Review: Leonardo Da Vinci

Leonardo Da Vinci is Walter Issacson's biography of Leonardo Da Vinci. It covers his life in great detail, covering his entire life.

What's interesting to you about Da Vinci might or might not be interesting to me, and we all pick and choose what we like. But the nice thing about this book is an explanation of how or why Da Vinci's important works were interesting and important. I enjoyed Issacson's explanation of why his portraits were so long sought after: Da Vinci would layer his paintings, adding a brush stroke here and there, year after year to create a translucent effect on the portraits. For "the last supper", he constructed the painting so that the perspective would look correct from various parts of the room, which was innovative both in the use of perspective as well as integration into the area where the room was.

Much has been made of Da Vinci's inventions. Issacson points out that many of the drawings that are used to illustrate these might actually have been drawings meant to prepare costumes or props for pageants and stage plays or big events, rather than meant to be used for actual military or architectural purpose. This information would have caused me to view the various Da Vinci exhibits I saw in France several years ago.

Da Vinci was the ultimate (and probably most famous) renaissance man. He was curious about everything, drawing tons of illustrations and investigated science before Newton. That curiosity did not translate, however, into advancement of human understanding for his time, because he didn't care about publishing. Despite his notebooks having a wealth of detail, what happened was that after his death his notebooks were sold and scattered, and no one actually went back and condensed all that detail into books that could be reproduced and learned from. As a result, a lot of the knowledge was independently rediscovered much later (including his insight as to how the heart valves' fluid dynamics worked). All this happened despite the fact that he had two proteges that he was close to.

One thing that was revealed in this book is that Da Vinci was a master procrastinator. Either that, or you could call him a perfectionist. He would take 14 years to work on the Mona Lisa, never delivering it to the person who commissioned it (though it seemed like once he took a liking to the work he never intended to deliver), but just adding a brush stroke here and there over the years. So he died with the Mona Lisa near him. This habit of procrastination was so famous that the city of Florence tried over and over again to write contracts to ensure that he would deliver, in one case even goading him a long, by commissioning a painting from him, and then also commissioning one from Michaelangelo for a wall right next door to the one he was supposed to paint. (This particular story backfired: neither artist finished his painting) According to Issacson, this made Da Vinci an artist, instead of just a master painter.

There are lots of other stories about Da Vinci that stood out in this book, and many lamentations of "what-if", mostly related to Da Vinci's lack of concern about publication. His one publication that made a big contribution to mathematics happened when he teamed up with a mathematician who was writing a text book. A similar collaboration almost happened with a physician, but that physician died of a plague (ironically) before anything came to fruition. Da Vinci was like the archetypal professor with tenure: he could essentially explore whatever he liked, without concern about delivering sufficient commercial success to make a living.

I wished I'd read this book before visiting the Louvre or visiting any of the Da Vinci exhibits, so I would recommend this book to anyone who was about to visit any of those.

Things I would have done differently

I'm always thinking of ways to improve the next tour, and if there was anything I could have done differently to improve the experience. Of course, it's very likely the next time we do a tour Boen will want to come along as well, so we may or may not finally break down and do a supported tour. On the triplet, we'll definitely have to scale back on the degree of difficulty and passes that we need to ride.

First, the Wahoo Elemnt Bolt cannot serve as our primary navigation device. I'd like to replace it with either a Garmin watch that can do navigation, or a Garmin head unit that can do navigation. I'd like to replace the tail light with a Garmin Varia Radar as well, so some thought will have to go into compatibility and mounting options.

I think the bike tour from Merano to Trentino and Verona was a mistake. It was too hot, and not at all suitable for a summer trip. In retrospect, what I should have done, knowing what I know now, was to take the train from Bolzano up to Fortezza and then ridden over to Dobbiaco and then Misurina. That would have provided easy access to Cortina and then gotten us to the Badia area for riding in the Sella Rondo Bike Day. On the other hand, it was nice to see Lake Garda, which was new to me on this trip.

In any case, hammering up the two hard days right after Fuessen while jet-lag wasn't very smart. I probably should have taken it easy, and not promised Bowen "breakfast in Austria, lunch in Switzerland, and dinner in Italy." I probably could have stretched that out a bit so as to get a bit more rest in the afternoon on those days

I should not have switched brands for melatonin. Perhaps the correct approach next time for combating jet-lag is to get stronger medicine, but I guess I'll have a chat with my sleep doctor prior to the next trip.

Review: Moto X4

Amazon Prime Day had the Moto X4 (Amazon Edition) for $199. At that price, I'd jumped on it, given that I had cracked the screen on the LG V20 multiple times during various bike rides and during Bowen's tour. I'd avoided the X4 last year because it had only 32GB of storage and 3GB of RAM, a downgrade from the Moto G5+.

On paper, the X4 can be described as a "no-compromise mid-range" phone. The key features are:

• USB-C (some people consider this a feature, but I didn't)
• NFC (missing on the Moto G5+)
• headphone jack (missing on many "flagship" phones)
• MicroSD card slot (missing on Google's "apple-envy" phones)
• Waterproof (missing on the Moto G5+)
• Android Oreo (missing on the Moto G5+, but to be honest I don't really think it's a big deal: recent Android versions have introduced very few features that are noticeable)

As you can see, there's good reason people have been hanging on to their phones longer and longer: quite a few features on this list have been dropped from pricier phones, and many of these features aren't really required. For instance, NFC payments while nice, still aren't required in 2018. I got used to it when the neighborhood Safeway started accepting Google Pay and quick grocery runs no longer needed me to bring my wallet, but otherwise, even credit cards have started providing NFC chips even if your phone doesn't have one.

What drew me, of course, was the waterproofing and microSD card slot, which have been a mainstay in many Android phones since the beginning. The phone has a glass back, another fashionable and unnecessarily fragile feature which makes it slippery and demands a case. I picked the Spigen Armor case, which brought the weight of the phone from 174g to 206g, heavier than the LG V20 without a case. But there's a reason the LG V20 now has several cracks in the screen. While the LG V20 was milspec rated for drops, that doesn't apply to screens, apparently. For true ruggedness you'll have to get a phone that weighs more than half a pound.

