Ride from 1 July 2017; original post from 7.7.2017

This week somebody tweeted a quiz by Rapha on what kind of climber one is so I went over there and whaddya know, I came out as a Big Ring Burner. Have to laugh at this especially as I have just installed a small ring to help me with the hills. I just like pootling around the mountains, that’s all. 😍

Camus said it rather well 😉:

»La lutte elle-même vers les sommets suffit à remplir un cœur d’homme. Il faut imaginer Sisyphe heureux.«

Well as it happened, I rode over the Leber and Trötsch once again last Saturday, just for good measure. I set off a bit late, around 11 am, and as I headed up the Zösenberg, dark clouds were closing in from both sides. There was no thundery feeling in the air and no noises of thunder in the distance. I carried on, making a note of every barn or house that looked like shelter. The insects had gone quiet … The rain came just after the school in Kalkleiten, followed by a number of riders rushing in the opposite direction. I carried on, with rain jacket on and made it over to Martinelli’s pub. Their main room was set up for some kind of private party and the front bar was full of damp cyclists like myself. After about 40 minutes or so it seemed fine to go on. The weather was coming down slowly from the north and we could already see blue sky behind the shower when I got to Martinelli’s.

My red bike standing in front of a green wall with a yellow postbox on it. The bike is facing out from the wall and its rear wheel is propped against one of two earthenware troughs with flowers growing in them.
Bike outside Martinelli’s
A wooden hut with a red half-hipped roof in typical Styrian style, a green bush in front, blue sky overhead.
Hut by Martinelli’s
Among foliage we see a road sign warning of a 28% downhill gradient and another sign requiring the use of tyre chains on this road whenever the weather is wintry.
Top of the “other” road up to Martineli’s – one of the steepest roads around
A road does a gentle uphill s bend past the corner of a green house
Off to the Steingraben …

The rest of the ride was fine to euphoric, with the air clear and relatively cool after the rain and the sunlight picking out bits of the landscape with improbable brightness. I think it’ll be time to move on to new routes now … we’ll see …

Road animal of the week is a chicken
Some sterotypical alpine noises
Me riding up that last bit of climb in the sunlit woods. Complete with heavy breathing, creaking of saddle springs and other old-man-riding-up-hill noises – you have been warned! I swap the phone from my right hand to the left part way through.
panoramic view across nearby tres and bushes, bumpy hills with patches of forest, more green hills, then more blueish mountains towards the horizon. Fluffy white clouds are marching across a blue sky.
Road to Theisslwirt
A road , well lit but in shade, curves ways and down to the right framed by dark overhanging trees; on the left side of the road is first a green, closely mown meadow, then a patch of conifer forest with pointy treetops, and behind a sunlit patch of meadow, thickly wooded hills rolling away to the horizon. White clouds in a blue sky.
Beginning of descent above Jägerwirt
Dramatic cloudscape rolling away over rows of hills and mountains shading from green to blue towards the horizon.
View out over Semriach
Briliant green meadow sloping down a thick green forest; we can see over the top of the forest to the other side of a valley where steep wooded hills are lit in great detail by sunlight.
Pfannberg looking down towards Rabenstein