Cefalù to Caltavuturo

April 24, 2023

Riding in sunshine today, mostly uphill and mostly into a headwind, or so it seemed. The route was scenic, but not in a postcard sort of way, so neither of us took many pictures.

Here’s one from last night, a Mediterranean sunset.

The first 14 km were relatively flat along the coast and then we started climbing somewhat steeply through Campofelice de Rocella. Lots of traffic and diesel fumes through town and then we came to the market, the reason for all the craziness. Once we were out of town, the grade became gentler and the traffic dropped off.

The next village on our route was Collesano, where we stopped to get some bread to go with the salami and cheese we still have from day before yesterday. Collesano seemed to be a gritty place, but we only saw SP 9 through town so can’t really judge. It was too early for lunch but we stopped at a decrepit park to eat the last of the cookies Al’s been carrying since Randazzo to fuel us up a bit for the rest of the climb.

My jaw dropped when I first saw one of these a couple of days ago. I’ve seen them more advanced so they aren’t a pale version of what I first thought!

St Francis guarding our bikes while we are our cookies.

In Collesano. I noticed a few of these big liked this one best. If I hadn’t learned that Targa Florio was a car race (thanks to a couple of comments in this journal), this would have given me a hint.

SP 9bis (note to self: look up “bis”) was very quiet and pleasant riding. It went up but then it went down and finally ended when it connected to SS 643, another quiet road.

I think that’s Palermo in the distance, in the centre of the photo.

Typical view today once we passed Collesano.

When we turned onto SP 24, we expected no traffic at all since this was signed as closed except for “residents and authorized.” Bikes are generally okay on these so we continued. Down under the autoroute and there’s another sign and partial barricade: “chiuso al transito.” This one looks rather serious but our other choice is to ride back up the hill we just coasted down and then follow a long detour. We decided to continue, pushing our bikes up the initial very steep grade.

It wasn’t very far before we encountered the first work crew, installing low gabion retaining walls (gabions are those wire cages filled with rocks). Al was ahead and the foreman was telling him to turn around and then he saw me and waved us on. I thought I heard him say “capo” and hoped the boss up ahead wouldn’t send us back.

We encountered the second crew around a bend a couple hundred metres further on, complete with excavator and drill rig. A short discussion between Al and, presumably, the capo, and we were permitted to walk through carefully. We were grateful. This closed road under reconstruction was actually in better shape than some of the officially open roads we’ve ridden in Sicily.

Al took a photo of the construction site after we’d passed.

Passing the barrier closest to the uphill side of the construction.

And the barrier a bit further uphill. Off to the left in this photo was the shorter detour we could have taken if we hadn’t gotten through, complete with 27% grade.

This was the second big climb of the day so it was onward and upward to our destination.

Our accommodation in Caltavuturo: B&B Veraluce.

Inside, the place is very new and modern. I wish our new townhouse was so nicely finished! I especially like the lighting in the ceilings. The town was dead when we arrived around 3 in the afternoon. Then it livened up when the school across the street let out and was bustling with people when we went out for dinner around 7:30. Back to very quiet by 9:30 when we returned to our lodging.

Via Vittorio Emanuele, Caltavuturo, on the short walk back from the pizzeria. It, too, was very new inside.

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Today's ride: 49 km (30 miles)
Total: 1,463 km (909 miles)

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