Booting up the phone and inserting my sim card and micro sd card from the LG V20, I'm forced to realize that software matters a lot. While the Snapdragon 630 is a whole tier below the Snapdragon 821 and theoretically slower, the Moto X4 boots up just as fast. The Moto gestures (twist to shoot, chop chop to turn on flashlight, use the fingerprint sensor as a navigation button) are great and I can't tell you how much I missed them. Camera startup appears to be slower than on the Moto G5+ (5s), but that could have been fond nostalgia working. The camera shoots crap pictures. But all camera phones shoot crap pictures: they're meant for receipts, bank deposits, and moments when you really don't have a better camera with you, but when your intent is to make good pictures, bring the real camera. I don't even know why they bothered with the dual camera thing. They should have just kept the same camera in the Moto G5+ and I'd have been happy.

One very welcome feature in Oreo is the introduction of LDAC pairing over bluetooth.. That meant my fancy noise canceling headphones get high quality audio. Since I actually use music stored on the phone most of the time, this was great. Of course, the headphone jack itself isn't strong enough to drive my Sennheiser 600s but I'll keep the LG V20 around for that. Occasionally, the music playback on the device gets very confused and everything will play and skip. A reboot takes care of that.

The shortage of onboard storage was worrying: after installing my typical in-use apps, I only have about 8GB free on the onboard flash storage. In general, you don't want to fill up flash storage. Not only do you end up spending a lot of time managing storage, the more you fill up flash storage, the slower it gets, and the shorter the life of your storage device. I would have been much happier if Lenovo had launched the 64GB version of the phone in the US. The additional RAM would also have been nice, but in practice I don't find that RAM is a limiting factor in today's phones.

The phone gets regular updates, which is a pleasant surprise, getting security updates on the first of every month. Now a lot of Android enthusiasts make a big deal out of this. I don't. It's nice to get updates, but I've never had an Android phone get hacked (and neither have the less technically involved members of my family), so I don't think phone security is as big a deal as those guys make it out to be. Recent Android OS updates just haven't been compelling, and some updates introduce bugs that slow your phone down or drain battery fast. What is interesting is that the Moto X4 is one of the few devices to support A/B partitioning. That means that system updates can happen in the background, and the system has a backup OS partition in case something goes badly wrong in the update. This is only a useful feature if software updates come frequently, which in the case of the Moto X4 appears to be the case.

The phone charges fast, but because the Snapdragon 630 is just an overclocked 625 made on the same process, the battery life is worse than the Moto G5+'s, since the battery pack is the same size. Both are miles better than the LG V20, which would take an extended battery to survive the kind of trip the Moto G5+ handled with aplomb. My suspicion is that the Moto X4 would have to be topped up with some kind of power bank on a bike tour in the middle of the day. Overnight, the battery would drain by about 8-10%, indicating a screen off battery consumption of 1% per hour. I ended up turning off the Moto display feature because it would drain the battery superfast during the day, flashing notifications all the time.

In case you're wondering, the Amazon Edition of the Moto X4 also qualifies for Project Fi. This will be great for international travel as this year I discovered that the regular T-mobile speed just isn't fast enough for sync'ing routes to the Wahoo Bolt.

All in all, the X4 is a great phone. It's got all the features "flagship" phones have and many features the $600+ don't have. You will never feel like you're missing out on features you need with this phone. Recommended.

Review: Columbia Men's Trail Splash Shorts

Columbia recently had a sale on their Trail Splash Shorts. It being the summer, I bought one. When it arrived, I weighed them at 145g. By contrast, my no-longer-made Cloudveil Capris were 186g, but those required a belt!

These shorts are super comfortable. They wick sweat well, the super-light fabric feels great, and they don't need a belt because they have an integrated one.  They bead water, and my guess is in a pinch you can even use them as swim suits. After I put them on, I immediately went and bought another pair.

Recommended.

Review: Crazy Rich Asians

I didn't realize that Crazy Rich Asians was set in Singapore, so when my wife started asking about Singaporean 富二代, I found myself saying that I'd never met any of them. But I was intrigued, and so I picked up the book.

The novel is a reversed culture shock comedy story. We're probably all familiar with the typical Asian culture shock story: the Asian immigrant moves to the USA and gets into all sorts of incidents because this is the first time he/she has ever seen a supermarket or Costco warehouse store. This novel depicts Rachel Chu, who is unknowingly dating a super-rich Singaporean in New York, and when he asks her to travel through South East Asia for the summer, agrees and is thrown into the insanity that is the plight of wealthy "old money" in Singapore.

The book thrives on stereotypes and cliches. There's the ABC (American Born Chinese) girl who refuses to date anyone other than white people (but refuses to admit that). There's the aunt that everybody nicknames "Radio One Asia" because she'll broadcast every bit of gossip to everyone in the extended family. There's the snappy dresser cousin who acts as a secret agent for the Matriarchs of the family. And of course, all the female parents are the master wielders of the vicious rumor mill and are crazy enough to hire private investigators to check out their sons or daughter's girlfriends and boyfriends. Don't forget the stereotypical grandparents who use their children's potential inherited wealth as a threat to keep everyone in line. And all the young women are into visiting Paris for the Boutique fashion houses and spending a half million dollars at the time for designer dresses. And of course, every rich guy has a harem of mistresses and/or is in an unhappy marriage but has hung on because of the children.

OK. Those are the bad parts of the novel. The good parts are that Kevin Kwan actually did grow up in Singapore. The references all ring true and authentic, including mentions of the Anglo Chinese School (where my brothers and I spent our formative years), Raffles Institution, and of course, MGS, the sister school of ACS with the distinctive pinafore uniforms. Upon reading this book, I realized that I'd inadvertently lied to my wife: so those wealthy kids were the kids whose families were actually Christian, who did go to church on Sunday, and who'd shown up at grade one already speaking English, making me feel like I was already far far behind everybody else. (My mom, upon hearing that, switched all my younger brothers to an English speaking kindergarten) Thinking back, I remembered that one of my brother's friends would send a chauffeur with a Mercedes Benz to pick him up for a play date. I never actually had one of those play dates, being too introverted to actually make more than one friend in Primary school, though I remember a classmate living in a house so ginormous that they'd have a whistle next to the phone: when you called them and asked for the person you wanted to speak with, the person answering the phone would blow the whistle a certain number of times to indicate who should come to the phone!

