Thann - Oberehnheim 135 km 2000 m altitude difference

Was undecided, I dawdled, I didn't start until 9am, then breakfast, I wasn't sure whether I should ride 10 km back and then take on the ordeal of the ascent. I could have it so easy, just let it roll down to the Rhine. But no! I'm here to test it, and besides, when you've already got the highest mountain in the Vosges in front of you..... so I did what the young man told me last night. Back and up. At first it went quite well, and the sun was shining. At some point, the app said to turn right here, and the signs also pointed in that direction. Okay. The path changed from road to potholes with road to potholes with pavement. But as every now and then a car passed me I was in good spirits, I slowly cranked up. Then there was a final ramp divided into 3 sections 17%, 18% and 16% interrupted by short segments with 10 - 12%. All in all 3 km and a little more than 300 metres of altitude. That was brutal. The first segment was clearly too hard, I was already thinking of pushing (hello willi), but I was still able to get out of the saddle and ride up in a saddle, at the end I noticed that I still had one gear. I used up all my energy for nothing. At a distance of 100 m I saw a hiker in front of me, I couldn't catch him, the other two segments I had other problems. But I got to the top, well almost, then onto a road and the remaining kilometre. Unfortunately, you are not allowed to go all the way to the top for nature conservation reasons, then just pass the top. Laws concerning nature conservation must be observed at all costs. The road cyclists at the top who saw me just shook their heads when they saw my luggage. I grinned cheekily back, okay then down, it was getting cold up there. So potholes, ruts and rolling gravel are no good for a descent, and so I stuck to the 50 km/h speed limit. I'm not a fan of speed anyway, but with this bike you only notice that you're going fast when you're going too fast. I also wore my helmet. At the bottom, just before Colmar, I had another flat. Easy, Felix had shown me how to do it. Removing the thru axle, tensioning the chain, taking down the RaceKing (thanks to Fuchs for the right moves) was the hardest part, the rest as usual. Somehow it was already 4pm and I didn't have many kilometres on the speedometer yet, so I put the knife between my teeth and set off, only to find out that there wasn't much more I could do today. At 7 p.m. I saw a sign with Canping, did some quick shopping, that was it.... In this sense.... Why does the Saar have 2 headwaters? .... Good night