Which bike did you choose for alpine tour?
Short answer:
C 400 X
Got a few minutes for a long answer?
As you may note -- I bet you clicked on the "Tour Prices and Motorcycles 2023" tab -- no scooter is among the 30 or so choices of bikes for the Ultimate Alps Tour. The C 400 X and the 300 Vespa are available only on the few scooter tours. Here's the background of my choosing the 400 for the Alps.
I've been on four Edelweiss tours now:
1) 1998: Best of Europe (
https://www.edelweissbike.com/en/touren/?c=BOE), on an R850R with my wife riding pillion. I owned a year older version of the same model at the time, so that seemed like a good choice, as a familiar two-up mount.
2) 2019: Touring Center Alps (
https://www.edelweissbike.com/en/touren/?c=ATC), solo on a Niken, with my local riding buddy choosing a GS. I wanted to check out that three-wheeler, and I was appreciative of the extra contact patch up front. If you're not familiar with that Yamaha:
A)
B) One of my favorite moto writers, John Burns, did an enjoyable and insightful review of one a few years back (shortly before I did the tour):
After one tentative pass by the cameras, it was actually a breeze to get the 2019 Yamaha Niken heeled over to peg-scraping 45-degree lean angles.
www.motorcycle.com
3) 2022: Tuscany by Scooter (
https://www.edelweissbike.com/en/touren/?c=2TU), on a C 400 X, with my wife riding pillion.
4) 2022: Vienna by Scooter (
https://www.edelweissbike.com/en/touren/?c=2VE), on a C 400 X, with my wife riding pillion.
My wife enjoyed the ergonomics -- feet and leg position, seat, the angle of the pad on the topcase, etc. -- so much that she suggested, at the end of those two weeks, that I buy one. So I did. I had owned two Burgman 650s over the years (which have terrible ergos for typical passengers), and a number of other bikes, so I was familiar with scooters. And the Burgman I still had was 16 years old, so it was time for a new scooter, anyway.
I had a mixed experience on the Niken. I loved the power, handling, and speed. I disliked it particularly at stops, because it was top-heavy and the seat was too tall (tip toes for me), and it required a lot revs to take off in first gear. And so I dropped it twice, basically standing still, and was determined not to make that mistake again.
Being comfortable with scooters, and a repeat customer, last fall I whined to Edelweiss in a series of email exchanges. I told them I was looking to do another tour, but I wanted to do it on the C 400 X, and that they could pretty much count me out if they didn't comply with that request. I also pointed out that touring outfit Beach's allows that choice for all its tours (although they offer only BMWs). Last, I pointed out that now I owned a C 400 GT, essentially the same scooter, and had gotten it up to a GPS-verified 89 mph (143 kph) on level ground several times now, that was fast enough that it would not slow anyone down on the occasional autobahn stints, and that I would actually probably be faster -- and more comfortable -- going around Alpine hairpins on a scooter (as many local riders do, a few of whom passed me in 2019) than on a shifted bike.
Edelweiss eventually said -- I'm paraphrasing -- "Oh, okay, but the logistics regarding where we store the scooters for our scooter tours makes it feasible to agree to let you have one for only
certain of our non-scooter tours."
They gave me a list of six tours, and the Ultimate Alps was one of them. And it was one that I was considering for my next (and possibly last -- at 75, I'm not getting any younger) tour, anyway. (There's only a small amount of overlap with the Touring Center Alps tour I did in 2019; also, this one is eight riding days, and that one was five.)
So I bullied Edelweiss, and they got me to compromise, and so I'm looking forward to a solo C 400 X tour in July. (My riding buddy here has some medical issues, and this is not the kind of tour that my wife would enjoy out back).
End of story.