Every Hokkien (福建), Cantonese (廣東) or Malay phrase is foot-noted, and there are plenty of those thrown in there. The footnotes are somewhat amusing, though not always entirely accurate (and frequently incomplete), and the Anglicization is always difficult to parse because neither Hokkien nor Cantonese have a standard phonetic romanization.

And then of course, there's the food, which is the only thing I ever miss about South East Asia. The enthusiasm of Singaporean culture about food comes across and is authentic, and of course, the description of the various foods are spot on. I'm even miffed that my favorite Singaporean dish Mee Pok never made it into the novel! And of course, the mention of the ACS cafeteria losing its Mee Siam vendor made me sad, even though I'd long known that the campus I'd grown up in (with its 10 cents bowl of noodles and fantastic lunches) was long gone. The movie might be worth watching just for awesomely videographed food scenes. True to form, the older Chinese people in the book always complain whenever a non-Chinese dish is served.

There's lots more to give the novel authenticity: Gurkha guards --- I'd walked past Lee Kuan Yew's house with its Gurkhas on the way to kindergarten every day.  There's the references to different parts of Singapore which only a Singaporean would know.

What's missing, of course, is all the great stuff that a non-wealthy Singaporean would know about. The fantastic public transportation system (MRT and the public bus system). The mini-buses which would be stuffed with school children to and from school, complete with a conductor hanging off the door rails to keep the kids on the bus from falling out as the bus moved. The incredible safety and 24-hour food access (it shocked me when I went to school at Berkeley that you couldn't find food at 2:00am!) are barely mentioned.

I didn't expect to enjoy the novel as much as I did, and it almost makes me want to see the movie just to see how much the city has changed since I left. I'm placing a hold on the next book in the series at the library right now, so that means the novel comes recommended.

Notes on the movie:
After I wrote the above, I saw the movie version of the book. To say the least, the movie is disappointing, with many subplots eliminated or simplified. But that's not an issue: most movies are like that. The movie drops many of the distinctive feature of the novel which make it uniquely Singaporean:

• Very little Hokkien and Singapore slang. While the book is full of footnotes explaining unique Singaporean/Malay/Hokkien slang, most of the non-English words spoken in the movie is either Mandarin or Cantonese. You can go through most of your life in Singapore without knowing Cantonese, and the movie might as well have been set in Hong Kong. None of the distinctive culture that makes Singapore not Hong Kong or Taiwan has made it into the movie. 
• Very little emphasis on food: in the book, the characters argue about where to go get food all the time. There isn't even a single 30s sequence in the movie where the characters do that in the movie. The food photography/cinematography could also have been much better. The scene set in the hawker center might as well have been at any American food court.
• All the scenes set in Malaysia like Malacca or the Cameron Highlands are gone.

Other notable changes:

• The book spends gobs and gobs of time on boutiques and fashion. Famous designers and fashion icons are mentioned. The cinematography didn't even waste any effort there.  
• Nick Young comes across much more as a compliant Chinese kid than someone willing to give up everything for Rachel.

All in all, if I'd seen the movie first, I probably wouldn't have given the book a chance. So if you saw the movie and thought it was inane, please don't skip the book. The book's got a billion times more flavor and authenticity than the movie, which works very hard to dumb down the book into a simple "American vs Traditional Chinese person" plot that Hollywood thinks an American can understand. That doesn't mean the book isn't flawed, it's just that the movie blows up all the book's flaws without providing any of the book's fun.

Packing List for Tour of the Alps 2018

This year, I didn't bother with spare tires or spare derailleur and brake cables. The Park Pin tool is for adjusting the eccentric in place of carrying a much heavier bottom bracket wrench. I carried 3 missing links because if the timing chain gets messed up, having spare missing links would help make up for any broken links. I carried a separate chain tool after losing the one that came with the folding tool. The separate chain tool is much more usable anyway, but like with the spoke wrench, it's one of those things you bring as insurance and are happy not to use.

I solved the problem of constantly leaving chargers behind in hotels by having a new policy of not obsessing about charge state of the electronic devices. I now pack up those chargers when I wake up, not leaving any chargers around to top up any electronics. The Moto G5's fast charger is still the smallest and lightest Qualcomm QC 2.0 charger I've found, and it works on LG phones.

One thing I've learned is that if there's something I bring for myself, I need to bring an equivalent for Bowen. I brought arm coolers for myself, but he refused to let me wear them when I discovered that he didn't have any! I probably no longer need to carry the Minoura tyre levers. The VAR lever is good enough for the tires that are on the bike.

It turned out that one spare bite valve was not enough. By the time we got to Pontresina, Bowen had bitten through the replacement! The kid has sharp teeth!

Tools & Spares

• VAR Tyre Lever
• Minoura Tyre Levers
• 2 Inner Tubes
• NBT2
• FiberFix Spoke
• Park Spoke Wrench
• Gerber Dime Tool
• EyezOff Folding Tool
• Topeak Universal Chain Tool
• 3 pair KMC Missing Links
• S&S 6" double spanner/pedal wrench
• Chain oil
• Finish Line Extreme Fluoro Grease
• Shop Towels (4 sheets)
• 4 packets multi-purpose grease
• Park Pin Tool

Clothing

• Cycling jerseys (x2 each)
• Cycling shorts (x2 each)
• Smart Wool socks (for Bowen) x2
• regular sock (for Bowen)
• Waterproof socks (for Piaw) x2
• regular cycling sock (for Piaw)
• REI hiking pants (for Bowen)
• Merino Wool sweater (for Bowen) x2
• Featherweight Hiking Shirt (for Piaw)
• Eagle Creek Money Belt (for Piaw)
• Cloudveil Capri shorts (for Piaw)
• Rab wind jacket (for Piaw)
• Columbia Outdry Rainjacket (each)
• Columbia Outdry Rainpants (for Piaw)
• Splashy Nylon Rain Pants (for Bowen)
• Giro Jag Gloves
• Arm coolers (for Piaw)
• Arm Warmers (for Piaw)
• Knee Warmers (for Piaw)
• Patagonia Boys Down Jacket (for Bowen)
• Nashbar Headband x2 (for Piaw)
• Long fingered gloves (for Piaw)
• REI mittens (for Bowen)
• Underwear (x2 each)
• Training pants (x20) for Bowen
• Swimming suit (each)
• swim goggles (each)
• 1 backpacking towel
• Cycling shoes (each)
• Keen sandals (Bowen)

