| Day # |
22 |
State of Legs |
:-) |
|
Distance (miles) |
Distance (km) |
Ascent (feet) |
Ascent (metres) |
Punctures |
| Today |
0 miles |
km |
0 feet |
metres |
0 |
| Trip Totals |
1029 miles |
km |
38719 feet |
metres |
0 |
Travelogue
The heat these last few days has been slowly but surely draining my energies away! My legs haven't faded once, but there's an overall tiredness setting in because of the conditions. My current location is a great place to stay and rest so that's the plan for today. I'd considered staying for two days but on reflection have decided to get back on the bike tomorrow and head for Tende in the Alpes-Maritimes department of France. Yes, France. My route is about to cross the French border but will shortly afterwards cross back into Italy.
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| The pink line is the France/Italy border |
There's quite a big climb to do to get to Tende, so I'll be making a very early start to ensure I do the climb in the cooler part of the day.
Meanwhile, I shall enjoy my day off. There's a lot to like here. The birds are always audible. I saw what I think were fireflies when it was dark, which was a first for me. Certainly they were flying insects that acted like they had flashing LEDs inside them! Very cool. And there are butterflies of various types. This one seems to be a Chromebook fan.
And of course there's always food to consider. I had to carry all my food here on my back yesterday so I don't have the biggest selection but I have more than enough to get me through to tomorrow. Breakfast was an orange and some biscuits. Lunch will be a large sardine and tomato sandwich. And dinner is to be a replay of what I had last night, which I have to say was utterly delicious. Couscous, tuna, tomatoes and the tastiest pesto I ever had in my life, with a little Tabasco sauce to liven things up. Yum.
Meanwhile, the morning is best summarised pictorially:
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| The view from inside my tent with no flysheet - a room with a view! (sorry about the knees!) |
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| I borrowed a chair so I can sit and read comfortably - very relaxing |
Newsflash!
"It's all part of the adventure"
"If it can go wrong, it will go wrong"
"Every cloud has a silver lining"
All of the above are pertinent! I was talking with my host, Anna and her daughter, Cecilia and discovered something really important. Part of my route is closed!! That's part of the Eurovelo 8 route (not mentioned on their web site). And... Google Maps still routes through the closed section. Oh my!
Specifically, there's a tunnel called the Colle de Tende tunnel that the mountain part of the route uses. But apparently a section of it was destroyed in a storm two years ago (and Google Maps doesn't have this information?!). The train line is still open though and Cecilia helped me look at trains that could take me and The Mule through this section but unfortunately there were no tickets available for tomorrow or the day after.
I was told that there's an alternative route that might be possible in theory. A very twisty, mountain route that looks very enticing. I started plotting a route to use it and found some of it is off-road, which could mean anything of course. Might be OK. Might be impossible for The Mule and its load. But worst of all, it eventually passes through a new tunnel that is currently under construction. I couldn't find further details but Anna said sometimes it was open and sometimes not. I can't risk cycling all that way to find that this tunnel is also closed, especially not in hot weather. Frustration and exhaustion aside, there's also the risk of running out of water to consider.
So after some deliberation, I've decided to go a completely different way and bypass this mountain section entirely, much as I had been looking forward to it. The key goals still apply. Enjoy the trip. Stay safe and don't do anything too spectacularly stupid (there's a certain level of natural stupidity to be expected!).
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| Old route in black. New route in blue. |
This is a detour of about 100 miles but that's not the way I'm looking at it. There's nothing magical about the original route. It was just one idea of many possible ideas. And now I have a new one. I'll see some of coastal Italy now which I would not have done before. "It's all good" applies also :-)
I've spent the last two hours researching and planning. I've tentatively selected my next two destinations; a campsite near Mondovi tomorrow and then a hotel in a very small town called Ponte di Nava, immediately after a bit of climb. I'm waiting for each to confirm I have a reservation. If not, it's back to the drawing board!
Another newsflash!
The family that run this farm/campsite are just wonderful. After I had come up with a way around the closed tunnel and in fact the whole mountain route, they took a look and immediately started offering helpful suggestions. The essence of the advice was that my destination was a good one as apparently there's a cycle path along the coast from Imperia. But some of the roads Plotaroute had put me on were going to be busy. So, Anna's husband, Peio patiently worked out an alternative way to get to Imperia which included some of the mountains, was most definitely going to be scenic and above all would be much quieter in terms of traffic volumes.
So here's what the new route looks like.
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| The new route is the one on the right |
I've booked somewhere to stay just over halfway into the new route at a place called Garessio. There's quite a lot of climbing involved but then that's exactly what I was originally planning to do before the Tunnel of Doom issue arose. It will be fine.
I'll be forever grateful for the help I've had today and on other occasions this trip.
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