October 3, 2022
In Cuneo
This morning, the first order of business was to locate a laundromat and do two weeks' worth of wash. We found one at the very end of our street about 1 km away. We are inexperienced commercial laundromat washing machines users, but even so, there does not seem to be a universal system except put your clothes in the tub. This one had a centralized control panel and we were very very fortunate to have a local woman walk us through the multiple steps! One hour later we were headed back to our hotel with clean but damp clothes. Here is a hack we just discovered - carry a small ball of twine and connect it around the room to hang your clothes to dry. Magic!
Today was also a route planning day. Cuneo is at a crossroads of sorts that can allow travel in a number of directions. We had been considering the potential of a route through the Alps over Col de Maddalena on the Italian side, known as Col de Larche from the French side. We thought that this may be possible but digging a bit deeper, it seemed to show that cyclists were not permitted to use the road at the top of col on the French side.
Comments from a rider of the web, ¨the hill of La Maddalena (for the French also called hill of Larche); here we immediately find the first dilemma: the road is forbidden to the transit of bicycles, but we as good Italians we care highly and we continue (I dare not think about what we should have done if they had made us go back). However, the road is forbidden to bicycles, but along the ditch there are the classic curbstones for cyclists that indicate height, slope and distance: a real mystery.
The key words - ¨I dare not think about what we should have done if they turned us back ¨ would weigh on our minds on a two day, 1500+ metre climb. Others have also said they have passed through the 4km rock fall zone at the col without an issue. In the end we decided that we would extend our cycling in Italy by continuing to ride east to Ceva and then south to Savona on the Med. This option seemed to have the least weather and routing risks but the Maddalena crossing to France would have been a real experience and we would have also visited Barcelonnette, France.
With the routing settled, we set out for a late lunch / early dinner and to see more of Cuneo. Not for everyone, but the shopping area on Via Roma has a number of high end outdoor shops worth a look such as Camp, Crazy (never heard of them but nice stuff) and North Face to name a few. In the end we came away empty handed. Which is a good thing considering our panniers are already overflowing!
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We watched the sun go down over Piazza Galimberti, with a couple of small plates of antipastos with beer and wine. Back in our room, we repacked the panniers with our clean clothes and prepared for tomorrow's ride to Villanova Mondavi.
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