Bike

• Camelbak Podium Big Chill
• Camelbak Podium Water Bottle
• Camelbak Kids MULE
• Camelbak spare bite valve
• Bruce Gordon Rear Rack
• Robert Beckman Panniers & Rain covers
• SKS Raceblade Pro fender (rear only)
• Delta Cargo Net

Electronics

• Wahoo Elemnt Bolt
• Garmin Edge 25
• Garmin Vivoactive HR
• Planet Bike Superflash Tail Light
• Kernowo Bike Light
• Canon G7X Mk II
• Sony Playstation Vita
• Kindle Paperwhite (Waterproof'd)
• NewTrent 90C charger
• Moto G5 Fast Charger
• LG V20 (with extended battery)
• Oral-B 1000 (toothbrush heads 1 each)
• HDM Z1 CPAP machine, hose, and nasal pillows

Personal

• toothpaste
• cough syrup (acquired on the road0
• floss
• pills, calcium supplements, and vitamin supplements
• kids ibuprofen (acquired on the road)
• first aid kit

Travel Credit Cards Overview

This time, we traveled with the Capital One Quicksilver and Amazon Prime credit cards for travel use. Both offer no-fee international transactions, which is why I started using CapitalOne credit cards in the first place.

The Capital One credit card I've used before, but for 2018, there was a twist that made the card really useful when in Europe: NFC wireless built in! What's even better, for small amounts like what you'll typically buy in a grocery store, if you use the NFC chip, they don't make you sign for your purchase! This made me not even bother with Google Pay on my phone. All cards should have this feature.

The Amazon Prime credit card was new to me for international travel. I think I learned not to trust credit cards that claim no-fee international transactions, since you won't know about any hidden fees until you get home and check your purchases. I was sparing with it, but I can confirm indeed that it has no fees for international transactions, now that checked my statement. Unfortunately, it doesn't have an NFC chip.

One trick you want to use is to set a pin on your credit card before you travel. This takes a month or so, on occasion, but what it does is to allow you to use your credit card to buy train tickets, where the machine demands a pin. I did this with the Capital One card, and it works well. (No, the train ticket machines don't take NFC)

The Amazon Prime card offers quite a bit more benefits than the Capital One card. The lack of NFC might be worked around by you setting it to be your default card on Google Pay. But I didn't really try Google Pay in Europe this time. That'll be an experiment for future travel. I'll probably try to use the Amazon Prime card a lot more next time, now that I'm confident that the "no-fee" clause is true.

Review: Giro Manta R Cycling Shoes

One of the biggest problems with using clipless pedals for kids is the shortage of cycling shoes small enough to fit them. We are at the point where I'm using aquaseal to fix Bowen's (bought second hand) Speeder cycling shoes so that Boen will eventually get a chance to wear them.

Pardo came across a pair of Giro Manta R women's cycling shoes in size 36 (the smallest they make) in a thrift store for about $10. He bought them. On a lark, about a month before the tour I tried them on Bowen and to my surprised, if you cinch down the straps all the way, they're a slightly loose fit on him! Kids aren't going to sprint all out on the tandem, or if they do, they're usually helping you uphill, so they're not going to pull out of the shoes. Because these shoes have a strap and velcro buckling system rather than shoe-laces, Bowen immediately abandoned the Speeder. (Some day, I'd like to meet the idiot who thought that shoe laces and a velcro cover are a good idea for kids shoes)

The shoes are definitely very stiff, and despite Bowen's abuse, I haven't needed to fix them yet. The big issue is that the cleats mount in a position that's a little bit too close to the lugs on the soles. As a result, playing in a playground with gravel will occasionally pick up a stone at exactly the right spot to prevent the cleat from engaging the pedals. Whenever this happens, the stone is too tightly wedged to pull it out by hand, so you'll have to pull out your pocket knife and pry it out.

From the looks of it, Bowen will outgrow these shoes long before he wears them out, and they're much nicer than his old Speeder shoes. Recommended.

Review: Smartwool Socks

I don't usually like wool stuff. It's hard to launder, slow to dry, and typical not as good as polyester, nylon, and other high tech fabrics made out of dead dinosaurs. I had a pair of wool shorts once, and it bunched up so bad I might as well have worn paper pants.

Smartwool socks, however, are a different story. We had 2 pairs of them on the trip, and they wring very well, sometimes drying even faster than the lighter cotton socks. They stay warm when wet, and obviously when your son has feet barely big enough for his shoes it's good for socks to be a little thicker. They're expensive but have survived the tour pretty well.

Recommended.

Review: Detla Cycle Elastonet

When we're at home and only have a light load, we use the Performance Transit trunk bag. When we're touring, our Robert Beckman panniers are enough for most of our every day equipment, but there are times when we need to carry a little more for usually not a long distance, such as when we buy food at a supermarket and ride to a picnic area.

For that, even the weight of the transit bag is too much. We wanted something even lighter. The Delta Cycle Elastonet is made of elastometer and weighs 56g. It's got 4 hooks, and can be stored on our rack empty without trouble. Throughout our tour, the hooks never came off the rack, even when we were bouncing on dirt road or bike path.

The net stretches sufficiently to carry a helmet on the day when we gave our panniers to the Mapo van and had the luxury of riding up the Stelvio unloaded. I'd say it can carry a basketball with no room for any other item on the rack. It was obviously enough to carry lunch on any given day.

The item is more than worth the weight and price. It's so useful that now that we're home, I still keep it on the bike. Recommended.

Review: Dell Tek Backpack 15.6"

3 years ago, I bought the Dell Tek 15.6" backpack for about $10 (including a bunch of coupons and a rebate), and I've been using it ever since on almost all my trips, and for Bowen's swimming lessons. It's an incredibly versatile pack and much lighter than the standard backpacks given out for free by Google to employees, for instance.

A typical loadout for a trip with Bowen across the Atlantic includes a tablet, a couple of Vitas, the Kindle, all bicycle electronics and assorted chargers, the CPAP machine, mask and all accessories, a full night's change of clothes for both of us, on-plane toiletries, and whatever other miscellaneous items that absolutely wouldn't have fit in our checked-in luggage. The backpack swallows all this with ease, and despite my repeated over-stuffing of the pack I've not broken it, and the backpack remains comfortable to wear. I prefer it as carry-on luggage to any other backpacks I have in, and given that I've had to carry it along with dragging a roll-on luggage, Bowen, and Bowen's camelbak all at the same time, I can confirm that it makes a nice platform for Bowen to rest on in a fireman's carry.

