TWIKE 560 Adventures

A new multiple-day TWIKE-adventure –
A new TWIKE team –
A new goal to reach!

After visiting the three northern-most points of the Mediterranean and crossing Europe’s fourth-highest pass by TWIKE last year, I wondered: where is the highest point in Europe i could drive to without needing a 4×4 or special permits?

Thanks to Wikipedia, getting the answer is not very difficult 🙂

June this year I added a new TWIKE adventure to my “upcoming activities” widget: Drive to the highest point in Europe reachable by an official, tarmacked road without special permits.

Theoretically, reaching this point and getting back home could be done in one very long day. Lately, I’ve come to dislike pushing for max kms in one day: like here and here. This is why I extended the trip to 3 days. Doing so would allow us to avoid driving up and down the same Inn-valley twice (would be the third time this year) and explore some parts of northern Italy. Furthermore, I wanted to add another AT>IT pass to my already extensive list of passes I have crossed 🙂

Northern Italy promises to be still very warm – it’s going to be a welcome change to all the 2400+m passes at 0°C!

Since JC is currently off to warmer places, a new TWIKE team will take on the challenge to drive to the highest point in Europe! Oliver Kuhn – a TWIKE pilot himself – has been on longer trips. We’ve been talking about traveling together for some time now and – for this trip – finally it’s coming together!

Only drawback was planning. Initially, this trip was planned for October 10-12. Unfortunately, this date didn’t work for Oliver – so, at short notice I decided to take the date forward by a week.

Pushing back the date wouldn’t work because one of the main passes making this trip interesting – the Timmelsjoch aka “the secret passage” – is usually closed for winter late October. (We’re definitely going to see some snow!)

Let’s have a look at the 3-day tour we’ve planned during the last few weeks.

Day1, drive to the highest point and stay in Sölden overnight

Day2, special starting position Sölden could prove interesting how many kms we can get from a single charge. Then cross the Passo di Stelvio (TW560 crossed it last year in the opposite direction) and head to Livigno, a small italian village close to the Swiss border, where we stay for the night

Day3, Still open: Cross the Fuorn Pass (last year) or Forcola di Livigno to the Engadin valley, head on to Chur, either via the Flüela Pass or, quite probably due to snow, using the Vereina Car-Train.

All in all, we’re really looking forward to this trip – stay tuned!