After the event

Now, back home after the fun, the travel, the excitement, time to pen one more blog entry.

First of all, to cover off on the days that followed...

We came back to Firenze a little tired but happy. Keith and Julie left fairly early on Friday morning, so it was a relatively early night on Thursday. Marie and I had a nice slow day in Firenze, doing a little shopping, experiencing the "famous" Friday hailstorm and a very nice seafood dinner at Pescheria San Pietro, just across the road from S.M.N. One of the best meals of the trip.

On Saturday we caught the train to Termini then the airport. This was A LOT BETTER than the combination that we had used on the way north via Tiburtina. We didn't have adjacent seats on our tickets for the segment from Firenze to Roma but in fact there were empty seats so we could sit together. Yes at Termini we had to put up with some unwanted attention from teenagers trying to "help" us, but not having to be eternally vigilant about luggage at every stop on the regional train made it a lot easier.

At the airport I had some hassles with carrying CO2 cylinders for my tyre inflater, but once that was sorted all went well. Arriving at Dubai I was whisked through to the hotel and had a good night's sleep before an uneventful leg (exit row upstairs on the A380) from Dubai to Sydney. Arrived home tired but OK.

Next to the credits...

First of all to my good friends Keith, Julie and Marie. The trip would have been much the poorer without each of you. Keith was an enthusiastic and constant cycling companion, never complaining, happy to go or to slow or to stop. Julie helped to organise, to make everything appear sorted, to bring a positive and supporting attitude when it was needed. Marie said "oh wow" a lot and had the energy to push on and experience (and to drink grappa), helping us to see Toscana through fresh eyes. Everyone was full of good humour and we joked and teased our way across Italy.

Second to the supporting cast:

• Giovanni, for taking us under his wing on the first two days, for his incredible generosity in helping us to experience "his" Toscana, showing us Lucca, turning a wet day from a negative into a positive: an unforgettable experience. We will never forget you. Thank you.
• Davide Biordi of Hotel Magda (and our taxi driver in Emilia Romagna) for going out of his way to make our logistics work well, including enlisting family help to make sure our beach trip turned out exactly as we wanted.
• The staff (and extended family) at Casa dei Grilli in Longiano for doing that extra bit to make our visit comfortable, enjoyable and memorable. I won't forget being served la cucina d'Emilia in the garden overlooking that extraordinary view.

Third to the extraordinary events, scenery, wine, food and culture of Toscana, Emilia-Romagna and indeed Italia:

• The Chianti Classico wine festival
• The Palio in Sansepolcro. I love the intensity of passion that Italians can bring to this sort of event and the late night celebratory parade. The drums and trumpets still echo!
• Italian drivers, the best in the world and the great roads that we used. Even just thinking about how as we left Firenze, the traffic on Via Senese was happy to just sit behind us would be impossible to imagine in Australia.
• Hills, olive goves, vineyards, towns and castles on hilltops, a postcard around every corner.
• Tartufi bianco e nero! Both in one day!
• Countless lovely wines, with perhaps the best being the Chianti Classico wines we drank at San Lorenzo markets.
• Climbing for 16km without feeling shattered.

Last to the technology and information that allows us (or at least me) to plan and execute such a fabulous trip from the comfort of my home PC, and the technologies that bring our fabulous bikes through such a trip with zero problems!

Festa della Rificolona

I only just found out about this festival and we will be in Firenze on the right day! Some of us may be a little jet lagged, but apart from that it looks like a good idea!

A period of fine tuning

Three months have passed. In this time I have not had to put too much thought into the plan. There have been incremental changes to the web site (some better graphics, some more text and pictures) and some minor changes to the route. The only significant one has been the change of the first night's accommodation from Altopascio to Montecarlo. This means about 100m of extra climb but a much more scenic night's location. It also means slightly more complex arrangements for luggage transfers since the hotel is not so close to the railway station. See http://apennines.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/luggage-transfers.html for the detail.

There was also some fine tuning of the route from Arezzo to Sanespolcro. I found a straight, flat secondary road which should have less traffic and be quicker than the original route I had selected out of Arezzo.

I have also added my pre-ride logistics... how to get me and the bike from the plane to Firenze. That is all sorted now!

I have also build a spreadsheet which compares the significant climbs of the route to the "Black Mountain" and Mount Stromlo climbs here in Canberra which will make it easier to figure out how hard each one is :-)

Based on this it now appears likely that we will try to get luggage transport rather than carry stuff in panniers :-) This is yet to be entirely planned, although I have had indicative emails from taxi services in some towns with the rough prices. Once again see http://apennines.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/luggage-transfers.html for my current thinking.

Second thoughts about Anghiari and Sansepolcro

Change of plans: we'll stay in Sansepolcro, and take a day trip back to Anghiari if we want to. The logistics of getting to and from the festival in Sansepolcro looked difficult and it is better to stay where the action is!

The other advantage of the change is that it shortens by a little the next riding stage to Novafeltria, which is likely to be the most challenging day of the entire trip in terms of climbing.

I've updated Basecamp and the wiki and located a hotel.

Luggage transfers?

Just in case... I have sent out feelers to several companies that might be in the business of offering luggage transportation services. I have had a couple of "no sorry" replies, and only one positive one, who want to charge €2400 for the eight transfers, approximately twice what I'd see as reasonable. Not that I think that we need this service anyway, but when the group is finally confirmed it would be good to be able to offer the choice. I have also asked Andrea of Vinarium (who we used on our last trip to Tuscany) for pricing and he has quoted €1750.

