're already planning some different rides when we get into South Tyrol and in the Dolomites, but this is the basic plan for now.  And we are hoping to take a couple days to divert to the Lago del Garda area.  We'll see how weather and timing goes and decide along the way.

Here's a photo taken from our apartment in Paris.

Nice view and as ever, there will be plenty to do in Paris so hopefully we'll find time to do some work.

And the overall map for our loop in Iceland:



Like the first part of the trip, our daily blog posts will include a map for each day's ride.  This map is what we'd initially planned, but we're already thinking of some variations.

Hope you enjoy this year's blog.

Doug and Lorie