Scenery: A+

I did come here for the scenery and the cycling infrastructure. No question the scenery is great. All the mountains here are beautiful. The lakes are serene. There are a couple nice waterfalls. Some of the towns even have character.

Infrastructure: B-

Some may say this is a harsh grade. The good paths, like Mals to Meran to Bozen to Brixen and the bit from Brenner down to Franzensfeste are great. The detours were terrible. Poorly signed, on dangerous roads or just plain unreasonable routes many times longer than the closed section. The Pustertal Radweg has an awful lot of gravel and it’s just not as scenic as the other routes. It’s still nice, just not really nice. And the Dolomiten Radweg. I’d rather not remember that riding experience. The Drau Radweg to Lienz is nice. The signage in Austria is superb. A lot of the path in Austria is brand new. But good luck getting back with the train....

Public Transit: A-

Südtirol does have a good transit network. The hotels will give you a free 7-day card you can use for the busses and trains. It works everywhere except the bus to Pragsser Wildsee and to the Drei Zinnen. I also found out through reading the small print that recumbents can be taken on the train free of charge. Kinda wish I’d known that sooner. The trains go roughly every half hour and cover all of Sudtirol. There is also a pretty good bus network. It doesn’t appear ridership is all that high. Whether it’s just beyond tourist season, or people are driving because of covid, or just not advertised well enough, I’m not sure.

Facilities: B+

there are actually quite a few towns at regular intervals with bakeries, ice cream parlors, restaurants, grocery stores, etc. One thing though is that in smaller towns shops close from noon to 3pm. Very inconvenient if you wanted to stop at, say, a grocery store to buy lunch rather than haul it with you. Better do that before noon or you’ll go hungry. There are trail side restaurants, but that means a longer sit down affair. It also costs more. Bathrooms mostly weren’t too hard to find. Train stations are the surest source. Some communities will rarely have public restrooms. Some charge €.50, others do it as a public service. And most just don’t bother. My favorite was the highly advertised trail side bathroom today in Austria. The signs started well before the bathrooms begging you to use the public facility and not pee along the trail. Ironically I’d just seen a large touring group stop along the trail a bit back to spread out and find their own tree to pee behind. The bathrooms were great, but charging for them may not quite have the intended result. I think most people would rather pee behind a tree for free than pay to pee.

And finally, Italians as a people and culture: D

Now, before you judge my judgement, this is entirely my opinion based on my personality. Most people will have a radically different perspective. I will explain myself.

As I said in an earlier journal entry, I am an incredibly introverted person. I have lived alone for 20 years (minus my 2 cats who ironically are super people oriented.) I love living alone. My job involves noise, usually cloaked in the veil of being “music.” At the end of the day I treasure utter silence. Italians are not a silent folk. They are very emotive. Very talkative. All the things I can’t stand.

They also have a very different opinion on what constitutes personal space. This is another one that really bothers me. They will blow right by you on a bike path completely unannounced. What happens if you swerve at the last minute to avoid running over a tree branch or a snake, or a small child?  The same goes for being in line for something. Or walking on a hiking trail.

And finally, Italians have a very loose view on rules. They have lots of rules, like wearing masks for instance, but not very many people bother to follow the rules, even on the trains, and no one says anything about it. Certainly not hotel managers or restaurant workers. I’ve no idea if the police or Kontrolle or whosever it is that enforces this stuff ever hands out any fines or gets around to enforcing these things. It just did not leave me feeling very safe. This one is entirely on me for not better researching what Italy is like during a pandemic. I figured northern Italy would be more like Austria and Germany. It most send is not. It is entirely Italian and full right now of Italian tourists.

Will I ever come back here, nope. Not a chance. There are many of my trips I would gladly do over again. I would ride the Tauern Radweg between Krimml and Salzburg along with the back way from Zell am See through Bad Reichenhall to Salzburg again in a heartbeat. I would ride the Rhein from Mainz to Koblenz again. I would probably ride the Mosel again. And definitely I would ride the liebliches Taubertal over again. I might even ride the Main and Bodensee Königsee again. But I would not come back to Italy. There are too many people and the culture is all the things that really stress me out.

I want to finish by reiterating that my experience is not going to be the experience of everyone. I’m sure this area would be a blast for people that enjoy being in crowds. It’s sort of a great big outdoor theme park. If you like that sort of thing, then Südtirol is perfect for you. I hate theme parks.