Austrian and Swiss Alps Tour

Eleven nights across five countries, guided, 2,100 miles taking in the three roads most riders have on a list, on the rider’s own motorcycle.

The three are the B500 along the Black Forest ridge, the Grossglockner with its thirty-six hairpins, and the Andermatt loop, which links six Swiss passes in a single day and is the finest day’s riding in Europe.

The Reims-Gueux circuit opens it, then the Vosges and the B500 to two nights in the Austrian Tirol, with a Grossglockner ride-out to the Hochtor at 2,504 metres and the Edelweisspitze viewpoint above it, looking at the Pasterze Glacier and Austria’s highest peak. Lesser-known passes carry the route into Switzerland for two nights, with the San Bernardino and the Oberalp, then the Andermatt loop itself: the Furka, which appeared in Goldfinger, the Grimsel, the Susten, the Gotthard, the old cobbled Tremola and the Nufenen at 2,478 metres. The Emmental, the Vosges, Verdun and the Chimay circuit fill the return.

The Eurotunnel crossing, ten nights’ accommodation, daily breakfast, three evening meals, hotel leisure facilities, route maps and GPS files, all the parking and a guide throughout are all included; fuel, tolls including the Swiss vignette, entry fees, other meals and the mandatory insurance and breakdown cover are not. The price shown is per person for a rider and pillion sharing a bike and a room. Late May to October is the window, since every pass on it closes in winter. Twelve days to take in all three of those roads with two ride-out days built in is efficiently done, and the Andermatt loop alone would justify the trip.