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DI +1 Cinque Terre

On Saturday a chartered bus took us back to Firenza and everyone had their own reservations home. At least three couples were going back to Rome.  The Carlson’s, Brenda and I had planned three nights in Cinque Terre, five villages built in the mountains on the Mediterranean. In addition to walking paths, the villages are now connected by a train, and together form a National Park.  We spent the entire day Monday walking the paths and riding the train.

Our “room” is in Vernazza, shown above.  A couple of photos from today’s hike are shown below.

 

 

 

 

After a strenuous day of hiking on Monday we took it easy on Tuesday, mostly roaming through the largest town Monterosso.  The train took us back to Vernazza for a picnic lunch on the pier: foccacia, wine and gelato.  Tomorrow we return to Firenza and Wednesday to Dallas.

Due to unknown technical problems, I have not been able to update the slide show for this tour.  When I resolve this, I’ll post a blog to this effect.  Otherwise, the next “planned” blog will be in (possibly) in February from California but definitely in April 2011 when we spend 4 weeks cycling in in Spain.

DI 12 Todi to Orvieto

Photo: Todi from 10 km towards Orvieto

Today is our last riding day and a glorious day it is. In terms of terrain and distance it is much like yesterdays – two long climbs in the morning and a then steep climb into town at the end.  The first two climbs are gentle and don’t require the low “granny” gear. Between the two climbs we stop at Prodo for coffee. Harry wanted to buy property in this quaint, isolated community.  See photos below.

 

 

 

 

The second downhill is especially nice; an extremely smooth road, gently downhill, wide switchbacks, sometimes tree lined, sometimes spectacular vistas.  I did not stop to take pictures, merely savored the moment.  -- The climb into Orvieto was very steep and with heavy traffic.

I forgot to mention that, 10 km from the end of the tour, I had a flat tire. I believe this was the first flat tire any of us had the entire 12 days.

We were in town by lunchtime so had plenty of time to dissemble and pack the bikes.  It takes approximately an hour, depending on several factors.

Click here for details on today's ride.

MEET THE RIDERS

You’ve met the ten couples who are riding, so today you’ll meet the people who designed and conducted the tour for us.

At left is Luca our guide. Luca is a geologist, teacher, spelunker, climber, canyoneering guide, former local champion skier, and who knows what else.  He has guided us, assisted us, and taught us.  Luca has made this more than just a bike tour; I think we all now know more about Italy and Italians.

Behind the scene, however, is the team who had designed and planned the tour as well as make all arrangements –‘where we go, where we stay, often what we eat. They prepare a “road book” for each of us which describes in excellent detail the roads we ride on, the turns we make, etc. Click here to learn more about Viadelsole's staff.  Because of another tour that Viadelsole did for us in 2005, I’ve been emailing with Bepe for over 6 years.  This is the first time I met him. Photo on right was taken this morning when he drove out to tell us “good-bye”.

DI 11 Spoleto to Todi

Although you rarely hear of it, Spoleto has been in important city for over 2,000 years. Yesterday many of us had difficulty getting into town. Some had more than others; see photo of Jim Hoyt. (Where’s the cyclocross-bike when you need it?) Several of us were led into town by a California cyclist who has been cycling out of Spoleto for several days.

And this morning, Brenda and I weren’t the only ones who had difficulty getting out of town. The man who had served our breakfast at the  hotel saw our predicament and led us out of town as we followed his car.

Today, on the road to Todi (click on the Todi link, it’s very interesting) we travel a little while on SP3 – the third Roman Road, this one going through Venice. It is a beautiful sunny day.  We have two pretty climbs and then a third to get to the town. We’re in town a little after noon so shower and then go into town for lunch and to explore the town.

Click here for details of today's ride.

 

 

 

 

 

Pictures above are near the top of the first climb and at the top of the second climb

Churches in Todi, neither of which is the Cathedral.

Above, street scenes in Todi

MEET THE RIDERS

Brenda and I have lead 5 tours for DATES; we’ve also led about 10 tours for Bicycle Adventure Club. Since retiring 10 1/2 years ago, we’ve been on 40 to 50 bike tours. I’m the only remaining member who attended the first DATES ride in 1990. We are currently serving as DATES chair-persons. Brenda’s other main interest is cooking.

We’re very fortunate in having such a great group of DATES members and friends who share our love of cycle touring and are fun to be with.

Photo was taken yesterday at the lunch and wine tasting.

DI 10 Assisi to Spoleto

Today’s ride is probably the easiest of the tour, as long as you don’t take the afternoon route to Montefalco. At most, two couples did this.
We have a special treat today, a picnic lunch, wine tasking and winery tour at the Dionigi di Mancinelli Chiara winery outside of Bevagna. The tasting was designed around 4 wines but many of us tasted six. And several of us ordered wine to be shipped to the US.











