Category Archives: Cycling

Cycling

Picnic bike ride

Leave a comment

On Sunday, August 28, meeting point is at 16:00 in the city at the intersection between Boulevard du Prince Henri and Avenue Monterey (next to the boat in the park). Please be there on time as we’ll leave shortly.

Link to map, where you can download the GPX file.

We will ride to Belair, Merl, Bertrange, Holzem, Garnich, Mamer and stop at the picnic place called Drēps. However if the group is too slow or unmotivated, we’ll go straight from Bertrange to Mamer – most of the way is on National Cycleways (PCs), Regional and Local Cycleways.

Below is a view of the picnic area (note that it’s not exclusive to the group):

Bridge at Drëps picnic place

Drëps picnic place

You can also meet us at Drēps at 19:00 if you want to skip the effort part. Drinks can be cooled down in the river, and there’s a weather shelter.

For the return ride, there are two options, where the first is the most likely due to the surface:

  • We’ll go back up to Mamer (get ready for this) and go to PC13 to European School II.
  • If eveyone is on a mountain or trekking bike, we could attempt to ride on Sentier de la Mamer to European School II (harder surface but slightly shorter than the first option).

Then we’ll follow the PC13 to Strassen, divert to Les Thermes (to avoid the segment on Route d’Arlon), ride back on PC1 to Val Sainte-Croix and back to the park and finish at the boat intersection.

If the group is big, I will need a co-organizer.

Important instructions:

  • weather may be hot, so please take plenty of drinks with you
  • better have something to eat at the picnic place (but it’s not mandatory).
  • please have some bike lights with you, we’re likely to arrive back to the city during dusk.
  • if you want/have to leave early, please get the GPX file to your GPS or smartphone to find a safe way back. You can use phone Apps such as ViewRanger or OruxMaps to view the GPX on your phone.

There’s no mandatory registration, but would I appreciate if you can register to either the Facebook or the Meetup event, just to get a brief idea of the amount of people to expect.

Update after the ride: just a few photos 😉

20160828_141426-Edit.jpg

20160828_160512-Edit.jpg

20160828_160533_1.jpg

20160828_160705_HDR.jpg

20160828_162940_HDR.jpg

20160828_163942_HDR.jpg

20160828_170146-Edit.jpg

Cycling, Luxembourg, Stuff

Cyclehack Luxembourg City 2016

Leave a comment

Thanks to Cycle Luxembourg, I was privileged to help with the preparation of the first Cyclehack in Luxembourg City. A very nice experience from the inside, where a group of very busy people have managed to do everything; also it was a bit discouraging because it was during the National Holiday weekend and many people decided to travel for an extended weekend before the beginning of the holiday season.

Back to the topic, the event took place during the whole weekend (from Friday the 24th of June to Sunday) at the Rotondes. Friday evening and Sunday afternoon were opened to the public and the rest of the weekend only to participants.

Videos

All videos are also available for download on my personal gallery.

On Friday, there was a series of talks:

Introduction talk by Kasia Krzyzanowski:

Keynote speaker: Marc van Woudenberg of Amsterdamize:

Some local speakers:

Sam Tanson, member of the Aldermen council and in charge of mobility and transport issues for Luxembourg City:

Philippe Herkrath from  Lëtzebuerger Vëlosinitiativ:

openData by Tezza Lana from Level2 – Syn2cat Hackerspace:

Jean­-Michel Mertz from Bike43, a bicycle related startup here in Luxembourg:

Pierre Englebert from the Luxembourg branch of Cycling Without Age:

And my first ever talk,  I even tried to talk, about my daily bike commutes in Luxembourg, with the glitches and everything:

My slides are also available online.

And to finish, Steve Clement from Level 2 and coorganizer made a very inspiring talk:

Sunday: presentation of the projects

Continue reading Cyclehack Luxembourg City 2016 →

Cycling, Europe, Luxembourg

Waste of money and insecurity

Leave a comment

While cycling on PC14,  I discovered it was closed; and they did a detour via a the roads CR103 and CR109, a popular itinerary for trucks going to Kehlen. So I wasn’t very pleased to find which wasn’t announced on any web site. Imagine a family going for a bicycle ride altogether during this sunny Easter holiday…

Detour sign

The fun continues one kilometre ahead, where the main road is also closed, and all the best they have done is to Strikethrough the bicycle detour…

Detour no longer applies

What a waste of money; doing a detour via a dangerous road, and then close the detour…

Also, on Tuesday, April 14, the cycling route is also closed between Mamer and Capellen; no alternative road is planned; but at least they have put the sign since last month:

PC14 closure

So let me suggest the alternative way below to go from Mamer to Nospelt, which is technically against the law as the way is market with a (C,2) sign with no bicycle exemption, but:

  • no one cares, they often put this sign even on official cycling routes, and
  • safety first.

Please note the traffic light when crossing Route d’Arlon in Mamer.

Cycling, Europe, France, Germany

Cycling from Strasbourg to Offenburg

Leave a comment

On cycleways, mostly dedicated. Easy to ride, the total distance is about 60 km long on a flat surface, mostly on asphalt; only one small segment is on a track and another one on gravel. The North segment to Offenburg is nicer than the South back to Strasbourg via Illkirch.

Download GPX file.

Elevation map
Link on GPSies.

Cycling, Life

Not a common Monday

Leave a comment

It’s very pleasant to start a new week with a day off. The main reason was to study and to let the repairman in. Then a succession of events occurred:

  • he called me in the early morning and let me know at what time he was going to arrive,
  • I will be going to be on call from this evening on,
  • according to the weather forecast, it was the last sunny day until god knows when,
  • I couldn’t find any interactive way to study on the security frameworks, knowing that passive learning is useless.

Based on all the facts above, I invited some people for an evening BBQ, went out into the forest and rode my mountain bike,  bought some groceries to cook a nice salad, let the repairman fix the dishwasher, started some laundry, went out again to another forest, mowed the lawn, went shopping for BBQ food and finally had my guests.

Tam showed up to fetch his car but unfortunately his battery was flat; since it’s a hybrid car it wasn’t possible to push it. Therefore he stayed with us for dinner until his car could be fixed, which took about 1 minute and costed 100 Euros. At least he could enjoy with us some fish-kebab, grilled mushrooms and other vegetables. It was nice to spend some time with some friends!

Ended the day doing 61 km of activities, including 48 km on my bike. Still 690 km to go this month and 6,428 km this year (7,042 km would be ideal if I can afford not to include non-bike sports as well). Too bad this week I won’t have as much free time than I had for cycling…

Of course my mind wasn’t in security frameworks while mountain biking, but rather organising some games on mountain bikes based on the snake game which could be played in groups in the city centre or in the forest.

So below are the maps of the two rides.