The East Riding is Yorkshire’s overlooked third. Largely flat, gentle farmland, it’s a Schubert song alongside the Wagnerian grandeur of the North Riding; a trowel compared with the colossal factories and mills of the West Riding. But it’s where I come from and I love it, and the small-scale, intimate dry valleys of the Wolds are among my favourite places in the world to cycle. No Wolds for me today, though, as I rode from York to Beverley, mostly offroad, as the second of my three ‘Yorkshire County Towns’ rides. It was the first serious outing for my new mountain bike – a bargain from Halford ..read more

Thanks to all that vertical work yesterday, we had the agreeable situation today of downhill all the way. Downhill from Susch to the border; downhill from the border to our accommodation target in Landeck, Austria. Along with thrilling scenery, sunny weather, light winds and a return to Austrian prices, it made for a very enjoyable day. Also, in contrast to the recent Denmark End to End which was compromised by injury, I finished this traverse with the conventional number of working feet. Cashing in all that height in the bank: East of Susch Our final Swiss breakfast was a standard budget-hote ..read more

After a day off yesterday, today’s challenge was the enjoyable ascent of Oberalppass, one of the few alpine cols to sport a lighthouse. Yes, it’s 230 miles from the nearest sea, at Genoa, but as you know the Swiss are very keen on safety. The climb starts here: Andermatt It was another lovely sunny day, with memories of earlier torrential rain a distant memory. Until I put on my trainers, which were still wet and smelly. The only way is up (As for our day off the bikes yesterday, we fancied a pizza at one point, but we were reluctant to pay Swiss prices, and had an Interrail at our disposal, w ..read more

Q: What name is given to a cyclable road that crosses a mountain saddle at high altitude? A: Pass! Yes, today it was down to real business: two of the four big passes between us and the End of the End to End, namely Grimselpass and Furkapass. After those will come Oberalppass and Albulapass, but our two ascents today add up to a mighty day of 3000m climb, or to put it in feet terms, far too many. Ripple effect: Lake Brienz, east of Interlaken But the good weather arrived at last: sun and blue skies all day. My sunhat was excavated from the damp abysses in my pannier, the sunscreen recovered fr ..read more

This is the first of three day-rides from York to each of Yorkshire’s three County Towns: Northallerton (North Riding), Wakefield (West Riding) and Beverley (East Riding). Because yes, historic Yorkshire is really three counties in one, with York at their hub – in them all yet in none of them, more a separate superior-feeling entity, like Cristiano Ronaldo with football teams. (→ See map of the route at bottom of this page.) I’ll be starting off from the Minster in each case, selecting the appropriate face to begin: West Side for Wakefield; East Side for Beverley; North Transept for Northaller ..read more

No progress on our End to End today, by design: we’re staying in Interlaken again tonight and did the Grosse Scheidegg loop, one of Switzerland’s best day rides. Central to its appeal is the middle eight miles over the 1960m / 6,440ft col between Schwarzhorn and Wetterhorn, which is car-, but not postbus- or horn-, free. When not under cloud, the views at the top are mindbending. Today it was under cloud. Minds remained unbent. Go away, clouds: Heading east out of Interlaken It was a grand day of cycling, though, with sunny spells and bright, decent weather almost all the time. Our clockwise c ..read more

A day short on miles (51), modest on elevation (3,600ft), but long on precipitation (6.5 cats and 4.3 dogs). Yes: rain had been forecast for the whole day, and for once the forecast was spot-on. Cross talk: Bridge in Fribourg Still, we at least kept positive, if not at all dry. My Ortlieb panniers, like me, are old, battered and leaky now, and they didn’t give much protection to my gear from the incessant heavy rain that seeped everywhere into them like right-wing xenophobia into social media. OK, so, the route. We followed Route 4 then Route 8, at first on pleasant, well-surfaced ribbons of t ..read more

UEFA, WTO, IOC: this French, western part of Switzerland is home to the HQs of various globally important abbreviations. Something, no doubt, to do with its stability, neutrality, and ability to satisfy expense accounts. Give me a ring: IOC HQ in Lausanne Yesterday we passed the Union of European Football Associations, sporting a giant football alerting us to the current Euros, and the World Trade Organisation, not sporting a giant dollar sign. Today we swung by the International Olympic Committee, right there in central Lausanne, sporting a mammoth set of rings, perhaps alluding to all those ..read more

We’re cycling across Switzerland, land of milk and money, from west to east. That is, from the French border, at the splendidly-named Chancy near Geneva, across its mountainscapes right across to where it meets Austria at Martina. We’ll have the chancy to use our French, German, Italian and Romansh, and to spend ten days and a lot of money in the neutral-lawful country that’s entirely surrounded by the EU but not in it. Will we have a good time riding in Switzerland? You can bank on it! And hide all your money in the process… Switzerland is that way: In France, heading towards the Swiss border ..read more

The last day, all the way from the Fourth City, or perhaps the Forth City, up to the farthest-flung strand, literally, of Denmark. But quite not all the way for me. Like a surgeon in a faulty lift, my left ankle was not operating at the right level. So I thought it best to leave the full-on cycling to Nigel, and for me to get the train most of the way before cycling the last 25 miles or so up to Denmark’s northernmost spur up at Skagen. Lots of this today It turned out to be a rather fabulous finish to the ride. I got the train as far as Kvissel and headed north, at first alongside one of thos ..read more