The High Triple: Susten – Grimsel – Furka

Susten - Furka - Grimsel. Together with a friend from Zurich who came spontaneously and who accompanied me on the tour 😎

Today was the pre-brevet queen stage. From the beginning I rode at a measured level of power - which was a good thing, because I kept up the 180-200 watts until the end. However, I had expected a bit more power. It was already warm at the Furka, I had to wring out my headband twice because the liquid ran over my glasses. 🥵😖 Grimsel went well, the descent to Innertkirchen was brilliant. 32 km, 1500 meters of descent, little traffic 😍. Turn right in Innertkirchen, straight into the first ramp to Susten. It's an epic climb: 27 km, 1700 meters of elevation... At some point I was at the top too. In between there was the wonderful view of the Steingletscher! 🏔️ It was cold at the top, I couldn't really get used to the descent. Changing winds, wet roads in between and the road bordering the abyss anything but reassuring. Continued in the next comment 🙂

3000m is my pain limit at the moment, the additional ones were correspondingly hard 😂

Beautiful, but the holy trinity of Swiss Alpine passes really wrinkled me🤩🚵🥵So, a detailed comment will follow when I'm back to full strength😉

If you want to do the tour without a backpack, there are lockers in Andermatt. The CHF 5 fee can be easily paid with your EC card. The pastries are then triggered using a QR code. A good thing😉👍

Roll out the narrow tires once a year, otherwise they will become brittle. Mandatory program for 2024 fulfilled 😉 The Susten and Nufenen passes are currently closed at night from 6 p.m. to 8 a.m. When we started at 1 p.m., that was a certain stress factor 😊 Susten was OK. Pleasant gradient, foggy but dry and hardly any traffic 🎉 The Grimsel pass then really sapped my motivation. A full 1000 meters of altitude in the thick, very wet navel. The sun came out just in time for the Grimselsee ☀️ Mega panorama 😍 and 🤟🏻 sunset. After a 20-second break, we went straight down to Gletsch. Passed the barrier at exactly 6 p.m. 🥳 Now pedaling leisurely up the Furka pass. The barrier man came to meet me, but with a mutual 👍🏻 the matter was settled. At the top it was 2.5 degrees and the drizzle got heavier 😱 It got warmer again with every meter of altitude. Down in Realp it was a cozy 5° again. - Seat and steering wheel heating in the car is awesome 😁 - At this time of year and in these temperatures you get a 👍🏻 and 😊 from every second driver Here is the tour from last year: https://www.komoot.de/tour/1335503157?ref=aso

Grimsel, Furka, Susten: The drive over these Swiss passes (2165 meters, 2436 meters and 2224 meters) is a much-driven and much-described classic. There are higher and more exotic passes. But in the combination of route and view, this tour is hard to beat. Therefore a new description at this point. There are, slightly different from the set, driven GPS file, 120 kilometers and 3525 meters in altitude. The gradients (for example on the Furkapass) go up in a range of up to 14 percent. The numbers for the tour alone indicate that we are on a "compact" and equally demanding route. The view is sometimes fantastic: from the Furka Pass we can see the white 4000m peaks of the Bernese and Valais Alps on a clear day. Likewise, on this route we witness an almost extreme glacier retreat, for example when the Rhone glacier breaks off (which hardly exists any more) towards the glacier. The author of these lines first rode the lap in 1991, then in 2005. Some pictures from 1991 and 2005 were deliberately included in the tour description. They speak for themselves with a view to the disappearance of glaciers. Due to the high volume of traffic in the Schöllenenschlucht (Andermatt-Wassen), it is highly recommended to take the tour counterclockwise and thus the Schöllenenschlucht downhill for 500 meters.

I must admit, I felt unsatisfied after yesterday's flop 😂 and had a big hunger for something special 🤩 Although the weather forecast for today was not perfect, I just jumped on the train to Göschenen at 6 am, believing that all will be fine ☀️💪 It was still a bit dark when I started cycling, and light rain, wet streets and low hanging clouds complemented the grim scenery... I managed to escape from the strong rain and be on top of Susten just after 9 am 😎, but my socks and shoes got wet on the way and remained so for the rest of the day 🥴 Blast downhill to Innertkirchen, shopping in Volg, eating on a bench catching every sunbeam. Next uphill, to Grimsel, was much harder - crazy headwind almost blew me down a few times, and I even had to use the last but one cog to move forward. The prize was coffee and cake in the cosy Hotel Alpenrose ☕️🍰 There's a saying in Polish within climbers' community "choćby skały srały...", which means that whatever happens you'll get what you wanted. And that was this moment for me, I knew 😁 I climbed Furka painlessly, even with delight, smiling 😎 Dark clouds were following me, so I stopped only to take some pictures and look back to keep the view in my memories, and went down to Hospental and in a light rain to Göschenen, to catch the train back home 🚂🔜🏠