Slow Up ride around Lake Morat, Switzerland

Sunday Morning we set of early to participate in the SlowUp bike ride around Lake Morat, about 20 miles around. We did this last year, but since I was 5 months pregnant we didn't go the whole way. Our goal this year was to cycle the whole way around.

Payton rode his bike for the first 3 km and then Stanton got to test out our new "tag-a-long" bike tow. It worked very well and we were able to go much faster this way. I pulled Parker in the buggy, along with our lunches and gear. The day was a little bit overcast, which made the ride nice and comfortable. (Last year we all got sunburnt.)

The roads are closed to road traffic, but there are thousands of bikers, rollerbladers, and the occasional person on a kick scooter. The road would get very congested as we passed through the small towns. Most of the time it was easier just to walk our bikes through the crowds. There were food vendors and entertainment set up in each town, but we had packed our own picnic.

About 6 miles or so into the ride I spotted Lucas (Editor's note: actually is was 9.7 miles), the son of our friends the Marchiondo's. He had become separated from his family. Thank goodness for cell phones as I was able to call them and let them know we had Lucas. They were ahead of us so he continued along with us. We met up with his family at the very end.

A little more than half way through I spotted a nice area with a jumping balloon for kids so we pulled over and enjoyed our lunch. (Editor's note: actually it was 14.2 miles into the ride or the 70% mark.) Payton got his exercise jumping around while we ate. Here also was the biggest chicken rotisserie I ever saw.

We finished the ride quite easily. Payton actually did pedal a good deal while he was being towed and occasionally it was actually helpful to Stanton. Lucas was reunited with his parents. We were tired, but in pretty good shape considering we hadn't done much biking yet this year. After Stanton got our bikes packed up on the car we sat down for a nice cold beer at a cafe across from our parked car.

Unfortunately we forgot our camera this time around and I forgot that I could take pics with my cell phone - oops. (Editor's note: except for the picture below all pictures were borrowed from the SlowUp website.)

(Editor's note: We rode 32.9 km (20.4 mi) in 4 hrs 15 min. Our moving time was actually 2 hrs 45 min and we were stopped for 1 hr 30 min. Our top speed was 31.6 kph (19.6 mph). Our moving average speed was 11.9 kph (7.4 mph) and our overall average speed was 7.7 kph (4.8 mph). We rode over an area of 16.4 sq. miles. How's that for detail? I had a GPS mounted on my bike.)