The Bear gears up and heads to the Dolomite for a five day Touring Centre tour out of Collalbro, run by Edelweiss Bike Travel, riding a 2024 Yamaha Tenere 700 Explore...
Edelweiss Centre Tour Dolomites. Motorcycle trips for me are about riding. That might seem a bit obvious, but it isn’t so for everyone. It wasn’t so for me once upon a time. Consider the six month Europe/North Africa tour that Mrs Bear and I did before we were married…
Mr and Mrs Bear toured Europe and North Africa on an XS1100 ‘Elephant’ back before quick-shifters and heated seats… Pic: Farmforce
That was about riding our borrowed Yamaha XS1100, sure – but it was also about the cultures we encountered, scenery, ability to deal with borders and getting to know each other. Lots of stuff to do apart from hitting that button and hitting the road.
Read Bear’s previous trips and columns here…
Today, when I go on bike tours, I meet people with all kinds of different motivations, too. There is, however, one kind of tour that attracts riders (including me) primarily for the riding, and that is Touring Centre trips run by Edelweiss Bike Travel. You stay at one hotel and head out for riding loops every day. This means that Edelweiss needs to find a place that has sufficient interesting loops to fill a week or whatever the length of the tour is.
“I was looking forward to nearly as many hairpins as in the Canaries”…
Fortunately that isn’t difficult in Europe and surrounds. I did one Touring Centre trip before this one, in the Canaries, and loved it. Out of bed, breakfast and a full day’s riding before making notes and dinner, a bit of bullshitting over drinks and then bed. What could possibly be not to like?
You stay at one hotel and head out for riding loops every day.
Which bike?
Well, as it turned out there was one thing, my choice of bike. I was on an Africa Twin, and the 21-inch front wheel made the many, many hairpins less than perfectly enjoyable. The Canary Islands except for Lanzarote are essentially hairpins set in the Atlantic Ocean, and the Honda was reluctant to turn in as nicely as I would have liked. No problem with the bike – it is intended more for off- rather than on-road, hence the wheel size. It was just the wrong tour for the bike (although in the end it wasn’t really all that important anyway).
The Bear booked a Yamaha T7 Explore for the trip, despite the 21in front wheel, he found it OK in the twisties.
When I booked Touring Centre Dolomites, then, I was looking forward to nearly as many hairpins as in the Canaries, and that meant I was caught in a bit of a dilemma. I have been familiarising myself with the 700 Yamaha Ténéré recently for a variety of reasons (stay tuned) and the T7 Explore that Edelweiss has on the fleet also has a 21-inch front hoop. I bit my tongue and booked one anyway; you’ll see how that worked out below.
Preparation
The planning of the tour demonstrates that Edelweiss knows what they’re doing. It starts on Monday and runs for five days, so you don’t encounter the heavy weekend traffic. It is based in Collalbo rather than the larger and more obvious Bolzano, which means that the moment you roll out of the hotel garage you’re on bike roads and you never need to deal with city traffic. You can also sit on the hotel terrace and look straight at one of the vertical faces of the Dolomites. That’s a wonderful experience in the evenings.
Five days, five tours although they are not necessarily done in this order. It’s worth considering the weather, and our grizzled and seriously experienced tour guide Harald did just that in the mornings. The first tour took us to the Sella, one of the most famous mountains in the Dolomites. We circled it on what is called the “Sella Ronda” which takes in four large passes. From one of the higher ones, the Passo Pordoi, you can take the cable car all the way up to the peak; Edelweiss’ brochure describes the view from up there as “extraterrestrial”. We didn’t go up because clouds were in the way.
Another day took us to the far east of the Dolomites. We managed to avoid the traffic of Cortina d’Ampezzo (another demonstration that Harald knew what he was doing). Instead, Harald took us over several great passes with good if not always perfect roads. The authorities know why riders and drivers come here, apart from the mountains, and keep the roads in good repair as much as they can. “Let’s see how well they’ve re-sealed this next stretch,” said Harald at one point. “They have to do it after winter every year.” The surface was good enough to not distract from some amazing (in the literal sense of the word) views.
You can sit on the hotel terrace and look straight at one of the vertical faces of the Dolomites.
Mind Blowing
The landscape is not the only thing that blows your mind in the Dolomites. I usually could not care less about cars, and the steady parade of insanely expensive Porsches and Lamborghinis we encountered impressed me very little, but at one of the lookout parking lots we came on a contingent from the Bentley Club of Italy which included two supercharged cars, a boat-tail and a polished alloy model. If cars can be beautiful… although I’d hate to have to pay for the maintenance.
“Harald took us over several great passes with good if not always perfect roads”…
The day to the mountains west of Bolzano took in peaks that are not as spectacular as the Dolomites themselves, but the roads are just as great if not better. They are also quieter with rather less traffic and less development. After looking around carefully, Harald suggested that the Mendola Pass could be considered “something like a racetrack”, even if “we never said that out loud”. Not only did you not say that, Harald, we didn’t hear you. The café at the top of the Mendola Pass is quite homey and was warm and crowded even with our small group.
“You can also sit on the hotel terrace and look straight at one of the vertical faces of the Dolomites. That’s a wonderful experience in the evenings”…
Another day took us back into the Dolomites for some photo opportunities northeast of Bolzano on narrow and less frequented but spectacular roads. Harald took us to a lakeside ice cream parlour just when we needed the refreshment. I’ll admit here that I prefer dairy-based ice cream to Italian gelato, but this stuff was really good.
I skipped the final organised day which included some Autostrada to save time for a visit to Riva on Lake Garda. I know Riva and its surroundings pretty well and wanted to spend as little time as possible on the Autostrada, so I took off on my own. It’s good the Edelweiss guides are happy for you to do this although they usually prefer at least two bikes to go off separately. Apart from admiring the puzzling earth pyramids, I just rode without a particular target and loved it. As I said at the beginning, it’s all about riding to me. Seeing the Dolomites really is special, though, and would be impressive for anyone.
But the mention of riding reminds me. The 21-inch front wheel on the Yamaha Ténéré 700 Explore didn’t bother me one bit. Possibly the corners are a little less tight in the Dolomites compared with the Canaries, but I doubt there’s much in it. The bike was just really nimble and a huge amount of fun. I’ll write some more about it for you later, I think.
The Bear took part in the Edelweiss Bike Travel (www.edelweissbike.com) at the invitation of the company, and says a sincere “thank you”.
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