Also, thinking that the Emilia Romagna transfers might be costly coming from Firenze, I have asked Davide who has the taxi service in Novafeltria. His prices like quite reasonable, so given that some of the other sectors are quite short (via the main road), I am encouraged to think that the entire trip's transfers could be organised for significantly less than €100 per day, using only three taxi services (Firenze, Arezzo and Novafeltria). This is what I have found:

As yet unidentified:

• From Firenze to Montecarlo
• From Montecarlo to Firenze

For this two it is only one night away, we should be able to carry one night's requirements without panniers. I'd use handlebar bag + under seat and that should cover it. The other possibility is to get the train from Firenze to Montecarlo, drop off the luggage there (the station is still 2Km from our hotel), then ride the 5Km down to Altopascio and catch the train onwards from there. This still leaves the issue of how to get it back to Firenze on the 10th. I have asked the hotel in Montecarlo for some advice...

• From Firenze to Greve in Chianti (this one should be easy by taxi)

From Arezzo taxi:

• From Greve in Chianti to Arezzo €132
• From Arezzo to Anghiari €50

From Novafeltria taxi:

• From Anghiari to Novafeltria cost €90
• From Novafeltria to Longiano cost €50
• From Longiano to Rimini cost €50

To carry or to hire?

One significant unanswered question is what bike to ride. If I take a bike should it be my road bike or my touring bike? The same question applies to hire bikes although I have yet to see a "light touring" bike like mine for rent.

The road bike's advantages are that it is lighter, has better brakes and a smaller "Q" factor. The Touring bike is more robust (cro-mo instead of carbon), takes a rack and hence panniers and has wider gearing. On the balance I think the touring bike is more likely. I can mix and match wheels and tyres as I see fit, with the 28mm Continental 4 Seasons a likely choice. They survived Melburn-Roobaix just fine. I'm willing to risk the road bike so long as I can carry enough stuff. Maybe I'll do a trial pack into the largest Ortlieb underseat bag and the largest handlebar bag to see whether that feels like three days' worth.

Hire or carry?

The other consideration, probably more important is to leave my bikes at home and hire in Firenze, but that depends on whether I can get exactly what I want from a hire company. In general they do not seem to be very flexible but I guess I have a year to negotiate :-) Because it makes the logistics so much easier this would be my preference, but I'm not riding 400km on a bike I don't trust and enjoy.

Almost every day I am exchanging emails with Lia at http://www.florencebybike.it/index.php?lang=en and we are slowly coming to an understanding.

Our heavy touring bikes are what you need.
You can't fit Ortlieb handlebar bags to our road bikes.
Our road bikes only come with 23mm tyres.

We'll get there maybe!

One thing led to another

There was no overseas trip planned for 2014 and now there is. How did this happen?

It all started, as these things often do, with me looking at a map of Italy. I was noticing the way the Apennines curve as they switch from near the west coast at the Gulf of Genoa to almost on the east coast as they wrap around Tuscany. I was reminded of the couple of times that we have driven over the mountains, once from Firenze to Ravenna and the other from Montepulciano to Ancona. So I got to thinking about riding in the mountains and wondering how hard it would be to traverse the range.

So here is the "method" that gets me from basic idea to a finished plan.

1. Integrate the planning of arrival and departure... there is the matter of logistics, getting bikes and luggage to the starting point and all together again at the end. This resulted in the Bologna-Bologna concept which then dictated the overall shape of the route.
2. Using the OSM cycle map in Garmin Basecamp, explore routes, keeping an eye on distance and altitude gain. Use Google to find out about the towns and regions. In this instance, looking at Anghiari alerted me to the "orange flag" towns which I used for later stages of planning.
3. Open prospective routes in Google Earth to do a more detailed check on elevation changes and to "fly" the route in some areas. This resulted in some changes to the route to make the climbing more manageable.
4. Once the set of routes and hence days of riding is known it is time to start capturing all this information, so off to PBWorks to create yet another Wiki as the knowledge repository with the front page and one page for each riding day with the general description and route profile.
5. With the basic structure captured, the ride can be publicised, and the last details can be added afterwards.
6. Research the overnight towns using TripAdvisor, or where that fails an "accommodation" search on Google Maps. For likely prospects, use their web site to get more information. For example this caused me to reject one B&B because the owners have dogs and cats. Put the hotel information into the wiki and also into a planning spreadsheet to hold booking status eventually. Add restaurant recommendations where they exist.
7. Check out suitable towns as lunch stops on the mountain sections to ensure that food and water will be available. To find lunch stops the easiest thing is to cruise the town or village in Google street view.
8. Choose dates. The general time of year (September) is driven by weather considerations, but exact timing can take advantage of local events, fairs, festivals etc. In this case the Chianti Wine Festival was too good an opportunity to miss! The rest days and riding days were sequenced to make 3,2,3 chunks of riding.
9. Go back and tidy up the Wiki, add maps and photos. Drop the weather widget on the page for each day.
10. Research flight schedules to make sure that getting from Canberra to Bologna and back fits with the dates chosen with little dead time. To take a touring bike means that 20Kg luggage may not be sufficient, so Emirates/QANTAS or Etihad/Virgin with their 30Kg limits are the go! Capture all this in a spreadsheet too.
11. Initiate contact with those overnight hotels that might be problematic (where there may be little or no choice or demand may be high). Bookings will wait until after flights are booked.
12. Create this blog with the same name as the Wiki, just to be tidy.
13. Wait for September so that flights can be priced and booked.
14. Then it is just a year of waiting, dreaming and hopefully some training :-)