Roberto and Caroline were wonderful hosts. We had more food than we could eat and the wine pourings were very generous.





On TODAY'S ROUTE many of us got lost, some more than others, getting from the bike path to Spoleto.
Below a group picture at the winery

MEET THE RIDERS

Al and Cheryl Minvielle are from San Francisco, which is named after St Francis of Assisi. How they got involved with DATES is a long story! Cheryl retired from United Airlines and Al recently retired as “Director of Special Activities” an the University of California, San Francisco. They have previously toured with John & Brenda in Texas, Ireland and Wales. All of these were with Bicycle Adventure Club.

DI 09 Il Poggiolo to Assisi

This is being written at 9:30 am Tuesday morning.  Everyone was ready to leave about 20 minutes ago when it started raining – hard.  So we’re waiting out the rain. I’m told there was a major storm last night with lightening and thunder but I slept through it.  -- Later: The Carlson’s and Brenda and I leave about 10:20 and get rained on, mostly gentle but about 20 minutes of hard rain where I had difficulty seeing the road through my fogged glasses.

We do not stop at the ceramics factory in Duret (Yea!).  We hear that two of our couples spend considerable money at this facility. We have difficulty finding a restaurant open for lunch but do find a pizzeria about to close at 1:45 and he makes us a great “to go” bag which we eat as soon as we get to the villa.  Tonight’s villa seems to be a modern facility but they don’t have internet. Grrrr!

On the way into town, looking for lunch, we pass Santa Maria Maggiore (shown on left), the city cathedral until 1020. I think I read or was told this is where St Francis of Assisi died but cannot confirm this.

 

 

In Assisi we visit Basilica di San Francesco which was started just 18 months after St Francis died on October 4, 1226. The basilica has two churches, one on top of the other. St Francis tomb is below the lower church but I believe the crypt wasn’t dug until the last 1800’s. The basilica was severely damaged in the 1997 earthquakes but restoration has been completed.

MEET THE RIDERS

Jim and Melody Yuhn ride both tandems and road bikes. Jim has a new Trek Madone waiting for him when he returns to Dallas. In addition they ride motorcycles.  Jim has a Yamaha FJR (I think that’s it) 1300. Melody has moved up from a Vespa scooter to a small (250 cc) motorcycle to a respectable Honda 650. They take weekend tours on the motorcycles. The Yuhn’s (in addition to the Hoyt’s and the Bryant’s were with us in 2005 for the BAC Costa a Costa ride across Italy. A few of the places we’re staying, including last night and tonight, are repeats from 5 years ago.) Several of our riders have developed colds or some sort of upper respiratory infection. Today was Melody’s turn. Damn.

After last night’s storms and today’s off/on rain, we have a nice sunset at the villa

DI 08 Cotrona to Agriturismo Il Poggiolo

Today’s destination is an agriturismo in the Umbrian countryside. It is also the home of Viadelsole, the company with which we contracted this tour.

The main thing to note is that Brenda and are back on the bike as if nothing has happened, a few aches and pains being ignored. In fact, we did an extension to the original route, adding 15 km and two climbs of 1,200 and 1,000 feet. The first climb takes us to the very isolated village of Mercatale, where we find a nice bar for coffee. Photo right, Harry and Janette top the first, most difficult, climb.

After the climbs, the route was mostly around Trasimeno Lake.  There are several islands on the lake (see photo on left) which can be visited but we reject this option. In fact the weather looks threatening after lunch so we don’t dally. We arrive at the villa about a half hour before the rain.

See today's ride

Some of us visit a bike store in Perugia which has been family owned since 1933. Jim and the shop owner get along well.  Tonight we have a cooking class and it’s quite a production.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Left, Jim Hoyt hanging laundry.  On right, a wine break from the cooking class.

Alfonsa leads the cooking class. Since she speaks no English, Luca translates.

MEET THE RIDERS

Harry and Janette Thompson are long time active DATES members.  Janette retired a couple of years ago from the legal profession and Harry retired this year from Honda-Acura finance. Janette is in love with tennis and plays on several teams. They have been on both of the former DATES tours, England and Nova Scotia. Also note their photo at the beginning of this blog.

DI 06-07 Montalcino to Cortona

Hotel Capitani in Montalcino (see Thompsons and Barton’s at breakfast) is an excellent hotel in this very hilly town.  The view (right) from our hotel room looks like it’s the top of the world.  We looked over a fog gradually lifting from the valley this morning.  But we’re at the  we’re at the bottom of the town and every place we walk is up.

Saturday is a loop ride from Montalcino. Those who did it said it was the prettiest ride so far.

Montalcino and Montepulciano, which we pass through on Sunday are famous for Brunello (Sangiovese) wines.  But why wait for Sunday when we can taste on Saturday? So we have a wine-tasting (photo above on right) at the Encota Wine Bar in the fort (Fortezza). Photo below is a typical street seen in Montalcino, or any Tuscan town.

