Should We (Over)Stay or Should We Go?

With time dwindling down on our 90-day Schengen visa, the title of this post was a frequent topic of conversation. The Schengen Borders Agreement permits citizens from certain countries, including the US, to travel freely within the 27 member countries for up to 90 days every 180 days. That being said, we had heard stories of people who overstayed their visas and had no issues. In fact, the man who runs the company that shipped our motorcycles told us that in his 20 years of owning the business, he had never heard of anyone having issues overstaying and even encouraged us to do so. While we're not typically ones to break international laws, the idea of not having to rush through parts of this once-in-a-lifetime trip was very appealing. However, we had also read stories of people who overstayed and had to deal with the consequences (typically large fines and issues re-entering the EU). With three weeks left and still so much to see, we left Andermatt, Switzerland undecided about what we should do.

Let me preface the rest of this post by saying our time in the Alps and the Dolomites involved riding A LOT of gorgeous passes, combining two of our favorite things - motorcycles and epic views. I realize to most other people the names of the passes do not mean much, but I have included them for my own memory. These regions in Europe are so dense with beauty and insanely good riding that I couldn’t possibly describe it all, so I will let the pictures speak for themselves.

We started the morning off by riding up the Splügen pass.

We then popped over to Italy for lunch before crossing back into Switzerland to ride up the beautiful Maloja pass.

While passing through St. Moritz, a luxury alpine resort town that has hosted the winter Olympics twice, a gust of wind managed to somehow blow my windshield right off my bike. We are still unsure exactly how this happened, but I am very glad it happened here and not on a busy multi-lane highway.

After reattaching my windshield with some always handy zip ties, we continued down the road, going up Albula Pass and Bernina Pass, before crossing back over the border to a campground in Livigno, Italy.

The next day, we left our luggage at our campsite and set off on a route that would include the highly anticipated Stelvio Pass. The Stelvio Pass is often described as one of the most scenic drives in the world, and with 48 steep hairpin turns on its northeastern face alone, we were anxious to see if it lived up to the hype. After riding up Ofenpass and Umbrail Pass, we arrived at the top of Stelvio. The top of the pass was an experience in and of itself as we were surrounded by hundreds of bikers, cyclists, and other motorists passing through, chatting, or grabbing one of the famous hot dogs, a Stelvio tradition.

After taking in the view from the top, we set off down the road for a fun, but chaotic and intense 45 mins of riding. The steep and technical hairpin turns were made all the more interesting by the combination of other riders, cyclists, cars, and even public buses going in both directions on the narrow winding road. Below are a few stills from the GoPro video I took, but even they do not adequately depict the adrenaline that this road induces, especially on a busy Saturday afternoon. After arriving at the bottom, we turned around and rode back up to the top of the pass.

We continued on to ride Gavia Pass and the super narrow and gorgeous Mortirolo Pass before heading back to our campsite after a truly epic day of riding.

The following morning we left our campsite in Livigno and attempted to ride up the tamer side of Stelvio one more time, but it was closed for a bike race until 2 p.m. Happy we had already ridden the pass the previous day, we backtracked a little and crossed the border into Switzerland to ride up the Flüela Pass before making our way over the border into Austria.

We admired the lush, green rolling hills as Brian was forced to listen to me sing the Sound of Music over our comms. The summer heat was starting to catch up with us, so we happily paid the toll to take the gorgeous Silvretta-Hochalpenstraße pass into Tyrol. This small stretch of road was by far my favorite in Austria.

Once over the pass, we arrived at our hotel in the small town of Partenen. The hotel we stayed in has a lot of character and has been owned by the same family for generations. After chatting with one of the owners and chuckling at some of the photos and family portraits on the walls (see below), we met two other riders, Peter and Yanik, and spent the evening chatting with them.

The next day’s route took us through the Montafon Valley and Lech Valley. The slow traffic and scorching heat detracted from the ride, but the scenery was beautiful. We made a detour over the border into Füssen, Germany to check out the castle that apparently inspired the Disney castle, but after snapping a few photos over the crowds of tourists we decided to skip the tour and pressed on to Innsbruck.

After checking into our hotel, we took the bus into Innsbruck to have dinner and explore the charming city.

We would have loved to spend more time in Innsbruck, but we decided to continue on so we would have time to spend a few days relaxing at our next destination: Riva del Garda, Italy. On our way to Riva del Garda, we rode up the famous Timmelsjoch Pass and Jaufen Pass, before taking a long, hectic, and hot stretch of highway most of the way to our hotel. After taking off our sweaty motorcycle gear, we quickly headed down to the water to cool off and take in the truly magical view of Lake Garda and the surrounding mountainside.

