June 2, 2024
Day 7 - Salurn to Peschiera del Garda
I still hate Italians and Italy
I had a very nice quiet night of quality sleep in the B&B in Salurn, perhaps in part to the massive pizza I ate last night. Breakfast was not the largest, but I did give the proprietress extra credit for leaving an orange and a banana for me. Only one roll for breakfast seemed a bit meager though. Maybe Italians don’t eat large breakfasts?
The weather this morning was the best of the trip. Beautiful sun and warm. The B&B owner wished me a good ride and assured me the weather today would be fantastic all day.
My route resumed more of those great North Italian bike paths along the river. Smooth and fast. There was a lot of bike and pedestrian traffic with lots of people out with expensive carbon road bikes and fancy Lycra kit and their silly aero socks. However, none of them seemed interested in playing chase-the-velomobile. It was most disappointing. I always marvel at how much difference smoothing the airflow around the rider makes. Technology that allows an average rider to keep pace with a really strong rider, all through human power alone is pretty remarkable to me.
Speaking of power, about 2/3 the way to Trento I got sidetracked by a series of people in yellow vests along the route. None of them spoke English. They just kept saying “Trento?” with me replaying “yes. Trento.” Then they would point a certain direction. However, at one point the cyclist I was following went one way, and I inquired to the person with the yellow vest and was told to take a left. So I did. But it didn’t seem like I was going the right way. So I stopped at a corner and consulted my map. Indeed I was headed in quite an inefficient way. While I was stopped, I tried to ask the guy with the yellow vest there which way to go. Having no common language, this was quite counterproductive. Instead he kept trying to push me backwards. I couldn’t figure out why, until I saw a series of cars coming. Turns out there was a youth bike race happening and I was right on the corner of the intersection where they would be turning. The peloton moved through quickly with one poor kid straggling off the back. Once they had passed, I was allowed to proceed forward and finally found the bike path.
I reached Trento around noon. Here is where I made my first poor navigational choice. It started with opting to ride in the road because I wanted to make better time through Trento. This led to getting yelled at by a driver for daring to use the road. He leaned out the window and motioned at the bike path. This put me out of sorts. Even at home I’ve only experienced this once, despite the reputation of US drivers. As a result, I did not pay attention to the fact that the road I was on would end and dump me on a main road with no further access to the bike route. I ended up having to turn around and backtrack about half a mile to get on the bike path again. Not exactly what I wanted on a 79 mile day backed up against a 102 mile day. I didn’t train for this many miles.
Things want a little better once I exited Trento, but the bike path was having a hard time deciding which side of the river to be on. First it was on the East side, then the west side. Then it went up above the river to the canal. Then back down through the grape vines. And here, and there, and everywhere. More and more the path surface would deteriorate. Tree roots breaking up the surface, spots that seemed like they probably had been flooded a few times decaying the path, nasty transitions between path and road, bollards leaving a very narrow place to navigate through, right turns onto little bridges. You name it, it happened today.
Meanwhile, as I was starting to curse the path which was killing my nice average speed and making my original plan of arriving midafternoon in Peschiera, I noticed some ominous clouds building in the mountains to the west. My weather report had indicated a chance of rain around 3pm, but this was only 1:30pm. The clouds looked like they were moving in ever closer. In fact it looked rather imminent. Not desiring to recreate the experience of three days ago when I was caught in a deluge reminiscent of Noah’s Flood, I decided to take a lunch break under a bridge and see what would happen. Within about 15 minutes the skies had opened up and started bucketing down rain. It didn’t take long for me to be joined under the bridge by quite a few more people, all of which looked pretty wet. Not only was it getting really wet, but it also started getting cold. I pulled my coat out and put it on while I consulted the radar to see how much longer this would last. It looked like a pop-up storm that would pass. However, the storm didn’t seem to much care what the radar said. It took a good hour before it decided to let up.
Once back riding, the skies still didn’t look very nice. Neither did the path. The horrible surface and constant changing of sides of the river continued. Then it started to rain again. When I got to the next bridge, I found many of the same riders that had been hiding with me under the last bridge. This time a group of German speaking cyclists came by to ask about my velomobile. We had quite an awkward conversation which started with one of them asking me questions including if I was going to get out (no, why would I do that when it’s warm and comfy inside?) and then led to them talking to each other while standing next to my bike staring at it. Finally they ran out of things to say and moved on. Shortly after that I fell asleep. When I woke up the rain had stopped and everyone had gone.
