I finally found a back road I had been on years ago with my old cycling club and had not been able to find. When I went out cycling with the club, I never knew where I was going, I just followed along. I didn't have maps, and when I bought my first head unit, it didn't have any maps. I had been looking for ages, then eventually checked my very old rides on Veloviewer and there it was! So, last week I checked it and this week I included it on the planned route. The ride started at the back of Sissach Bahnhof which was buzzing with Fasnacht preparations.
I was there for about 10 minutes and must have seen a hundred people dressed up scraping around with their clogs on getting off the trains and going to the main street. I had seen a few as I left Gelterkinden too, all of them in different costumes.
I knew it wasn't going to be many with me today as its holiday time. Around here it seems you either do Fasnacht, or you go to the snow. I had a single taker still there in the Strava event on Saturday evening but when I check Sunday morning, she had de registered, so it was just me. I went to Sissach in case anyone decided to join without registering, but nope, just me. I set off!
Going through Itingen, Lausen and finally around Liestal, being directed by the traffic people. Clearly, despite the festivities not starting till later that day, the town had been cleared. Once I had navigated out to Frenkendorf, there was very little sign other than a stray piece of confetti.
Onwards to Rheinfelden past the brewery and I stopped near the river for the first toilet stop. My heart rate strap battery had died and I had taken a spare (always prepared) so stopped to replace it. Horror of horrors I didnt have the right torx bit to unscrew the sensor. I must find it, it will have been tidied up somewhere in my house.....
Nevermind, I then found the road to Möhlin I had found last week and in Mumph turned left to get on to the farm roads that are so popular with cyclists. I met quite a large group coming the other way, there was some shouting to get out the road and we just missed each other in the narrow lane.
The road out of Rheinfelden looks like a bit of gravel but never fear, its not.
When in Mumph, the view along the river always takes my breath away with its serenity.
No time to stop for long so off I went again. There is a small section of mad main road before the relief of the right turn towards Münchwilen. I was pleased I remembered the weird hard right, down the slope, under the road and back up which I had missed last week and had to turn round. The farm road again parallel to the train tracks took me to Eiken, keeping on the narrow roads end up just before Frick and neatly avoid all of the main road. Now in Frick, I headed to Wittnau for official stop number 2 where evidence of the festivities was still to be seen, confetti was still in the water trough and the horse still had his friend to scare the wits out of anyone passing who wasn't paying much attention - not me you understand!
I had been here last week and instead of the planned climb over the top towards Rothenfluh I turned left and went via Kiensberg and right towards home. At Anwil I had the genius idea of avoiding the main road incase of Fasnacht and went to Oltingen, Wenslingen, Tecknau and Gelterkinden. For those who may have missed the fun of the Anwil - Oltingen road this is it. It starts with a good downhill but just as I was coming to the corner ,someone was in the middle of the road coming towards me so I had to keep to the right and the steep part. This, combined with my heavier than normal wheels (aluminium and a dynamo hub), meant I just about popped getting to the top. Luckily I dont know what my HR was because, as we know, the sensor had no battery.
