August 15, 2019
Savona
We have done over 1000km !
It was the right decision we made to get the train to Genoa yesterday. We enjoyed poking around Genoa but todays ride around the Liguria Coast to Savona was superb.
We decided to take Scott and Rachael’s advice and ditch the train and take on the metropolis of Genoa and it was the right thing to do. We downed a banana and were on the road as the bells were striking 7am and the street sweeping machines were busy. I had a good route on my phone. At first the streets were very narrow but there was not much traffic and none out to beat the speed record. After a short time we were on a wide road with a wide bus lane which we were able to stick to. The only problem was when we neared the place of last year’s disasterious bridge collapse where we had to do some wiggles to get around the new construction. It was a year ago yesterday when a huge span of that massive bridge collapsed killing 46 people. Yesterday there was a big memorial effect to commemorate this - the reason for the collapse hasn’t been found yet. Looking today at these huge motorway constructions flying over me it suprises me that more dont fall down. This urban jungle continued for about 10km and we didn’t see a single other cyclist. After that things got more like normal small towns and cyclists began to appear. It is important to realise that all the big fast traffic, like trucks take the motorway which is flying above you and plunging into tunnels as we potter along beside the sea.
It was after 20km we reached Arenzano (were we had been going to train to) and we were truely in holiday territory. There was a fine coffee stop and we could watch the serious business of people and all their paraphernalia going down for a day at the beach - it certainly seems that you needs lots of bits and pieces . We went across the road to look at a beach, this one was stony, one person had a drill like thing to make a hole to erect his umbrella - there were person to person bronzed bodies lying out there, some were dipping themselves in the sea and small children were filling buckets with pebbles. It is certainly different from the beaches as we know them in New Zealand with their wide open spaces of sand, the comparatively few people and no fences going down into the sea to fence off different areas.
From Arenzano to Cogoleto and then with a small gap for the town on to Varraze there is a wonderful rail trail for walkers and cyclists. You whizz along above the beaches hearing the happy laughter of children and the splash of people in the ocean. Headlands at this stage are eliminated as you cycle through well lit tunnels - you just cant help feeling happy. After that it is back on the road you are sharing it with cars but they are holiday traffic. I particularly liked it when someone going past put his head out the window and yelled out ‘Go Kiwi’. Savona somewhat to my surprise has a largish port with some big ships in it. We were staying at the other end in the beach part at a Band B Hotel
Dropping our gear over the road we went to a ‘beach club’ for lunch. This was a new experience for us and we loved it. What it was a fenced off bit of beach (covered in bronzed bodies) combined with an ultra busy restaurant. To sit on the beach you need a reservation so we had to sit slightly inside. We were about the only people with clothes on - no it wasn’t a nudist beach most of them had bikinis or some other sort of bathing suits on. Ken commented that people over a certain age or above a certain body mass index shouldn’t expose too much flesh. (You can understand why I was pleased I was not in a bikini) The food was great and everyone was tucking in. We had large beers and melon with Prosciutto Crudo which was exceptionally good. Then back to the hotel for a little sleep.
Today's ride: 48 km (30 miles)
Total: 1,017 km (632 miles)
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4 years ago
Ciao
Ken and Tricia
4 years ago
4 years ago
Ciao
Ken and Tricia
4 years ago