After seeing this view, we went ahead and extended our hotel stay an extra night. We spent the next two days relaxing by the lake, working out, doing laundry, exploring the city by bicycle, and witnessing two of the craziest lightning and hail storms we have ever seen.

All too soon, it was time to leave. We rode south along the lake for a while, stopping to take in the view, before heading back up north.

Our departure from Riva del Garda was bittersweet as we continued north and entered the Dolomites! The roads and vistas leading into the town of Cortina d’Ampezzo were spectacular. We arrived at our campsite just outside of town, set up our tent, and made friends with an Italian man named Matteo who gave us loads of advice on the hiking trails in the area.

The following morning we woke up early to get a spot near the trailhead for the most popular hike in the region which traverses around the Tre Cime di Lavaredo (three striking granite towers that are an iconic view in the Dolomites). Unsurprisingly, the trail was packed with people, but it was relatively wide in most places and we still found the hike to be well worth it for the views. The weather could not have been more perfect as there was not a cloud in the sky and the shade of blue over the mountains transformed with the shifting sun.

After finishing the Tre Cime hike, we did another shorter trail in the opposite direction from the parking lot called the Cadini di Misurina. The views of these jagged peaks were equally stunning.

After a successful day of hiking, we rode back to our campsite for a quick shower before heading into town for dinner.

The next morning, we awoke early again to tackle two more hikes. The first hike was recommended by our campsite friend Matteo who told us the Croda da Lago circuit is much less-traveled. It was refreshing to have the trail to ourselves at times as we wound our way up the mountain and through a fun scramble section to the top of the peak before making our way down the other side.

After getting back to the bikes, we rode to the start of our next hike. Having already done quite a bit of elevation gain for the day, we opted to take the chairlift to the start of the Cinque Torri hike. Part of the Cinque Torri hike is an open-air museum with restored trenches and fortified positions built by the Italian military during WWI. It was super interesting to walk through the trenches and gain some historical context as we made our way along the trail. Unfortunately, we only had an hour to explore before we had to catch the last chairlift down, but we managed to complete a good portion of the trail.

The following day we rode to the base of Mount Marmolada and took a series of cable cars up to see the Marmolada Glacier. During WWI, the front line between the Austrian and Italian forces ran over Marmolada, and Austrian soldiers built quarters in glacier tunnels forming an "ice city" in the glacier. We spent some time taking in the beautiful view at the top and visiting the WWI museum that highlighted what war was like at 10,000 ft and the brutal conditions that the soldiers had to survive.

After the glacier, we continued on to ride a large loop of some fantastic winding roads, which included Giau Pass, and took us through Val Gardena on our way back to Cortina.

With so many roads and places still to explore, we spent the next day riding a northern loop through the Dolomites. We started with a visit to another well-done WWI museum and then continued on to Würzjoch Pass, stopping for lunch at the top of the pass. While riding over one of the last passes on our way back to camp, a crazy storm rolled in unexpectedly. We quickly took shelter in the refugio at the top and we are very glad that we did. The wind was so crazy that it actually knocked Brian’s bike over! Once the worst of the storm passed, we rode the last hour back to our very soggy campsite.

The next morning, we packed up our tent and said goodbye to Italy as we crossed the border back into Austria. We had planned to ride the Staller Saddle, which forms the border between Italy and Austria, but a crazy rain storm and a suspected wheel bearing issue with my bike caused us to turn around. Fortunately, we determined the issue with my bike was just poor chain maintenance (we had been admittedly lazy when it came to lubricating our chains), and once the rain let up we were able to continue riding up Austria’s highest mountain, the Grossglockner. Although the weather wasn’t ideal, we were still able to appreciate the incredible views. We also had one of our funniest animal encounters as we came across a fox with over 6 hotdogs stuffed in its mouth just strutting down the street (the photos are stills from the comical GoPro video).

After all of the rain, we were welcomed into the small town of Villach, Austria with a rainbow.

We spent the next morning riding around to the various motorcycle shops in town looking for a long list of items we wanted to get before moving on to countries where sourcing parts would become more difficult. Mostly successful in our quest, we continued on and crossed the border into Slovenia. We rode the famous Vršič pass over and back before riding along the beautiful Soča River and into the Soča Valley. We made a detour to visit the gorgeous Lake Bled, before ending the day at a hotel in the capital city Ljubljana.

