What great people the Puleio's were who operate the Hotel Serena in Arenzano, they even gave us a Italian power adaptor to keep. Aurora there Daughter in her young twenties was a fantastic interpreter. Grazi !
Jenny & I did our last ride along the Med (SS1) for this trip, it has been amazing, over 1600kms of sun, surf, sand, pebbles, high rise, reserves, train line trails, brilliant people (Spain, France & Italy) I would recommend it to anyone.
The massive A10 auto way dwarfing us cyclists & joggers on the SS1 near the coast.
On the outskirts of Jenoa, Italy. About to turn left (North) & head for the hills....pain !
Then on the western outskirts of Genoa we turned left & headed North for the mountains. In hind sight we should has turned off on the SP456 ( our original plan) which is a lot closer to the city centre. But DavoGPS in his wisdom decided to give us a work out.
And let the fun begin. 9kms to climb upto 560 metres above sea level....ouch.
Looks like Mondays are washing day ! Hmmm that reminds me,...Jenny ?
Stream flowing down from the Mountains.
First 250 metres of elevation conquered, time to get some food.
It was bloody hard work people, Davo took us on single lane farm back roads that at least were paved. It was incredibly scenic, but difficult to fully enjoy after spending 3 hours of riding in 2nd & 1st gear plus a fair chunk of walking ! We covered 9kms in that time that included a 40 minute rest & food stop in Aquasanta. If you believe our Nikon Camera with it's internal GPS we reached an elevation of 561 metres & started the day at about 3 metres.
Buy some food, Pane (buns) & Loquates, at Aquasanta, then eat it all with eggs..yum!
Rail bridge just out of Aquasanta, the steep climb continues. Why is Jenny staring at that car ?
Jenny: "it's so cute I want one, in fact I bloody want one right NOW !"
Looking back towards the coast & rail bridge we rode under.
Yes we need to get over those Mountains.
I'm having fun, are you ?
Jen spotted a Bee Keeper stealing honey !
Uh Oh we are down to walking gear slowly zigzaging our way over the Mountain.
Like all good things it finally came to an end and with the exception of a few very minor climbs it was down hill for about the next 20kms. We went through a couple of towns & since we were hungry, very keen to stop. But all the shops were shut. Not closed down, just shut for their 2.5 hour lunch break !?
This is pretty much us at the summit for our day, 561mtrs. At least most of the next 20kms will be down hill....
Let the roller coaster ride begin.
You start to get nervous around 50km/h on a pot holed single lane road that you have never ridden before. We have read stories of people overheating their bicycle rims so much using their brakes that the tyres overheat and explode...
Eventually at 3pm we came across a small Hotel in the middle of no where that was open, called the Bellargio. They were happy to make us a couple of large carbonara's, we also had a couple of beers each. After a quick discussion between ourselves, we decided to ask about accommodation, the Manager said no problem in reasonably good English & sorted us out a room for 60€ including breakfast.
Lucky find, The Hotel Bellargio.
Complete with screeching peacocks.
So not many records broken today but overall a good result, we are about 3 days from crossing into Switzerland and getting onto the Euro Velo 5 towards London. There is a Pass early on during our route through Switzerland called Gottardo Pass it is at 2106mtrs. We are nervous !!!
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