Joined: 15 Aug 2006Posts: 2666Location: No Fun Town, USA
henry wrote:
I'm thinking about riding Frankfurt to Amsterdam in May.
Has anyone done much riding in that part of the world? Any advice?
I lived in Germany (Saarbrucken) for 2 years after grad school. Good god, that was 15 years ago! I took my bike into France to Metz, then up the Mosel to Koblenz. My other relevant experience was the day I had my bike in Aachen, and figured, what the hell, let's go visit Belgium! I ended up in Brugge/Bruges.
I would assume you would (very roughly) follow the Main river down to the Rhine, then the Rhine down to Amsterdam. That route would be flat, obviously, but so would most any route once you enter Belgium and the Netherlands.
Anyway, advice: I had a bike map at some point, but eventually I realized a regular road map was just fine. Just stay off the autobahns, and favor the country routes. I had a Hostelling International membership, which I imagine is still the best bet for cheap lodging in Northern Europe. As long as you stay away from heavy tourist spots, you should be able to easily follow a chain of hostels to wherever you please, and not worry about reserving rooms. You can always ask the front desk at your current hostel to hold a room for you at your next stop. One time in Belgium, I stopped at a hostel at around 3:30, realized I had plenty of time left, and asked them to reserve me a place at the next hostel (which turned out to be not so easy to find; I had to stop at a bar in town and ask in some awful mixture of French and German for directions from the locals).
A couple of times it started raining, and I just biked to the next town and took the train. Obviously, you're not biking on the train, but days like this give you extra time to see the sights wherever you are, something you often can't do if you're biking with loads of gear. So be sure you're comfortable with the train system. Each country runs its own, but if you're comfortable buying tickets from a counter or machine in one, you can handle it in the others.
The bike + the train gives you loads of flexibility. When I was leaving Belgium, I couldn't find a train to take me back to Saarbrucken, so I took one to Luxembourg, then biked 20 or 30 miles into Germany until I found a town I knew had a train connection to Saarbrucken. Also, of course, if you have your bike with you, it allows you a lot of flexibility if you choose to stay in a town for a day or two.
What else: I didn't have a cell phone at the time; you'll probably want to make sure yours works in Europe. Money is probably a lot easier, since all these countries use Euros.
Destination-wise: Brugge is very nice, but out of your way. Amsterdam is obviously great. There's a neat museum in the middle of a (I believe, perhaps the only) national park in the Netherlands: http://www.hogeveluwe.nl/page.asp?id=4
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Joined: 15 Aug 2006
Posts: 2666
Location: No Fun Town, USA
