Bike trilogy part III - A double

After our climb to St Bernard pass, Maciej and I looked seriously into the list of highest Alpine passes. St Bernard (2469m) was third highest in Switzerland. Remaining two are Nufenenpass (2478m) and Umbrailpass (2501m) (with bonus Stelviopass (2757m) part in Italy). Thus, the plan was clear -- we need to beat these two (three). As a part of this plan, we decided to do a grand triple Nufenen, Gotthard & Furka. However this was very ambitious and it was estimated to be a two-day ride which was fine except for the fact that there was nowhere to sleep (for a reasonable price). Thus, we decided that just two of them must do. The best option was Nufenen & Gotthard as this left a potential for Furka&Grimsel next time.

Therefore, on Tuesday (just two days after my Jura trip with Daniel), we take a train to Ulrichen and started a twelve kilometers long ascent to Nufenenpass with the stop at Griessee dam. We enjoyed views to Griesgletcher and then continued last two hundreds of meters of ascent to Nufenenpass.

Descent from Nufenenpass to Airolo was quite long (and on quite terrible road, welcome to Italian canton). In fact, it is so long (25km) that it was obvious we have chosen a correct side for climbing as the other way would take forever as we are quite slow even on very small slopes. This way, Airolo welcomed us with just small pedaling at the end (and most notably some road constructions with annoying traffic lights).

After a lunch break at Airolo, we were ready for Gotthardpass. And here it was again obvious that our decision to take trip in this direction was quite good. Quite unexpectedly, the asphalt route turned into an old stone-paved road which was quite pleasant (definitely not so boring as asphalt). Moreover, as this road was not built with speed in the mind, there were a lot of cute little hairpins and near the top we even met an coach with tourists. And then it was time for another set of pass-pictures.

But we did not stop at Gotthardpass. That would mean missing views to two dams -- the first was Lago della Sella with incredibly blue water. In fact, it was so blue that I had an impression that I am near the sea and not 2256 meters above. The second one was Lago di Lucendro but it was getting late and cloudy so we just did a quick climb without really going all the possible way around. And that was it, the rest of the trip was just a quick descent to Hospental where we took our train back.

You can enjoy photos here.