The newer models go for north of $50 on Amazon and other sites, but as of this writing you can get the exact model I have for $25 direct from Dell, which makes it a great deal. Highly recommended.

Review: Columbia Kids Outdry Hybrid Jacket

Bowen already had a Marmot Kids rain jacket, but I noticed that it wasn't very effective in the rain during last year's tour. The inside of the jacket would be wet when it was raining outside. Fortunately, the England trip never went very high, and getting a little damp when it's not cold is OK. For this year's trip, I wanted something much more effective. Having used the Columbia Hybrid rain jacket, I figured I would give their kids rain jacket a try.

Ironically, it didn't rain on us at all during this year's trip, which did involve the Stelvio, the highest pass in Italy. But Bowen did test the rain jacket in the Hollentalklam, and it worked really well. The inside was bone dry, and his rain pants held up as well.

Both pieces of equipment come highly recommended.

Thoughts: Mountain Touring with a Child

I didn't intend this year's trip to turn into a tour of the Alps, but Bowen turned out to be far more enthusiastic about mountains than I expected. When I compare our touring statistics with say, my 2007 tour, we did about 2/3rds as much distance and about 1/3rd the amount of climbing, but in exchange we didn't have any days where we were stuck due to bad weather. Looking back at my trips over the years, I can see that better information technology in terms of smart phones and better weather forecasting models meant that we're much less likely to be stuck in one spot due to thunderstorms, and the corresponding value of not making reservations and being able to change directions at the drop of a hat have increased. Of course, I'm also more conservative when traveling with Bowen: there were many days when with an adult group I would have risked climbing into a storm where I demurred because kids are more prone to heat and cold stress.

When climbing big mountain passes with your 6-year old on the back of a tandem, it's tempting to think about how he's never out of breath no matter how steep the hills are, and think about how little work he's doing. But this is the wrong way to frame things: instead, think about how much time he's happy to share with you, and how much joy you're having from hearing him laugh and say the words, "This is just too pretty." In many cases, Bowen's asking for a break, or an early stop in the day led me to discover wonderful new stuff that I would normally overlook. Sure, in some ways, it's a preview in some ways of a future where I can no longer ride 100km with 3000m of elevation gain a day while carrying luggage, but it also showed me that a tour of the Alps is meaningful even if you're taking 2 days to climb the Stelvio. And of course, traveling with your child on the back of a tandem means that when you ask for help from a passing motorist or support van, there's no one who will have the heart to turn you down.

I was surprised that Bowen never asked for a Disney-world trip and would ask for cycling tours and sailing trips instead. But I shouldn't have been surprised: maybe the reason more kids don't ask for cycling tours and live-aboard sail trips is quite possibly because they've never had the option! It could very well be that kids who want to go to Disneyland do so because it's the most excitement and fun they've had in their parent-curated life. Jeff Rothschild once told me that the first time he took his family to a backroads cycling tour, at the end of the trip his children asked him, "Why did you wait so long before doing this?"

Executing an independent cycle tour is not for everyone. But there are many ways of touring (all covered in my book). Most of them are very cheap (Hint: Americans do cycle tours most expensively. The same tour sold by an European/UK operator is usually 50-75% discounted compared to the prices shown to Americans. In the case of certain expensive American tour companies, it could be as much as 90% off. With the internet available, there's never any need to pay American prices), so there's no reason you can't go on a bike trip with your family. And of course, now that e-bikes are common and easy to rent in Europe, even hills should no longer stop you.

Epilogue: Trains and Old friends

Buying the train tickets, I made a mistake, which was to buy a group ticket instead of a single day ticket for me and a single child ticket for Bowen. Not only did I end up paying more, it would make it much harder to sell the tickets later. My phone's slow internet made it tough to find the optimal train to take for easy train changes, but Thomas Bottinger, who owned 2 tandems with his wife and ridden all over Europe and the US, not only helped us figure out that we wanted to change in Pasing, but helped us carry the bike down and up and onto the train! He was going with us until Pasing, so we got a chance to chat. Europe is so much better about cycling culture than the US: he told me that when he dropped his children off to school by tandem, the other kids would swarm around and beg to ride that cool bike. Upon reflection, I can't ever remember that happening to me in the USA!

Once in the Munich Hilton, they graciously got out our bike and wheel boxes. I took apart the bike and stuck the frame into the big box and gave it back to them. This time, bystanders helped me pack, though even with help it still took me a good 90 minutes to get things into a state where I could stick things into the wheel case and move into the room to finish packing. By this time it was 5:00pm, and we did our shower and then went out to buy chocolate.

Alan Wissenberg and Daniel Vogelheim had agreed to meet us for dinner, but I pre-fed Bowen some airport sushi in case they were held up or the service was slow. It turned out though, that the Airport Biergarten, Airbrau, was itself a brewery! The beer on tap was excellent. Alan had train troubles getting in, but he was resourceful and found us.

We finished the night late, chatting late into the night, but we had plenty of time the next morning anyway, though I was glad I went to the airport early, as we got stuck in a broken-down elevator in between floors while getting to the United checkin counter!

Fortunately, Bowen stayed calm and in typical German fashion, it only took 20 minutes for the technicians to come and rescue us. After checking in, we waited for Manuel Klimek and his family so we could meet his baby.

The airport had no less than 4 passport controls between us and the gate, so we had to move at a good clip, though we stopped to buy some Kinder surprise eggs, chocolate that  was banned in the US because they were considered a choking hazard.

On the flight, Bowen fell asleep only in the last hour, so I ended up having to carry his backpack, my backpack, our carryon, and him on my shoulders on our way to passport control. One flight attendant saw me and said: "You must be the best dad in the world!" I smiled at her, not mentioning that this was far easier than the mountains we'd already climbed together in Europe.

Xiaoqin picked us up soon after we'd gotten out of the terminal, and I was soon driving home. After 3 weeks of not driving, American roads with way too many cars moving too fast felt strange, but I got used to it.

Next

July 3rd: Garmisch-Partenkirchen to Tutzing

We woke up to cloudy skies. I packed everything and then went downstairs to check on the bike. I was pleased that the front tire was not flat. We had a big breakfast, and then when we checked out the owner told us that she needed cash, as she had no way to take credit card payments. We rode out to downtown but uncharacteristically, it took us 2 tries to find an ATM that worked!

