Motorcycling Germany’s Black Forest on the R1300 GSA – RTW Motorcycle Tour! [S1 EP3]

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This leg of the journey takes us through the winding roads of Germany’s Black Forest, surrounded by towering pine trees, dense woodland, and fairytale landscapes — the kind of motorcycle touring dreams are made of. Whether you’re into adventure motorcycling, scenic European rides, or just epic BMW R1300 GSA footage, this is one for the books. Along the way, we make a special stop at the iconic Touratech headquarters in Niedereschach, the beating heart of ADV gear innovation, to check out some top-tier motorcycle accessories and soak in the history of a brand that’s shaped the global adventure bike community.

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We’ve woken up to another glorious day here in Strasburg in France and we’re just going to load up the bike. I’m going to hit the road and head to the Black Forest. But we thought you’d show you some of the security things we do with the bike when we’re parked up here. So, this hotel we stayed at last night and Emily managed to get us a room that was round the back so we could actually see the bike from the window and also be able to hear the alarm if it goes off. We always carry this uh big cover with us. protects it from the rain, but also keeps any prying eyes away from seeing what’s underneath there. So, for the amount of weight this is, it’s definitely worth taking. And we store this in the front pouches, right, from Yeah, that’s right. We got uh one of these front pouches here from Toretek. And I’ll just stuff that in there. And then I’ll stuff the chain in there, too. It’s nice and soft. It’s another little cushiony if that falls over. Um, for the lock we’ve got going on here, um, you might have seen already we’ve got the light lock X3, the Dlock here, which is brilliant. And it fits perfectly through the wheel, like not only through the spokes and the discs, but actually the hub of the wheel as well, which is brilliant. So, take that off. And we’ve also brought this from Hip Lock. This is their lightweight chain. And it it really is quite light. I think it’s 2 kg, 2.5, which the alternatives are 5 6 7 8 9 10 kg. So, this one’s really good. But what I like about this one the most is it’s only a meter long, but because you thread it into itself, it’s the equivalent of taking a 2 m chain. So again, you save a lot of weight with that one. And then that just attaches to the D-lock on the bike. So, good to have the bike at least fastened to something if you can. You can fit so much in those bags. It’s quite impressive. And they’re waterproof as well. Yeah, they’re not bad. I think what are they only like 3 L, so they’re not they’re not massive. But it’s perfect for keeping the cover and the chain because we never leave them in the bike. So, if the bike’s left, it’s because it’s got the cover and the chain on. So, it’s not something we have to keep taking on and off. The tank in the sunlight is my favorite thing about this bike. It’s a catching nice, is it? Even with the plastic protector on, you can’t really see it, which is good. This one’s a bit more tricky, but got the knack for this one. There we go. All right. And now we just strap on the two rack packs. Yeah. Rat packs on the side. These are going to get a little bit more empty as we go along. We’ve got a few things in there that we’re going to use up and probably not replace. Using the rock straps as ever. These are great. They’re got a bit of elastic in them as well, so they keep a tension for you and they’re quite quick to put on. So, we are in France right now and the plan for the day is to kind of spend the next hour or so riding through some of the curvy roads in northern France in this Alsas region and then we’re going to head over to Germany where we’ll be entering the Black Forest heading over to Nidarak which is where the Tourk HQ is. Going to see some friends there and then head south. So, that’s the plan for today as soon as Sean’s finished packing up storm. All right, we’re all packed up and ready to go. I’m going to wear my sunglasses today as it is quite bright today. I don’t have the internal sun visor on these because we have that new MIP security system. So, we got these from I think Sunod and they’re kind of like a sport glasses. So, they are impact resistant which is great. But we’re ready to go. So, let’s hit the road. You ready? Ready. Well, there’s the there’s the Ibis hotel. We stayed in the Ibis budget, which I think for the saving of €30, it’s worth staying in the budget. Yeah, especially when they share a um car park. It was pretty good, actually, wasn’t it? It’s really clean. Everything you need. Happy with it. And free breakfast. And a free breakfast, too. So, five stars for the ISIS