The following day we rode the bus downtown to explore the old town and eat some delicious Slovenian food.

We also spent some time calling local motorcycle shops. While in the city, we were hoping to get some maintenance done on the bikes, but as is often the case, it was almost the weekend and no shops could get us in until the following Monday. With the time on our Schengen visa rapidly depleting, we decided to take advantage of the weekend and do an overnight trip to the island of Cres in Croatia. So the next morning we set off along the Slovenian coast, stopping in Piran for lunch, before crossing the border into Croatia. We stopped at a few idyllic coastal Croatian towns as we made our way down the Istrian Peninsula, before taking a ferry across to Cres Island.

We arrived at our hotel just as the sun was setting. The next day we explored the length of this beautiful island. The hot and humid weather gave us a great excuse to pull over and jump in the water before catching the ferry back to the mainland and riding back over the border to Ljubljana.

The next day we took Brian’s bike to a guy who specializes in Triumphs and came highly recommended. Marko and his wife Natalija were so incredibly helpful and friendly and we cannot recommend Jerman Moto Center enough! We did not have as great of an experience at a different shop where we took my bike, but both bikes had major services completed and were looking good to go. While chatting with Marko before leaving his shop, he casually mentioned his family also owns a welding business that specializes in aluminum. Brian and I instantly looked at each other and laughed. One of the major issues with my bike (that I have yet to mention in this blog) was a crack in the engine mount that occurred when Brian was fixing an issue caused by the previous owner of my bike mounting crash bars with an aftermarket bolt. The crack happened right before we had to ship the bikes to Germany and we had spent the first month and a half of our trip trying to find an aluminum welder to fix it. We had given up hope (and read plenty of accounts of people who rode with multiple engine bolts missing without issue) until we met Marko. Marko comes from a family of motorcycle racers, most notably his brother Igor Jerman who competed in over 100 world superbike races and won the Les Mans 24-hour race twice. Marko is a competitive racer himself, and he and his family have a lot of experience keeping bikes going and fixing them fast. He was the perfect person to do the job so we decided to extend our stay in Ljubljana an extra day.

With just three days left on our visa, we headed for the border back into Croatia. Unfortunately (for us), Croatia joined the Schengen country list in 2023, so if we wanted to stay legal, we would have to cross the border into Bosnia and Herzegovina by then. We vacillated frequently on what we thought we should do, but ultimately decided that since our plan is to leave the bikes in Europe so we can return for short trips in the future, we did not want to risk any red flags on our passports or issues re-entering. We rode through the Slovenian countryside and over a rarely used pass into Croatia. We ended the day at a hotel just outside of Plitvice Lakes National Park.

Plitvice Lakes National Park is Croatia’s oldest and largest national park. It is known for a chain of 16 terraced lakes joined by waterfalls that extend into a limestone canyon. It is a very popular tourist attraction and can get extremely busy in the summer months, so we booked a 7 a.m. entry ticket to try and avoid the crowds. There were still a lot of people on the narrow boardwalks, but the views of the bright blue and emerald lakes were breathtaking.

As the afternoon wore on, the crowds continued to thicken, validating our early entry choice. We left the park and headed for a very different experience. Brian had read online about the abandoned Željava Air Base, which was the largest underground military air base in the former Yugoslavia, and one of the largest in Europe. During the collapse of Yugoslavia, the base was intentionally destroyed and left to decay. Today it’s one of the best places in the Balkans for fans of urban exploration. We rode our motorcycles a couple hundred meters into the eerie, dark tunnel, before donning our headlamps and exploring on foot. We weren’t completely alone in our exploration (thankfully), but it was a surreal feeling turning our headlamps off and being engulfed by complete darkness. We made our way to the central command station before opting to turn around and re-enter the sunshine.

The airbase also has a couple of abandoned planes, and we visited one of them before riding three hours along the gorgeous coastal road to Starigrad.

The following day was the last day of our visa, so we took the highway to Split before continuing along more of the gorgeous Croatian coastline. We stopped for lunch in the town of Omiš and then combated the afternoon heat with a dip in the ocean. Although the famous city of Dubrovnik was nearby, we decided a super hot day during the height of tourist season would probably not be the best experience, so we headed for the Metković border crossing into Bosnia and Herzegovina!

After a super fast and trouble-free border crossing, we ended our day in the picturesque and historically complex city of Mostar - but more to come on that in the next post!

Cheers,

Brian and Erin