We turned on our GPS navigator and started riding. We felt a rain drop here and there, but overall, it didn't look like thunderstorm weather. We used Google Maps routing on the Wahoo this time, and while it was mostly OK, there were times when its idea of a bike path was questionable:

This was somewhat familiar country to me, since it was close to Munich and I'd spent a good several months riding in the Bavarian country side every weekend: hills, river side dirt paths, and lots of towns with Onion domed churches. In Murnau, I found the bike feeling heavy and asked Bowen to check the back tire. "It's not flat," he said. I looked down and found that it was the front tire that was flat. Of course, the flat had to occur on a busy road with no shade right after we'd escaped all threat of rain. We pulled off to the sidewalk, I pulled out the front tire's tube but the hole was so small that I couldn't find it, and the road was so noisy that no matter how hard I listened I couldn't hear the hiss of air escaping the tube. I examined the tire but couldn't find a hole or foreign object stuck in it, so I shrugged and put in the other tube.

After that, the road started climbing steadily. The climb was fairly straightforward, taking us through forest lands and nicely enough, taking us away from main roads. In the small town of Habash, we stopped to eat the snacks we'd brought, trying to finish what was left of the power gels that we'd carried all throughout our tour so far. It turned out that the descent into Starnberg lake happened soon after.

The cloudy weather had caught up with us again, but now that the end was in sight, we knew we'd make the deadline no matter what. The bike path took us along the lake on dirt roads that slowly got smaller and smaller until we finally got to a single-track.

Once we got past the Tutzing city limit signs however, it didn't take 3 minutes of riding before we found the train station sign pointing us uphill. Since we didn't depart Tutzing via the bike path, it took a while for me to find the area familiar, but soon I saw the little square where we'd started from so many days ago. We stopped and bought snacks for the train, and then looked for the train ticket machines. Our tour was over.

Next

July 2nd: Zugspitze

After breakfast, I walked outside to put our borrowed backpack on the bike and then realized that we had a flat on the front tire. I took the front wheel off, examined the inner-tube, and found that a patch had failed. My frustration was compounded when the brand-new-in-box Vavert inner tube that we had carted up and down the alps in the pannier had a flat in the seam! In disgust, I threw away the tube, and made a note never to buy those inner tubes again. I had another pre-patched tube ready to go, so I put that in the tire and repatched the older tube.

After the entire process was over, we went downtown to buy sandwiches for the trip, and also hydro-cortisone, because Bowen was complaining of itchiness, possibly due to some insect bites from the hiking yesterday. Google Maps showed a 300m climb in 10km or so, but the ride to Grainau yesterday had very little climbing, so I guessed it had to be a pretty steep climb at the end. Indeed, I was right. The last 3km went up 10-12% grade, made much worse by the bike path which turned out to be unpaved. We ended up having to walk the last little bit. As we climbed, we observed that the car traffic wasn't that bad, and we should have just stuck with the main road and ignore the bike path signs.

The cable car up to the top of Zugspitz is a relatively new entry, only having been completed in the last year. In fact, they were still building out the top. While the older train took a good 90 minutes to get to the top, the cable car only took 15 minutes. We brought warm clothing, since the altitude at the top was 2900m, taller than even the top of Stelvio pass!

While it was sunny and warm at the bottom (near Elbsee), it was a partly cloudy, which meant that the fog would sweep in and out. This was fine, as we had plenty of time to out-wait the clouds, which were moving fast. At the top station, there's several walkways, one of which took you to the Austrian side of the mountain, so we did managed to get in one last border crossing:

The ticket also gave you a free ride down to the glacier area, which is a ski resort in winter. In fact, there was a snowfield big enough for kids to go sledding on (with a rental charge for the sleds), but it didn't look fun enough to Bowen for him to try.

Bowen got to spend some time playing in the snow. Since this was effectively a rest day after yesterday's massive effort, we took our time walking around and admiring the scenery, after which we took the cable car back to the summit restaurant, found a spot to watch the clouds move, and ate our sandwiches.

Back down at the Elbsee, it was warm and we rode to the lake side, but Bowen decided against riding around the lake. I settled for talking him into taking a picture with me and then we rode back to Garmisch, where once again we had ice cream.

After that, I talked Bowen into letting me take him to the Garmisch swimming pool, since our guest house had given us passes that let us in for free. He was reluctant, because he was still sore from yesterday, but I told him he'd have fun there, and we'd leave quickly if it wasn't. Well, all mentions of soreness disappeared when he saw the giant-sized water slide in the pool and took a ride. This was a 3 story ride, which meant that for every one of his 20 runs on that slide, he climbed 3 flights of stairs. Clearly, the soreness doesn't mean anything when there's a water slide involved! Of course, by the time we got back and got showered and laundered, he was once again too sore to walk to dinner. This time, I took him to the Asian buffet. The sushi was terrible, but he hadn't had any for 3 weeks, so he went at it like it was going out of style. I looked at the forecast, and it called for thunderstorms in Garmisch the next day, but it would be sunny in Munich. What that meant was that we needed to head North as early and quickly as possible in the morning. I suggested going to Wolfrathausen, which I was familiar with and knew the ice cream shop. It was a little longer but had less climbing. Bowen wanted to return to Tutzing so he could complete a loop, even though we'd already broken the loop by taking all those train transfers. After much thinking, I decided Bowen was right: the route to Tutzing paralleled the main train line, which meant that if we got into trouble or ran late, we could catch the train directly to Munich. The main constraint was that we had to get to the airport by 4:00pm, after which the S-Bahn wouldn't allow bikes in the cars. The Woflrathausen route had no such fallback. I plotted both routes on Komoot just in case. Of course, if it really did pour after breakfast, we could just roll into the train station and hop onto the easy train to Munich.
Next

July 1st: Hollental Klamm

After breakfast, we packed our rain gear into the backpack so kindly loaned to us by the owner of Guesthouse Nicole, got on the bike and rode my pre-programmed route to Grainau, where the trailhead for the Hollentalklamm was to begin. The day was partly cloudy, and it felt warm, but I anticipated it being wet in the gorge. We rode past the parking lot and onto the trail, past the restaurant. It being a Sunday, there was a steady stream of hikers going from the parking lot to the trailhead, and once on the trail, there was also a continuous stream of hikers. Maybe the people density wasn't as dense as what I continuously saw during our Japan trip, but it was at least 20-40% of what we saw then. There were so many people continually coming up or down the trail that during the hike, it was a major problem to find a place to pee! The flip-side of this was that you saw all shapes and sizes on the trail, including several elderly folks who had hiking sticks.

