Eric's Trip to Munich and Oslo

It's not just a velo club, it's a way of life. When PMVC members travel, they think about cycling.

Last week, I was in Munich. Munich is full of cyclists, many of them advanced in years and very few encumbered by helmets. Many of the sidewalks have designated bike paths. [Munich doesn't have the 61C, but it has next best thing to it: Oscar's Espresso Bar]:

After a week without riding, I decided to rent a "mountain bike" at the train station. The quality of the bike is what you would expect when renting at a train station, so I figured I would just follow the River Isar south (upstream), cross at some point, and return to the city. About 10 miles north of the city, the river valley got steeper and the trail headed into the hills. Pretty soon I was on a rocky single track. This is not my favourite riding on a real mountain bike, let alone on a railroad station bike. I stopped worrying about the bike, however, when I realized that I had no idea where I was. Fortunately, I came to a fork where the signs gave me a clear choice between two places that weren't on any map [which you can't read here anyway-O.S.].

Taking the lower road, I eventually found myself in a muddy pasture, with six inches of mud sucking the wheels. Thirty minutes later, I was slowly wheeling along a muddy canal with the sound of a German oompah band coming toward me. There on the canal was a floating biergarten, complete with five piece band. No pictures -- it was too hard to see the bier barge through the trees.

At last I came to a real biergarten where I was told that the paths along the river and the canal were gesperrt. No kidding. So it was back into the hills, this time on more even and less muddy ground. There were several attractive Bavarian farms along this route:

When I finally got back to Munich, I found just the place to end a memorable ride [no picture available- O.S.].

The next day, I left Munich for Oslo. Although I was only in Oslo for a day, and did not have a chance to ride, I was impressed by the number of cyclists. Unlike the cyclists in Munich, the cyclists in Oslo did not stop at every red light. Somehow, this made me feel more at home. Like Munich, however, there were lots of designated bikeways:

Munich may have Oscar's Espresso Bar, but Oslo has something even better:

For those of you who are not fluent in Norwegian, "gate" means "street." And yes, Oscar's Gate had some memorable attractions.

If you are planning I trip to Norway in the near future, I still have 230 Kroner and my exchange rate is reasonable.