Sunday’s ride, at 90 km the longest of the trip, first takes us through Pienza. The town was designed by Rossellino for Pope Pius the something or other. Brenda still does not feeling like riding, particularly this long distance, so we go in the van with Luca. In over 75 bike tours, this is the first time I’ve ridden in the van. I mentioned that our fall was the first in 12 years. During that time, we’ve ridden over 27,000 miles on the tandem.

Cortona, which dates somewhere from the 9th to 4th centuries B.C., in recent years was made famous by Frances Mayes’ book and movie “Under a Tuscan Sun.”  Brenda and I stop at one of the many street-side osterias; we had the best pizza yet. We’re staying at a spa Villa a couple of kilometers below the town. Happy hour and dinner is here tonight. See below alleys and doorways of Cortona.

MEET THE RIDERS (TWO TEAMS)

Jim and Rhonda Hoyt, owners of the Richardson Bike Mart, have probably been riding tandems longer than most of us. Jim is most famous for kicking Lance Armstrong off the shop team and taking away both his bike and car. Lance talks about this in “It’s Not About The Bike”. Rhonda suffered a major bike accident in 2006 when a car ran over her. She has recovered with a vengeance and most of us can’t keep up with her on the bike. Although both are suffering from bad colds this week, they haven’t missed a mile.

 

 

Alan and Renee Kailer probably trained more for this ride than the rest of us – studying the Italian language, watching Italian movies, eating Italian food and also training on the bike. Renee lost weight and rode her first hundred mile ride.  The Kailer’s are editors of the club newsletter, DATES Line, and published the latest copy while on this tour!

DI 05 Siena to Montalcino

Friday’s blog was delayed – you’ll soon learn why.

Remembrances of Siena – first a composite of 17 photos from Siena’s Il Campo.

Once again I give directions; this time I think it’s to an Italian.  As we approach Siena, still outside the wall, a lady has stopped her car, gotten out and, as we pass, pointing the direction we’re going, and hollers “Centro?”. I nod and holler back “Si”. At least we think we’re going in that direction.

In Siena, I choose for lunch, probably the only restaurant in Italy that doesn’t serve wine. The waiter offered beer. I accept and then learn it’s non – alcoholic. I didn’t know there were Baptists in Italy!

But our dinner made up for it; we chose the restaurant based on Rick Steve’s recommendations.  It was excellent. -- There is a Rick Steve’s tour group in our hotel. I imagine chaos when 30 of them and 20 of us arrive simultaneously at 7:30 for breakfast tomorrow.

Friday we leave Siena and soon the landscape changes with us. We now have rolling wheat fields, already harvested and plowed under. The smell changes with the sights. I don’t think this will last long; we’re headed to Italy’s most famous wine region, Brunello.

We have very light rain for part of the morning’s ride. After a visit to the Eustachian museum in Murlo we stop for a long lunch in Buonconvento. 

It starts raining for real as we leave the restaurant.  About 1 kilometer down the road I see a railroad track crossing the road at  a 45 degree angle. For almost 40 years, I’ve been maneuvering to cross track like this at a right angle. Well I didn’t get a good enough angle or was going too fast, probably both, but all of a sudden we’re lying in the road.

There are two types of falls from a bicycle. In one, you feel the wheel start to slide and try to correct it. Sometimes you can. In the other, you don’t feel the fall. One second you’re riding and the next second you’re down. We experienced this type of fall, our first in 12 years of tandeming.

Brenda was in shock (probably lasted 10 or 15 minutes); I had difficulty getting her to her feet and off the road. Help was immediate since we left the restaurant a minute ahead of our lunch group. And others, including our guide Luca were still at the restaurant. Passing motorists also offered help and one lady took Jim Yuhn back to get Luca, who administered first aid in the van (photo at left). We determined it was worth a visit to the hospital to get her checked over. Brenda got three stitches in her forehead and had brain x-rays. We waited and waited for the x-ray results but finally just left. Luca, Bruce and Carol had waited patiently for at least four hours at the hospital. We got to the hotel about 10:15. Bummer of a day but could have been tragic if she wasn’t wearing a helmet.

See pre-crash ride date here

MEET THE RIDERS

Bruce Hudson and Carol Croy got their first tandem in 1998, then an S&S coupled tandem in 2006 for the DATE’S England tour.  They immediately became active DATES members and have been newsletter editor and rides coordinators. Like Brenda and I, they both retired from Mobil Oil. Bruce and Carol have been on our other two tandem tours, England and Nova Scotia. They have REALLY been looking forward to the Italy tour and Carol said it has been  everything she hoped for. We thank them for their patience in the Siena Hospital yesterday.