budget. I think it’s near. We’re near Strasburg airport, aren’t we? Yeah, that’s why there’s this big shopping center here as well. Well, that feels good now to get the air through the suits. And a friendly reminder for the weird priorities as we are in France. Good point. We’re not too far from the German border, passing through the little French town of EA, I think it is. It’s quite nice, isn’t it? It’s got the the classic French buildings either side of the main street. do like the French architecture. Right here is the Grand Canal, the Alsace. There’s quite a lot of shipping through this area through the I think it just joys onto the Rine, doesn’t it? And you can do cruises on this with Viking, but this is actually quite a cool way to go into Germany. I’ve not done this way before, but Calioto’s taken us again. It’s a D426 and it’s basically taken us over the canals and well we’re sandwiched in between a place called Leordin which is like a thin strip of land between the Ryan rivers. This is cool. It’s quite a cool way, isn’t it? So this is like a giant version of a lock. Wow, look at the uh the big cargo ships coming through there. It’s quite interesting to see the canals being used for like their original purpose still. Right now we’re crossing over the Ryan itself and into Germany. And we’re going to be in Germany for most of today as we make our way through Bad Venberg and to the Black Forest. This is going to be a nice section, I think. We like the Black Forest, don’t we? We do. Kind of feels like home. Yeah, it does. Have we been on this road before? I don’t think we have. No, I don’t think so. [Music] She can come 20 times and do 20 different routes. Yeah, it’s true, isn’t it? This does feel similar to the one that was uh in the snow, but I think we’re too high north for that one today. Yeah, I think so. So, it must be a must be a different one. There’s some great hair pins coming up. And as ever, yeah, Black Forest has got some fantastic riding conditions. He’s home. Yeah, Storm is back home on his home turf. And it’s empty at this time of the year again, isn’t it? It really is. We really are big fans of offse season travel. And it’s quite warm, too. 15°. That’s perfect riding temperature. Let’s watch out for those black lines. Oh, loving these roads. them. What a fantastic day. It’s always fun here. Nice. Right in the heart of the forest now. The air is so clean here. It was really nice to ride here. Are you all right back there? You’re not too cold, are you? Em? No, I’m all good. Heated vest is on and so is my gloves, but it is warmer than it was the last time we were in the Black Forest. So, yeah. I think we got about 10° warmer than last time, which is good. I think the tires will be sticking a little bit better this time. Oh, it’s still Oh, that was windy. It was, wasn’t it? All right, we’re turning up here to Elzah again. This is another Calimoto mystery tour, but I think in Calimoto we trust at the moment. It’s doing some great roots. Literally put this in before we left the hotel. And this road looks like it’s going to be good. I think so. Yeah. Big traditional German farm houses. They’re lovely, aren’t they? Built to with the harsh winters. As these roads are very predictable and great quality, I’ve put the bike into dynamic mode. Just tightens everything up. Makes everything a little bit more responsive. And I’ve put my heated vest into high cuz we’re getting altitude. Are you Are you in a heated vest dynamic pro? Look at that view. It’s spectacular. I know you’re a bit busy, but yeah. On days like this, you can see why it’s called the Black Forest. It really does look really dense and dark. The tree um foliage. It really is quite like a super dark green, isn’t it? This is a fantastic road. Which one is this, Sean? Well, I’m not sure to be honest. Um it’s just appeared out of nowhere. They had the uh warning sign for bikers, which normally means it’s a good road. But yeah, some tight hair pins here. Good visibility, brilliant road services and surrounded by the trees. A great way to go to Toretek. Got a hair pin coming up. Or is it a turn one? Also, this bit of road, the speed limit is still 100 km an hour, which is very generous. So although people say the Black Forest isn’t fun anymore because of the new speed limits, you just need to find stretches of road like this one and there’s hundreds of them. We are 15 minutes away from Nidita Airshak and the Toretch headquarters. Uh temperatures actually dropped to 9°. It’s getting chilly again, but we’re not cold at all cuz we’ve got a heated stuff on. And yeah, this is the uh last last final kilometers before we get a nice hot cup of coffee. You’re looking forward to that, E. Yes, I certainly am. And I’m really excited to see everyone at Toret as well. It’s always nice to see a familiar face. And