Crema sits in the upper middle of the broad, wide, flat Po River basin. Even though it sits over a hundred miles upstream from the mouth of the river where it empties into the Adriatic, its elevation is still only at 75 meters/250 feet. It’s flat and wide open country, primarily agricultural, and it’s like this for a long ways in all directions. The nearest real hills don’t begin until 20 miles to the north or 30 miles to the south.
Riding in the Po Valley is pretty tame, and probably not really to everyone’s taste. Flat and boring, I’m sure many cyclists think. I really like it though, at least in modest doses and at this time of year when it must be at its best with the temperatures down and the bugs mostly gone for the year. The region has a soft, muted beauty to it, and if you pick your routes well you can bike for miles on quiet roads and paths along canals and rivers, soaking up the pastoral scenery, enjoying the broad views and the solitude, and being amazed by the occasional unexpected sight.
We’ve got three nights here, with time and weather for two day rides. Today we’re going south on a loop that takes us near to the Po River itself; and tomorrow we’ll go north toward the distant mountains.
It’s chilly this morning and we have plenty of time, so we wait around until about 10 or so before finally get started. After a couple of miles we leave the town and its surrounding congestion behind and bike south, paralleling but seldom seeing the Serio River, out of sight behind the trees.
Heading south along the Serio River, out of sight behind the trees. This water alongside the road is just some little channel.
Critters! I was too late to catch the whole group, but five nutria were clustered together in this field until I stopped and they all immediately dashed for cover.
Our ride is the usual mix: quiet paved roads with the occasional dirt connector. RideWithGPS misled us today though, claiming we’d be riding entirely on pavement. This doesn’t look or feel very pavement-like to us.
Jacquie GaudetI've found that RWGPS surface information isn't necessarily accurate. I don't use Komoot so can't compare its accuracy on this point. Reply to this comment 3 years ago
Suzanne GibsonTo Jacquie GaudetI think RWGPS and Komoot might use the same information source since they seem to map the same routes and provide the same information. I haven't done a thorough check on this but it has been my impression so far. Reply to this comment 3 years ago
We’re past the Serio now and are playing tag with the much larger Adda which swallowed up the Serio a few miles upstream from here. Most of our ride through here is within a natural park protecting the Adda and its wetlands.
Video sound track: Pavane, by Pablo Segovia Gardel
At the midpoint in the ride we come to Pizzighettone, a town that I hardly noticed when crafting today’s loop but which proves to be the highlight of the day. A walled city with some impressive surviving monuments, it’s one of the endless number of surprises you encounter in Europe - places you’ve never hear of that were obviously of great importance sometime in the distant past. I couldn’t find anything in English about the place, but this article in Italian gives a thorough and detailed description of the town and its place in history.
We stop for lunch here, sitting on a bench below the wall of a thousand year old church, looking at the remains of the fortified town’s walls that were upgraded by the Spaniards in the 1600’s and then the Austrians a century later.
Approaching Pizzighettone, a place you’ve probably never heard of before either.
Afterwards we cross the Adda and bike north back to our town. The Adda looks really swollen and near flood stage as we cross it, reminding us of a shocking article we read in the news this morning. Not far west of here near Acqui Terme where we’ll be in a few days, history was made three days ago when an unbelievable 29 inches of rain fell in just six hours. It’s the most rain in a six hour period that has ever been recorded in all of Europe. That’s five inches of rain per hour, for six hours straight! Really hard to comprehend. For context, the news pointed out that the region received as much rain in six hours as Seattle receives normally in half a year.
With this in mind, we feel very lucky about the piddling amount of moisture we endured over the last few days and with our forecasted two weeks of dry weather ahead.
Crossing the swollen and rushing Adda River, looking south toward its confluence with the Po.
One field we passed was filled with a huge flock of hundreds, maybe a thousand pigeons. From the distance we could hear their sounds as we biked past, a more or less continuous soft, guttural coo. Then with an explosion of wings they took flight and resettled further off.