The path continued to be a questionable mess of a riding experience and at one point I got so fed up I took the road. Which was going well until the road headed up a steep hill and I discovered it was now going in a direction I did not want to go. I backtracked down the hill and got on the cycle path again. However, the cycle path and its terrible surface also decided to go up a hill. A steep hill. With wet pavement, wet pavement in pretty horrid condition. The signs warning of 10% grades weren’t helping. With the wet path and poor pavement, my rear tire was periodically slipping. Things were not going well. I’d added the foam cockpit cover earlier due to the cold and the rain. Now I was getting pretty steamy I side, both from my body heat, and also because I was getting rather mad. I had expected another great magical ride like yesterday and was having a tough time seeing the magic in the current riding experience.
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The route today was not a planned route. I had originally intended to ride over to the Gardasee from Rovereto, but due to condensing three days into two, I had decided to stay along the river until the south end of the lake and then cross over. That meant this ride was not a well-planned one, and it showed. Once essentially on top of the hill overlooking the Gardasee, I saw a sign for the bike path to Gardasee. I decided to take that route. Bad choice. The road I ended up on was not really heading to the Gardasee. In fact, I’m it even sure what the bike route sign was for. It certainly didn’t seem to be right. Things went from bad to worse as I tried to navigate my way back to my planned route descending into utter chaos when I ended up on what was allegedly a bike route through woods up steep wet hills. One hill was so wet and steep and covered in leaves and other crap, that I had to get out and push up the hill because my rear tire was slipping so badly. At this point I started letting loose with a series of words that I will not share here. I will simply summarize it as this: Italian roads are bad, I don’t like Italy, I’m not having fun anymore, make this stop. I nearly lost it when I came to an intersection of multiple paths where two ladies pulled their phones out to record the momentous occasion. I really wasn’t in the mood to be anyone’s entertainment at that moment.
I did finally get back to my planned route which went more quickly until I came to a detour. This led to a steep nervy descent down horribly paved roads that make the roads in Minnesota look good. The poor quality of the pavement and the ridiculously steep grades meant heavy use of the brakes with nowhere good to stop and let them cool. It was a mercy I made it to the bottom without overheating them. This is one of the big reasons I chose a velomobiel with open wheel wells for this trip. Much better cooling of the brakes. Once at the bottom, I joined the main road. I had originally intended to ride the East bank of the lake. It was good I did not do that, because my presence on the road was not very popular with the Italian drivers. I got honked out a couple times and yelled at another. I spent as much time on the bike path as I could, but the path is not always there.
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Meanwhile the sky was starting to look more and more ominous again. Like really scary ominous. Then the lightning kicked in. A roll of thunder. Oh heck. Not again?!? Up ahead I saw an overhang to pull under. I stopped and checked the radar. Another big cell. This could go for over an hour. I was about 8 miles yet from my hotel, and I had not been moving very fast due to the pathetic infrastructure. I really didn’t want to go out in a thunderstorm. It wasn’t raining hard though. After some thought, I decided I’d stay warm and dry enough if I just kept going, so I did. The rain never got especially hard, but it was just enough to continuously pelt me in the face making it sometimes a challenge to see. Every bump or pothole I hit was another reason to curse Italians. When I finally reached my hotel, it was a huge relief. The hotel sign looked like a beacon in the night to me.
The people at the hotel were quite nice. They were not fazed by a smelly wet cyclist and his weird and equally smelly and wet bike. They got me checked in quickly and my bike safely stored. I got a warm room and a hot shower. Now that I am fed and nearly done with the blog, I can go straight to sleep. Don’t come to the Gardasee. It’s a trap. The roads suck. There are more interesting and scenic lakes. I can’t wait to get away from here.
Tomorrow I return to Trento. I will find a better route in the morning. I’ve had enough for today. Tuesday I return to the German speaking part of Italy where they have nice bike paths again. I can’t wait.
Today's ride: 83 miles (134 km)
Total: 399 miles (642 km)
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