we uh we know so many people around here that over the next few days, we’ll be popping into quite a few different shops, different dealerships, and also popping in to see some friends. Um cuz it’s kind of our last opportunity to for a really, really long time. So yeah, it’s going to be nice to um see the guys at Turk this afternoon. Here we are back again. It doesn’t seem that long ago since we were last here. Getting a bit of a deja vu feeling, but somebody pointed out that there was a camera sneakily positioned there in this 30 zone. I never noticed that last time, but there it is. That’s where they make the aluminium pas. There’s other episodes where we uh go and explore that one. But here we are at the HQ and I think we’re going to park around the back again. Um might see if they get just give everything a check, make sure it’s still tight from last time. Might be a good idea. Am I think it’s a great idea? It’s like the most iconic building with the yellow and black. Here he comes. Maybe you can put him here at the back. Sew, just truck him in here. They can move him as they want. Yeah, perfect. It’s quite busy in here today. Loads of 1300 in. So, we are back in Torch. Storm is currently in the workshop getting checked out by the mechanics there. And we have come in to grab some food. We’ve got a gorgeous salad here, two piping hot cups of coffee, and some bread. We’re going to head off and have a little look around the shop. Not that we can add much more to Storm, but it is always fun to have a little look. And the Toret team have very kindly gifted us a few more products for our trip. There are some um liners for the panas to make them waterproof and a few other t-shirts and little gifts from them. So, yeah, that’s what we’re going to be doing for the next hour or so while Storm gets his little check and we have a little break. What have you found? Well, you know, I like all things pouches and bags and stuff. I can’t take my hiking bags. They are these little bags here. They’re actually pretty good. They’re fairly lightweight, but quite robust as well and waterproof. And I’m thinking we’ve got some of the head torches and the lamps. Yeah, in one of those GoPro boxes. They are taking up quite a bit of space. Maybe that could be a better option. Yeah, I like them too, actually. They’re really cool. I like the fact that they’re square, so they fit well into the pas. That is true. Yeah, the square is a lot more easy to pack. These are are great cuz you can just dump everything in, but anything with like a circle bottom is a little bit more difficult to pack in the panas. But they’re really cool. I do like them as well, though. Yeah, cuz um we’ve kind of like got the predicament of we would like to have the top box completely in a dry bag. Yeah, but maybe it’d be better just to put the things that are in it in dry bags so then it’s easy to bring them all out again. It’s a good idea. We’ve got some options. Wasn’t that lovely? It really was, wasn’t it? M. I enjoyed that. Nice to see everyone again. Yeah. Also nice to have good coffee, good food, good company, and a few more little treats in the bag. Yeah, we got a few little pouches, uh, little waterproof bags that fit really nicely in the top case. So, that’s great. Well, next time we’ll be back here, we’ll hopefully be in a few years at the Tour Tech Travel event. Yeah, I should think so. uh we’ll at least have a few more stories to tell by then. But uh let’s make our way back to Basel. Bye to attack. So we’ve got only a short ride. Well, I say short. It’s about an hour and 20 minutes back to Basel, but we’re actually going to be staying in Germany tonight, which is just by the Swiss border by by Tech. It’s a really big facility, isn’t it? It’s huge. Uh yeah, where are we staying tonight, Sean? Just on the border in Germany, actually. Yeah, that’s right. I actually think it’s on the Rine, isn’t it? In uh near Lenenburg. This section of road that we’re on now in Germany is unrestricted speed limit. So you can go as fast as you like, but you’d think it would be chaotic, but it’s it’s not, is it? Everyone is driving at a sensible speed and no one’s having to check their speedo every 5 seconds. I think it’s great. Works well here, doesn’t it? It does until it doesn’t. until there’s a crash at 260 km an hour. Yeah, we did max out our old car on on this road. We did actually. We got two I think we got 230k on that car and then I think we could have got more but we needed like an extra 5 km of space. I was going to say the problem is you have to um you have to keep your eye out when it ends cuz it ends quick. Yeah, you might find yourself doing 200ks in a 120. Exactly. Yeah. But storm sat nicely at 120 here. Yeah, it’s happy fully loaded. Yeah, I think I think if you went fast fast fully loaded, your tires would