This is post to show my best animal pictures from around the world.  Hope that you enjoy it.

For best viewing, click the “Full screen” button in the slideshow.

This was my fourth time that I did the Pfronten MtB Marathon and every year I like it more than the previous year.  The mountains and scenery in this part of the Alps are just unbelievable.  That is of course if you can see the mountains – which was difficult this time because the weather was certainly not playing along.  It has rained so much that Noah (with his Ark) would have been scared the days leading up to the race.  On Saturday morning the rain luckily stopped, but it was still pretty cold with rain clouds covering the mountains.  This did not deter the 1,200 entrants, and everybody was ready for a fun and potentially wet day on the bike.  There were 4 different courses offered:

• Extremstrecke 70km (2,600m of climbing),
• Marathonstrecke 53km (1,900m of climbing)
• Kurzstrecke  26km (940m of climbing)
• Klapprad Word Championship

I did the Extremstrecke, but far more interesting was the Klapprad WC.  For those who don’t know, a Klapprad is a 70’s era “folding bike” that seems to have been very popular in Germany at the time.  As you can see from the picture on the left, there were pretty hardcore Klapprad participants…  There are numerous web pages in German that nostalgically goes on about the good old days when oil was so expensive that riding a Klapprad was considered chíc.  Given the current oil price and where it might go, it is perhaps a good idea to bring out those folding bikes again.  Nevertheless, the idea of the Klapprad WC was to use a conventional Klapprad and ride it up the northern side of Breitenberg, which is a 650m climb to the first cable car station.  This is quite an effort considering that the average grade is 11% – and that on two small wheels (and wearing a funny outfit.)  The winning time was 40min which I think is pretty amazing (especially considering the funny outfit you have to wear…)  So, a new world champion was crowned on Saturday – the world’s first Klapprad champion.

I started out on the Extremstrecke with that “remind me again why I’m doing this” feeling for the first half of the first climb.  After that I was warmed up and felt pretty good for the remainder of the race.  The weather was actually perfect – overcast, but not too cold.  It is always spectacular to reach the top of a mountain, looking down on all the switchbacks that you just did and seeing the green valleys stretched out as far as you can see.  There were 4 climbs - Breitenberg (850m, 13% average grade), Edelsberg (650m, 11.5% average grade), Barenmoos (320m, 12% average grade) and Breitenberg again from the south (720m, 11% average grade.)   Rita and her dad supported me half way up Edelsberg with a drink and some energy bars.  I felt pretty good throughout, but the last bit of Breitenberg towards the end was hard and I lost a couple of minutes (and positions) there.  Nevertheless, it was a great race and my timing was perfect – it started raining as I crossed the finish line.  Some of the guys that did the Marathonstrecke was not so lucky – they started an hour or so after us and some of the tail enders got some nasty hail, high winds and plenty of rain.  All in all, nothing that a nice Bavarian beer cannot fix.  I finished in 4h14min and was 12th in the Masters catagory.

Click to download the GPX file.

On June 7th we rode the Mountain Bike Race with start at the beautiful Lake Tegernsee in the Bavarian Alps. The race is one of 7 races of the Ritchey MTB Challenge series.

Pieter did the grueling 88km and 3,800m climbing, Rita was happy with her result for the B round of 57km/1,540m climb in 3:16min.
We were lucky – no rain from start to finish and a jolly good time as the atmosphere and organization of the event was superb. At the finish line we were greeted with beer, cappuccino, pasta and cake. Then the rain came…..

Our Sonoran Desert Tour in Arizona included 5 days of splendid mountain biking, mostly single track, on altitudes of 2,000–6,000 feet. We rode through hillsides dotted with shapely saguaro, prickly pear, and spiny ocotillo cactus, and camped in the middle of nowhere in the Santa Rita Mountains and at Catalina State Park.

As expected, the desert air was extremely dry and our skin cracked not only from scraping cactus on the trails. Nights in the tent were bitterly cold (32F, zero Celsius) but the temperatures during the day were pleasant and perfect for riding. We explored the Tucson Mountain Park, a natural Sonoran Desert preserve including the most magnificent Saguaro Cactus forests in the world. We climbed switchbacks in the shadow of Mount Wrightson, navigated between shrubs and cactus, pedaled through sand, and rolled thorough deep arroyos. This was challenging for me (Rita) the novice single-track rider who already went over the handle bar on day one of the trip. We also rode parts of the windy Arizona trail, climbed on the Flume trail and rode some more single-track through Catalina State Park. We experienced an exhilarating day of fun on the famous Fantasy Island mountain bike park, which includes over 35km of single-track. The tight twists and turns between the cactus in combination with sudden steep drops made for the ultimate thrill ride and while Pieter enjoyed the rollercoaster, I got cramps in my fingers from hanging onto my breaks. East of Tucson, we were winded through the loose rocky chutes of the so-called 50-year trail overlooking the Oro Valley on the last day of the tour.

Western Spirit, a great outfitter supported our trip and handled all the logistics, including the transportation of our tents, gear and luggage and the cooking of all meals on open fires. We enjoyed delicious food, and great company!

Our recent trip home to visit our family in Germany was framed by several important occasions and celebrations including Arnulf’s 80th birthday, our nephew Simon’s christening and of course Christmas and New Year’s Eve. We were happy and grateful that Vera from Hamburg and Rochelle from Pretoria were able to join us and thereby made the family complete for the last few precious days of the year 2008. Three weeks went by far too quickly while we enjoyed our time with family and friends. Apart from indulging in Lore’s home-cooked cuisine, and drinking wine, we played games after dinner, and enjoyed many hours outside in the bitterly cold (as low as -15°C). Nevertheless, the sun was shining almost every day, creating a sparkling winter wonderland; providing us with many opportunities to ski, toboggan, and skate (cross-country) in and around Pfronten.