Gremma's Travels: Biking through the Vines in Alsace

Riding on the back roads among the vines and the locals

Vines and pretty little towns everywhere

The last hill of the day

We had so much fun biking through the Alsace vineyards. The wines were amazing, the views incredible, and it was so good to really be in the vines, and not worry about how much we could drink!

If only the bikes were as good as everything else! We picked them up from Ribeauville (5 mins drive from Riquewihr), in our massive car. Was a bit of a mission getting three bikes in the back, and we had to drive back to Riquewihr with the boot open! And then we had to get the front wheels back on the bikes. Thanks to my amazing mum and dad, I knew how to do this, but we just couldn't get the front brakes back on for Nicks bike. After ages of getting really frustrated (and super black dirty greasy hands) we gave up, and Nick spent most of the first day with no front brakes! The bikes were absolute crap. Clunky gears, so old and heavy, and my chain kept coming off, until I learnt not to change into the easiest gear. We even got a comment from one guy we came across who runs bike tours: "where did you get those old things from?". Next time I think we definitely get better bikes somehow, and possibly even some hybrid electric ones. There were a few who came past us quite happily on them while we were pushing our bikes up some huge hills!

Our first stop was Hunawihr where we had quite possibly the best tasting of the entire trip at Sipp Mack. The lady welcomed us in, sat us at a table and proceeded to give us the full run through of most of their wines. A lovely older American couple joined us, and we spent a good hour there chatting to them and enjoying the wine, the best of which was the Grand Cru Rosacker Riesling. So good!

We then made it back to Ribeauville and got the guy to fix Nicks brakes, then stopped for a few more wines before making our way back to Riquewihr.

It's rather different to vineyards (domains) in Australia or NZ. The majority of places have their facilities in the town, and their grapes are spread over the whole area, right next to other peoples grapes. They have Grand Cru areas which are where the best grapes come from, and then have other rows in other areas. This means the grapes for wine from different domains can come from the exact same area, and the differences are down to how they make the wine.

The following day we set out in the other direction, and accidentally went to Kientzheim. Best accident ever, as we got to taste some more fabulous wines, and we came across that bike tour I mentioned before who suggested we go to Kayserberg, which we did, even though it was in the other direction. Best idea ever, as above the gorgeous little town was an old castle. We bought ourselves a bottle of wine, some cheese and more foie gras and climbed up there for a picnic lunch. So relaxing and such beautiful views, again of vines in every direction!

Castle above Kayserberg

We continued on our way, visiting Bennwihr, Mittelwihr and Beblenheim, tasting some amazing wines in every town and wishing we had unlimited baggage so we could bring more home. Lastly we rode up through Zellenberg before following our noses back to Riquewihr through the vines on some narrow farm type tracks.

The majority of the way we were riding through the middle of the vines on either very small country roads, or actual vineyard / farm tracks. There was virtually no traffic around, and not a lot of people either. Most places started harvest the second day we were there, so as you can imagine the grapes were ripe, and delicious! There's something pretty special about riding through the vines, and stopping whenever you feel like it to try some different grapes. On our way back at the end of the day, there were queues of tractors towing trailers full of bins of grapes from the harvest.