Le Grand Ballon, Route des Crêtes

After a decent mountain bike ride yesterday discovering new tracks below Gempen and sliding down one uber steep valley resulting in slight road rash (shouldn't that be mud rash?) I was feeling a little bruised and tired today but still determined to venture into the Vosges mountains for the first time.
I wanted to ride out from Basel to test the roads and get a feel for the distance, it turned out to be fast and very little traffic all the way to Mulhouse. Would be easy to hop on a train next time to save 40km or so, or head out to Altkirch and avoid Mulhouse altogether - theres not much to see here.
Today was the first day in leggings and long gloves, chilly start but by the time I was Wittelsheim the low cloud evaporated and blue skies remained for the rest of the day. Still, it would be chilly on the higher ground.
At the top of the first col at 906m is Hartmannsweilerkopf, on which is a cemetery and national monument for those killed in the first world war. Worth a brief stop.
After this point the road is known as the "Route des Crêtes" - the route of peaks. Well theres one main peak, Le Grand Ballon at 1325m after which I followed the the route for an amazing 22km undulating at around 1200m before dropping down to Munster and the road down to Colmar. Its quite rare to find a road which continues at altitude after a major climb, so this route is a real gem.  The climb up to Le Grand Ballon really seemed to go on forever and on the lower parts I came across the familiar cobblestones as first encountered on the slopes of La Tremola, Gotthard pass. Thankfully it was only 3 very short sections, I was worried I would have another 8-9km of these cobbles all the way to the top! What was really cool is there really is a Grand Ballon at the top of the mountain, but you'd have to hike up from the road to get to it. Another day perhaps. Also its nice the French like to mark all their climbs every kilometer. Here the climbs were not marked with a gradient like in the Alps, but at least they marked how far from the top and the altitude every km, its always nice to know how much further there is to go.
The first ski slope of the day was at the top of the Grand Ballon, then at Markstein, and a few smaller slopes before the end of my ridge ride at Col de la Schlecht.
It really was a nice ride in the cool air, the forests all coloured for autumn it all reminded me of the ride I did last autumn in Nagano, along the Venus line from Chino to Bessho onsen.
Its a great route, and once you're off the main ridge you can soon be down amongst the vineyards of Alsace. The harvest was a couple of weeks ago now, but the leaves still remain on the vines so it all still looks very attractive. The whole "route du vin" from Mulhouse to Strasbourg is dotted with picturesque villages, wine caves and acre after acre of vineyard as far as the eye can see. I made a brief stop in Turkheim to take some photos, and of course the center of Colmar which is a must visit if you're in the area.
When planning this route I had though I might continue on beyond Colmar and see a few more of the villages on the way to Selestat, but all thoughts of this evaporated on the slopes up to the first col when I realised how far and really how big these climbs are. 150km for the day and I feel really tired now after another weekend on the roads and trails around Basel.
I'll definitely be heading back to the Vosges again, seem to be a thousand different routes here and with all the routes du vin villages to finish a ride, it could make for the perfect day.

Route on Mapmyride