June 25 - Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and Austria - Oh My!

This morning started out wet.  We left the hotel at 9:00AM and everyone had their rain gear on.  It was a light rain so not a major issue but it did slow us down at the start of the day.  We stopped at the bottom of our first pass to determine if everyone wanted to attempt going over the pass; there was a very low cloud base and we didn't know what to expect as we headed up the pass.  Everyone wanted to go ahead so we did.  Below is a photo of statue that was in the town at the base of the pass.  Not sure who it is as I have not yet tried to translate the text that was on the base of the statue. (Update: Saint Gallus - Patron Saint of Wassen – Thanks Keith!)

NOTE: I tried to upload pictures and the internet is really slow so I have to limit number of pictures today.

Once we made the top of the pass and started going down the other side, the weather was very different with very few clouds and the rain stopped - yeah!  The second pass we did today was Klausen pass which was just 6,400 feet at the top.  As we come down the pass, there was a very large ranch that had cows on the road and free ranging everywhere.  I would guess there was close to 1,000 cows in the area.  All the cattle had cow bells and so you could hear the orchestra playing as you drove slowly through this area first to avoid the cows and second to avoid the cow droppings!

Today we saw many waterfalls coming out of the mountains.  Due to the rain as well as the snow that is still melting at the mountain tops, they are really flowing.  Here is a picture of one large falls.   For a few of the waterfalls the road went through the mountain (via a tunnel) just behind the waterfall.  Pretty amazing!

After the second pass, it was time to transition to our next area.  We spent the rest of the afternoon riding through Liechtenstein and then into Austria where at 7:00PM we finally reached our hotel.  This riding was mostly in the valleys which have many small communities and back roads.  Below is a picture of our hotel for the evening.  My room is on the top floor on the far right.  We had dinner at the hotel and this was my well-deserved dessert after a long day of riding.  Notice the spoon on the left side, it has a bend in it so it hooks to the side of the bowl; pretty clever.

Tomorrow should be a great day of riding.  If the weather is good (I haven't check the forecast yet), we will do at least 6 different passes.  We will work our way out of Austria and into Italy.  We will be spending the night not far from where my previous Alp tour was based in Italy (Bolzona).