The Route: 67% Hilly, 25% Mountainous, 8% Flat

March 15, 2009

After reading these fascinating statistics on the topography of Tuscany, I had to ask myself: What was I thinking of? And why was I so rash as to announce our plans on this site before I knew what we were getting into?

Looking for more information on cycling in Tuscany - encouraging information I hoped - I poured over some bike touring books and scouted around on the Internet. Using www.mapymyride.com, www.gpsies.com, www.bikely.com and www.bikeroutetoaster.com, I charted some routes and created elevation profiles. Here are a few examples.

A round trip starting and ending in Siena
(Map from the bicycle guide "Radatlas Toskana", Esterbauer Publishing House)

Florence - Siena
(Profile generated by Map My Ride)

Siena - Florence
(Elevation profile generated by Bikely)

Siena - Buonconvento
(Profile generated by Bike Route Toaster)

My reaction was, of course, yikes and ohmygod. I think I already mentioned that we are neither the youngest nor the strongest of cyclists. By the way, I noticed that if I map the same route using different programs, they don't all agree on the meters for the total climb. Bikely's figures will be twice that of Bike My Ride, for example. Maybe some register the "felt" climb, others the actual climb?

Enough dramatic build up. What's the good news? One thing, I decided to stop wasting my time creating elevation profiles (although it is a good diversion on a cold, grey day). And why are we riding Bike Fridays if not to be more flexible, to be able to take buses and trains when we feel like it. We had also planned from the very beginning to ride short distances and spend a lot of time visitng towns; this is not a compromise we will be making because of the terrain. One of my special interests will take us to several Medici villas and Renaissance gardens around Florence.

I have now worked out an overall route which seems feasible. We decided to end in Ansedonia where we will visit friends on vacation.

Approximate route: It doesn't cover an enormous distance, but it does entail a lot of things to see, probably more than we can fit in to three weeks (The dotted line will be by train)

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