September 13, 2023
Day 7: Arezzo to Cellai
I should be sleeping like a log
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Will someone please remind me to use the road cycling option when creating routes? I am so done with steep rocky gravelly sandy pothole- and deerfly-ridden "roads" already! Has the idea of bike touring turned into a bikepacking backcountry free-for-all? Because Eurovelo 7 (and 5, I'm told) has a lot of this type of terrain. Too much for my taste.
But what I'm really complaining about is the mistake I made after leaving EV7 in what was supposed to be a less-hilly shortcut to our campground outside Firenze. I knew we faced some climbing challenges, but I at least thought we were out of the woods (pun intended). We were on a perfectly good medium-traffic road when I got the signal to turn left uphill versus going straight downhill. It seemed fishy, but I wasn't about to let laziness lead us astray. The pavement soon turned to dirt. After many sweaty minutes of pushing our bikes up this steep incline, I zoomed out on the map and was disheartened by how little progress we'd made. I proposed turning back. Unlike with a paved road, we couldn't just fly back down. We'd have to walk it. We decided to keep pushing ahead. It turned out to be a good decision. After we reached a peak, conditions improved little by little. Eventually we even reached pavement again. I think the thing that irked me the most is that there were no incredible views or other interesting sights along the way. The psychological impact of knowing that there were more hills ahead left me feeling defeated.
I'm getting ahead of myself. There was a bunch of stuff that happened before this, but my recollection of it is somewhat blurred. Fortunately we have some photos to trigger my memory.
As you now know, today was anything but "straight and narrow". It was quite varied, and in hindsight, I appreciate that. We were also aided by a break in the weather. You wouldn't have known it from our hotel room, however. We kept the windows open all night in hopes of catching a cool breeze or two. What we were really doing was hosting a buffet for the mosquitoes, who hassled us just enough to disturb our sleep somewhat. We should've just asked the front desk for a fan. Lesson learned!
We quickly made our way to the outskirts of Arezzo, where we rejoined EV7 just in time for a stretch of boring highway. But this was a ruse. Someone had ordered the idyllic Tuscan countryside package for us. We spent the next hour or so just soaking it in.
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For a section so picturesque, we sure didn't take many pictures! Not great for the journal, but to me this is a sign that we were in the zone and enjoying the ride too much to want to stop often.
What followed was literally a mountain bike course through a nature reserve. It was early enough in the day for it to be "type 2" fun, but objectively it was just as bad or worse than the section I ranted about in the first couple of paragraphs. It was pretty long. It felt very long. We toughed it out. Also notice that we took no good photos, as we were too busy swatting away flies.
Thankfully, the next section was mostly straight, flat hardpack. Monotony in small doses is wonderful!
Mentally, the day was divided into two sections: pre- and post-Decathlon. We were bound and determined to get a screw-on isobutane canister, and sure enough, they were in stock! Our hard work finally pays off.
Knowing that the post-Decathlon push was going to be a doozy, we grabbed some cold drinks at the nearby Coop (I assume it's pronounced "co-op", 'cause that's what I'm used to) and rested for a while in the shade. We were grateful for the cooler weather. Hill climbing in the afternoon sounded pretty daunting, but not impossible.
We followed a road through an industrial zone, then met up briefly again with EV7 for the first big climb. I had identified three steep stretches. This first one was difficult. When there's traffic, I try really hard not to stop. It's not just concern that drivers think I'm crazy/incompetent/whatever -- because honestly, European drivers are pretty chill by our standards. It's more that I won't be able to easily start up again on the slope, and that I'll have to wobble for a few seconds to get my balance and cadence established again, which is dangerous when a car is approaching. But there's one thing I refuse to do, and that's to wish for the traffic to disappear, because when that happens, it means we're either on or about to be on one of these backroad bushwhacking adventures.
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Yeah, so that's what happened, and rather than bore you with another photo of us pushing our bikes up an impossibly steep gravel grade (not that we took any such photos), here's a happy scene that finally greeted us at the peak:
And I think this is me after walking down a not-impossibly-but-quite-dangerous grade:
We finally hit pavement. We were incredibly relieved, but really knocked out, and I just didn't know how we were going to tackle the biggest climb of all that was just around the corner. Then I spotted the oasis that is Camping Il Poggetto, and I said to my dear wife: this is it. We're not going any further today. And she said okay, rather unenthusiastically. But then we got a beer and took a shower and we both knew that we had made a very wise decision.
Today's ride: 65 km (40 miles)
Total: 426 km (265 miles)
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