Today is the first day of school for kids after summer holidays here. Barry went for a walk early and heard the familiar sound of excited kids in a playgrund. As a retired Primary teacher, he was drawn to the sound like a sailor to the Sirens. Luckily he made an escape, but it brought back memories of the years he welcomed equally excited kids back to school after a long break.
Today we are trying some new things. We never go out for breakfast - but we wanted to experience an Italian bakery and conveniently there is a good one across from the campground. We were pleasantly surprised to be offered a large coffee (Americano), juice and our choice of 7 types of croissant - all for 3 euros. We finished off with an espresso machiato for 1 euro.
Our bakery breakfast in Ora - yummy and reasonably priced.
The riding continues to be magical as the trail follows the valley of the Etsch River with lush orchards of apples and grapes filling the valley and bordered by soaring mountains and sheer limestone cliffs on both sides. We are impressed by the infrastructure provided by Italy on the trail: frequent drinking water fountains, comfortable picnic areas and information signs in Italian/German/English are appreciated. Knowing that there are no campgrounds within the area where we want to finish riding today, we followed a sign to an Agritourism farm, Piffer B&B in Lavis but they were full. The proprietor told us that, unexpectedly, this particular Monday was very busy so she offered to call ahead to another Agritourism accomodation in the next village. We are pleased that she went to bat for us as we never would have found Val D'Adige B&B, an apple farm, a little off the route in Roscalfor. We like this style of accomodation as it is more personal since it is located on a farm, you meet local people where they live and you get to try their produce and enjoy a good breakfast. Despite the riding being easy we continue to meander along rather than racking up big mileage days. The reason for this is simple: we are so enjoying what we see that we are taking our time.
There are so many cycling routes through this area - we recognize the stickers for some Dutch routes.
Our view in this section gives us a lovely river, vineyards, apple orchards and limestone cliffs. No wonder we don't get far in a day - we stop to make coffee and enjoy where we are. Considering that it is the first day of school here, Barry is tipping his hat to the teachers who are now back at work and very grateful that he is now retired!!
We have left Bolzano districd and have now entered Trento region. We are now out of German/Italian regions and we are now in the heart of Italy. Mary Ellen's beginner German skills will no longer help us to communicate. We are finding that there is very little English spoken.
