Judith and Neil Forsyth are pensioners living in a small town in Southern Germany. They have written a number of cycle touring guide books in English, set mainly in SW Germany. They took up writing guide books both as an attempt to ward off Alzheimer’s Disease and because they realised that at that time there were only guides in German about cycling in Germany. The publishing industry showed no interest in the books and so the Forsyths published a few books themselves. Later they adapted these books as e-books which can be ordered from Amazon and Smashwords. Cicerone has published one of their books: “Cycle Touring in Switzerland”. They are occasional contributors to “A to B” and similar arcane publications.
They have a website bicycletouringeurope.eu and write two blogs:
http://europeancycling.blogspot.de/ – about life and cycling in Germany, and http://hiking-rambling-walking.blogspot.de/ – reports on their rambles.
Travelling Europe
Although many of us have a dream of cycle touring where we set off from home for six months to reach Gibraltar via Tromso, Helsinki and Athens or to visit the Black Sea coast via Hook of Holland, Heidelberg and Vienna, most of us have limited time to go on holiday. Even we pensioners cannot leave our modest little home for too long, because the lawn needs mowing or the flower beds need weeding. The first question when planning a spot of bicycle touring is, how do we get there? When travelling to Western Europe the answer to this question is often the plane, with the train being used for the last few miles. Railways in continental Europe are fortunately more cyclist-friendly than those in Britain. However railway operators sometimes make travel difficult for folks with bicycles, not to mention tricycles! The poor cyclist has to deal with a number of national organisations with different regulations in each country. We hope to find a way through the forest of tickets, websites and regulations to help the cyclist travel economically and trouble free through Europe.
A very useful starting guide to railways, both European and worldwide is the www.seat61.com website. We also enjoy the eclectic and interesting “Hidden Europe” magazine and its associated website and newsletter which offer very useful hints from time to time.