We eventually got to a point where it was impossible to ride the bike any further, there being a series of steps up the trail. We got off the bike and locked it, changed Bowen into hiking sandals and then started hiking up. Right past the steps there was a clearing and a dirt road led off to one side. We would later figure out that it was a road used by cars to deliver supplies to the Hollentalanger Hut, the mountain hotel/hut/restaurant up the hill.

The initial part of the hike went through the forests and was easy walking, mostly featuring a stream next to it, no doubt fed by the gorge above. We then arrived at a cable car station, but the cable looked like wires: too small for human carriage, and we would later understand that it was used to ferry supplies up to the hut. (Supplies too big to fit in the cable car were dropped by helicopter) Past this point, the trail got more rugged, once again featuring steps and stairs, but still very easy going. When we got to the Klamm, I paid my entry fee, and Bowen was free because he was 6 years old. He was very unhappy not needing a ticket.

Gorge hikes are somewhat unique to Europe. At least, I've never seen them as frequently as I see them in the Alps, where it seems that every gorge has been engineered for hikers to visit (and pay a fee to do so). It's hard to describe, but fortunately I shot several videos. You get to walk along a walkway, with water running underneath, and in some cases above you, with the spray of water. The closest you can get in the San Francisco Bay Area would be to hike the Steep Ravine trail in the winter in the middle of a rainstorm, something I've done and consider very fun. But even that wouldn't describe the scale and the sound of water rushing through like a jet-engine. Of course, the trade off is that if you were to do the Steep Ravine trail in a rainstorm in winter, you're likely to get a wilderness experience and get the place to yourself. In Hollentalklamm on a weekend in Germany, you're just going to get lots of people in your pictures, and be continually negotiating with people going the other way, or moving over to let faster hikers overtake you and your Bowen.

The initial part of the gorge was dry, but pretty soon, I found a landing and got out the rain gear and put it on Bowen, and put on my rain pants and rain jacket myself, the only time I would do so on the entire trip. (I'm not complaining: it's great to have a bike tour in Europe where I'm not constantly putting on rain gear!!) Bowen did what every 6-year old does when confronted with water while wearing rain gear. He put it to the test by deliberately standing under waterfalls, stepping into puddles (he was wearing sandals and so got his wool socks very wet, though they stayed warm)

Once out of the hike, the scenery opened up, and we got to see some mountains! I then made the mistake of asking a German hiker an improperly worded question. I asked if the hike was a loop or an out-and-back. She said, "Yes, there are ways to make it a round trip." I didn't pay attention to her odd phrasing. What I should have realized was that I needed to ask a follow-up question: "How do I make a loop out of this hike?" As it was, I just followed other hikers up the mountain until we got to Hollentalanger hut. There, we ordered lunch and ate it, and I saw another family I'd seen earlier, and asked them which way to go to complete the loop? The answer: "Hike back down!"

It turned out that the loop fork was way down back near the exit of the Hollental Klamm! We got to the fork and turned off, since there was what looked like a mountain cave along the stairs, but that turned out to be a disappointment. Then some hikers told us that this was the loop, and that it would take 20 minutes longer. Bowen decided that it was a good idea to see something new, rather than retracing our steps, so we went on it.

The alternate path was gorgeous, granting us beautiful views of the mountains from high above the gorge, but of course, that meant that we had to do quite a bit more climbing, and for Bowen at least, it was much more than 20 minutes longer. I started to worry that we had been mis-led, but then the trail suddenly took a dive down to a bridge that crossed back over the gorge: we could see the gorge below, and then we realized that we had seen a fork off before the entry to the Hollentalklamm, so I became less worried. At which point Bowen said he need to go to the bathroom. I quickly borrowed some tissue paper from another hiker, but we couldn't find a place that wasn't exposed. Fortunately, the need passed.

By the time we got back to the bike, my GPS had said 12 miles of hiking. Even if I'd carried Bowen for 2 of those miles, that was a lot of hiking for a little kid. There was no question that we were not going to make the Zugspitz that day. We rode down the path, and now I was grateful that I was persistent about riding up as high as I could: downhills are way easier on a bike than on foot, and I was skilled enough to handle the mild-off roading this involved.

We rode back to Garmish and got an ice cream each downtown. Bowen wasn't done with his lessons for the day, though! When he ordered the ice cream and the server gave him a cup with a cookie, he asked: "Why do I get a cookie?" At which point she assumed that he didn't like the cookie, picked it off his cup and threw it away, and gave him a windmill instead! He was quite upset about it. I had to explain that when someone gives you what you want, the best thing to do is to say "Thank you," and shut up. There's no way for the situation to improve by talking. I'm not sure if he fully understood what I said, but at least he enjoyed the windmill a little bit.

My tough little guy was now too sore to walk to dinner, so after our shower and laundry routine, I rode the bike to a nearby restaurant and we didn't have to do any more extra walking. I promised him that tomorrow would be an easy day, mostly cable car rides.

Next

June 30th: Lindau to Garmisch Partenkirchen

The whole point of making it to Lindau was to make use of the Bayern ticket. With the ticket, you can travel all throughout Bavaria using as many local trains as you like, all day. The catch is that you must use the local trains, and unless it's a weekend, you can only use the train after 9:00am. Well, it was a weekend, but the train from Lindau to Garmisch didn't leave until 10:00am, so we had time to leave the hotel at 9:06, take pictures and say farewell to the Bodensee, screw up and go the wrong way and still make it to the train station with plenty of time to buy train tickets.

The first of the trains we needed to take was an Alex train. It had narrow corridors and was a massive pain to get a tandem on, but once you're in, you get these massive private compartments where the two of you can spread out and lounge around in.