just like disintegrate within 10 minutes. You have a nice big flat spot on the bottom. We’re 7 minutes out from the destination. This is actually a very familiar place with us. We’ve ridden this road a lot of times. So, strange feelings of are we just riding back home? But, uh, no, we’re not. No, we’re uh riding to a little hotel and we’re going to be staying there for the night and uh tonight we’re actually going to be spending some time with some friends. Um so we’ll head back to the hotel, try and see where we can secure the bike for the evening and have some hot showers and then head on out. Yeah, that’s right. We’re staying right on the border of Switzerland and Germany. We’re staying in Germany. So, if if you ever fancy visiting Switzerland, but you’re concerned about like hotel prices, something like that, you do have plenty of options where you can stay just in Germany. And yeah, the Swiss Alps are only probably like an hour or an hour and a half ride into Germany away. So, you could base yourself quite well here in Germany. And you could also do the entire day uh the next day and ride all the way through Switzerland and then get to Italy and you wouldn’t have to stay in Switzerland if that’s what you’re worried about cuz it is an understandable concern. Uh prices in Switzerland are obviously double travel what they are the rest in Europe, especially in peak season like July or June. So this is something to keep in mind. Um but there are some good camping options which we’ll talk about a little bit later. Any signs that say we can’t go down here? I don’t think there was. Was there? Oh, there’s cars here. I think we’re down here. I’m pretty sure you can take a vehicle down here. We’ll soon find out. We can claim ignorance with the British plate. That’s the hotel. Is that the hotel? Hotel Rub there. Oh, nice. Which means that’s the parking back there. Can you do a yui here? Oh, yeah. Here’s reception. So, we’ll get the bags out here, shall we? Ah, okay. Oh, it’s lovely. Is it this one? Oh, yeah. Revtock. Reb. Okay. I just parked the bike here then. Now, we can unload. The reason we’re acting so surprised is we actually didn’t book this hotel. Uh, a friend of ours booked this hotel for us tonight. So, yeah. So, which is really kind, which is nice. So, we’re going to be It looks gorgeous, doesn’t it? Wow. I can’t believe we lived like 10 minutes from here. Look at that. It’s beautiful. Okay, I’ll go check us in. Here we are at Hotel Rebtock here in Lafenberg in Germany. What a beautiful little village this is. We’ve got the room already and I’ve taken the first pa up. So, I’m going to take the second pa up now. What’s the room like, Em? It’s actually really nice. This hotel is lovely in general, but you do have, I think, eight stairs to go up. Oh, do I? Taking the right pack at the same time. Let’s head on in. It’s got a really like oldworld feeling to it, which is really nice. And then Oh, yeah. Like a traditional one. Yeah. The room’s just up here. Quite creaky. I know. There’s a little restaurant just under there as well. Well, and we’ve got breakfast in the morning. Awesome. So, the room’s just there. Wait, it is really traditional, isn’t it? Oh, there’s an old photo what it used to look like the Wow. This is our room 107. Lovely, isn’t it? It’s really nice. Yeah, it’s got a gorgeous view from that window of the street. And we also have lovely bathroom in here as well. And there’s some good parking at the top of the street as well. But it is a really sleepy place this I’m quite feeling good about leaving the bike here. A quick turnaround from us. We’re showered. We’re dressed. I think we’re half presentable and friends coming to pick us up and I think we’re going out for dinner very shortly. But today has been quite an enjoyable day again, hasn’t it? Was was fun riding over the Rine through the Black Forest as always. Yeah, it was great to see our friends at Toret as well. It’s always fun to go to the HQ, but it has been cold. The past few days have been really, really cold on the bike. So, we’re very much looking forward to getting to warmer climates, hence why we’re going quite fast through Europe at the moment. But, I think we’re going to have a bit of a reshuffle. Um, things that maybe we do and don’t need. We’re learning as we go on this trip. So, I think we might have a little repack tonight. A little repack. You love a repack, don’t you? You’re looking for It’s going to be a late night, I think, with Emily repacking. But, uh, once we do get repacked, um, tomorrow we’re going to head into central Switzerland and maybe ride to some familiar places. I’m not sure what the conditions of the passes are at the moment, but I do know that the Julia Pass is open pretty much year round, so perhaps we’ll throw that one in as we make our way to Italy, I guess.