Hey, Bobby Frost ... if you took the more travelled road you wouldn't be pushing your bike up one that would be more fun to ski down would you! However, you wouldn't have met, and surprised, Alberto, and you wouldn't have become a minor celebrity in Montese either.
Fed, watered and wined in Porretta Terme, with time to reflect on the day, you are absolutely right that the road less travelled is the better choice. But holy crap, a road less travelled in the Apennine involves some serious steep!
We knew today was going to have lots of elevation, all gained and lost in short, sharp shocks. That's the primary reason we planned a short, distance wise, day. Good thing we did too. We could have taken a longer route, with the same net elevation gain, and pedalled our bikes the whole way, but we didn't. As a result, after riding about 20 km, the first 8 on a wet and slick dirt/gravel bike path and the rest on a quiet perfectly paved local highway, we took off basically straight up out of the Panaro river valley towards Montese. Our straight up pedalling lasted about a kilometer. Then we pushed. After about 2 km's , and 350 m of elevation gain (do the math on that gradient), a good chunk of it on a muddy forest track we popped out onto a flat section in Alberto's farm yard.
His dog saw us long before he did, and he (the dog) was getting pretty excited about our arrival. Hearing his dog making quite a commotion, Alberto thought there might be a wild boar thrashing about in the forest. Nope, no boars, just us. Must be quite a site to see two old sweaty lycra clad folks pushing their bike up a muddy forest track that has probably only seen three tractors in the last month.
This unusual confluence of events lead to a good conversation, and from that, thanks to lots of gesticulation and a little help from Google translate, we found out that Alberto had a Pizzeria / Gelateria / Pasticeria in Montese, about a 5 km pedal down more reasonable (i.e 8 - 12% grade hills) road.
After the obligatory pictures, and cleaning the mud out of our cleats, we pedalled off towards Montese for lunch. Since we now knew Alberto we decided to check out his place. When we arrived, word of our adventure had arrived at about the same time. Before long we're recounting our adventures with Gabriel, who's working at the pizzeria, Polly (from London) and her friend Emanuella , who were just having lunch here as well. Then Alberto shows up, cleaned up and not wearing his farmer coveralls's. One thing leads to another and we're all lined up taking pictures and the local retired policeman joins in ... then the talk turns to us ending up in the local paper ... in about 2 months next time it's published!
This sort of thing does not happen on 'the more travelled' Danube or Loire cycle paths, and makes the pretty tough push up the mountain worth it.
The rest of the day we biked along really nice roads and saw lots of beautiful stuff. Cloudy and hazy so this pics don't do it justice but did remind us a lot of Croatia between Zagreb and the Coast ... up and down and green with not a level spot anywhere!
We finished the day in Porretta Terme , a nice little spa town (Terme is Italian for hot springs). More of the same tomorrow as we head into the heart of Tuscany.
Song of the Day, When I'm Up I Can't get Down by Great Big Sea. Just kind of fits with a great big push up hill only to discover folks and experience we are unlikely to ever replicate.
Lyle McLeodTo Glenna JefferiesOptical illusion I think! I’m a bit more particular about packing and my bags are probably more densely packed I’m pretty sure I’m carrying a bit more weight (mostly electronics) Reply to this comment 5 years ago
The first 6-7 km of today's route was wet and slick single track along The Panaro river south out of Vignola. The soil here has a high clay content, making it very slippery when wet! This was one of the better sections.
Just as we started to climb out of the Panaro valley, the sky lightened up a bit. This picture spot also marked the end of our riding for the next ~2 km's!
Rachael AndersonIsn’t it fun pushing your loaded bicycle up a very steep climb! Well think of it as a full body workout. You are both very tough! Reply to this comment 5 years ago
Lyle McLeodTo Rachael AndersonOr incredibly stupid 🕺! In the famous words of Moose DuPont (A defenceman for the Montreal Canadiens in the ‘70’s) .... ‘strong like bull, smart like streetcar!’ Reply to this comment 5 years ago
polly iannacconeSo lovely to meet you at the gelateria and so impressed with your journey so far. Good luck with the rest of your trip, I will be following your progress! Reply to this comment 5 years ago