Surprisingly enough, the train from Lindau to Garmisch-Partenkirchen did not go through Munich, as I would have expected, but switches in Kempton for a train to Reutte (which is in Austria), and from Reutte we had to take the train to Garmisch. Being German, the train schedule was setup so that we never  had to switch platforms for a transfer. We could just stay on the same platform and either switch sides or get on the next train that arrived on that platform. Because getting off at Kempton was a pain, I enlisted the help of other cyclists to assist with the transfer. The nice thing about the bike car being so big was that nearly everyone in the car was a cyclist and hence eager to help!

Once on the Reutte train, we got to see some Austrian scenery, which reminded me once again that I had yet to explore the part of Bavaria that connected Kempton/Lindau to Reutte. From the window, it looked gorgeous, and I guess I should have considered riding instead of taking the train, but what was done was done.

Local trains are slow. By the time we got to Garmisch, it was nearly 2:00pm. But the train we were on from Reutte was going to link up with another train to get to Munich, and we got to watch that and even capture it on video!

After watching that, we got off the train station, found a supermarket, and then found a little city park nook to picnic in. It was gorgeous, with a stream running through it, and a place you could sit and dip your feet into the water! The bread was also delicious.

We checked into the guesthouse, and I asked the owner about Partnach Klamm, and she said that it was closed because of high water, but I could check at the ski center for further details. I was disappointed, but we figured we had nothing to lose, it being too late in the day to do anything else, so we rode out there after leaving all our luggage at the guesthouse.

Indeed, we were told that the Partnachklamm was closed, but the Hollentalklamm, which I hadn't been, was still open. The tourist information person gave me a map, and when I looked at it, I said, "Oh, it looks like we can do both Hollentalklamm and the Zugspitze in the same day. Can we ride up to the Klamm?" She said she thought it might be possible, but didn't provide more details. Well, our trip wasn't wasted: we stopped by a supermarket to  buy some shampoo/body wash, and then on the way back downtown we saw that everyone was wearing white!

When we went to dinner, our waitress told us that tonight was "White Night", apparently a huge party and an excuse to listen to music/DJ and dance. Our waitress also confirmed that it had actually been raining hard in the afternoons over the last few days in Garmisch, indicating that we weren't being lied to about rain in the mountains. Back in town, we stuck out like sore thumbs, not having  brought anything white to wear.

Next

June 29th: Chur to Lindau

Hoping to avoid as much of the headwind as possible, we ate the 6:30am breakfast and got on the road at 7:50am. That early in the morning, the bike path was pretty and we even found a zipline pretty early!

Bowen complained that we weren't doing sufficient climbing, but I told him that this was where all the ziplines were. Also, that if we got to Lindau (which wasn't required), we'd traverse 4 countries today, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria, and Germany! That got him to perk up, which was good, because otherwise, there's actually very little to recommend this ride. I've done it far too often, and usually it's in circumstances like this: escaping from the mountains into the low lands in anticipation of poor weather.

At the intersection with Landquart, I saw the sign for the climb up to Davos for access to the Fluela pass: it would climb 800m over the next 34km, very gently. But Fluela was out of the question (and if anything, the descent down to Landeck from Zernez would have even more headwind), so we kept going down river until near the border with Liechtenstein the Rhine river opened up and granted us what would be the same scene for the next 50km.

The nature of the Rhine river bike path is that it's pretty for the first 10 minutes and boring for the rest of it, especially in the direction of the headwind. At the Liechtenstein border, we switched sides of the river so that Bowen could say he'd traversed the country.

We tried detouring into Liechtenstein to try to get our passports stamped, but somehow missed all the signs to the tourist information office. I was under the mistaken impression that the post office could do it as well, but no, only the tourist information could stamp our passports. We gave up and kept going down river, against an increasing headwind, which bogged us down to a speed around 10mph.

At the border with Austria, we found another zipline playground, which Bowen thought was a lot of fun.

While Bowen played on the zipline I tried looking for hotels in the direction where we were going. Since our goal was the Lindau train station the next day, we could potentially stay in either Switzerland, Austria, or Germany and still be well within striking distance of the train station. Switzerland was so expensive it wasn't even in consideration. To my surprise, Bregenz was also really expensive, so that left Lindau, which wasn't much cheaper, it being a Friday night. We ended up at the Best Western in Lindau, mostly because it had AC and had really good reviews that claimed that it was nothing like any other Best Western you'd stayed at.

By the time we were at the Bodensee, Bowen was thoroughly bored, and didn't even want to take a picture. We rode through Bregenz, and saw a zipline playground, but it had as many as 5-6 kids sharing the zipline, and Bowen decided that wasn't even worth getting off the bike for. The headwind had died down by now, but we both had 70 miles in the saddle and just wanted off the bike, so we beelined straight for the hotel, stopping only to take a picture with the Bavarian coat of arms when we entered Germany.

The hotel wasn't very far from the border, in fact, and it was in a part of the neighborhood that didn't have access to the little island of Lindau. In fact, when we asked about places we could walk to for dinner, it was a 15 minute walk to anything except the McDonald's, which was practically next door. The number one rated restaurant in Lindau happened to be one of those, though, so we showered and walked over only to discover that the place was fully booked for the night, and even though no one had showed up for dinner yet they were not going to seat us, no matter how quickly we said we could be in and out.

We ended up at Restaurant Meblo's for dinner instead, which was attached to Hotel Nagel and served gourmet burgers. The hotel looked very well appointed and had a crystal clear swimming pool. If we'd known we would have stayed there instead, but perhaps it was already all booked on a Friday. This experience made me realize that I should look again at hotels in the Salzburger Lakes and Garmisch since tomorrow was a Saturday, and if we were going to stay at the Salzburg Lakes we'd have to ride from the Salzburg train station, and you do not want to arrive on a Saturday without a prior reservation.

The Salzburg Lakes proved to be surprisingly expensive. I double checked the weather, and the forecast was for it to start raining in the afternoon the next day, which would be exactly when we'd get out of the train station and would have to start to ride. Garmisch, however, turned up a guest house that would put us up for 3 nights for about 90 Euros a night, and had the benefit that a return to Munich was easily accomplished from there. I discussed it with Bowen and his preference was to stay in Germany anyway (for whatever reason he didn't like Austria except for Hahntennejoch and Landeck), so I booked the guest house in Garmisch. I remembered spending an off-site with Google Munich 10 years ago there, with a combination day hike with gorge walk and then a river rafting trip that was fun, so I knew there ought to be enough to occupy us for 3 days. And even if not, we could easily do day rides from the area!

Next