Rome to Nice - Day 2 : Perfect Day?

We took about 6 of these pictures - i made sure to pose in each one of them so it looked like my head is directly bolted to my torso. Of course everyone else looks great #neckless

DAY 2

It has taken me forever to get another blog post up. Not going to go through the excuse list - just start off with... "I know". Maybe it is better this way, lets me relive the adventures later for a second time, giving it time to marinate in my mind. Ok I'm justifying my delays now. Time to jump on into it!

First... the daily stats!

Ride Statistics
Date ....................... Saturday April 23rd 2023

Departure City/Town ........ Lido di Tarquinia, Italy
Departure Time ............. 8:19AM Central European Time[CET]
Departure Temperature ...... 55f
Time in  Motion ............ 7:05:42
Elapsed Time ............... 9:57:33

Arrival City/Town .......... Grossetto
Arrival Time ............... 6:16PM CET
Arrival Temperature ........ 70f

Total Miles Cycled ......... 67.41 mi
Total Elevation ............ 2542 ft

Tour Statistics
Total Miles Cycled ......... 133.41 mi 
Total Elevation ............ 4225 ft

The first peak in the middle is a climb over to the Tyrrhenian sea

I'm sure I've mentioned it in previous posts, but I can not stress it enough, you have to email the hotel and let them know you are bringing bikes. The hotel Civico Zero Resort let us store them in an unlocked side vestibule next to the entrance. We U-Looked the wheels and bikes together so it would have been hard for someone to just roll off with them. And all the bags you see in the below pic were taken back to our rooms

Me actually working, my dad doing something I am sure I would have to fix, Matt roaming around being Mr Shorts cool and Shruti taking paparazzi pix... about sums up a typical morning

So we started off with a very nice breakfast - i had smoked salmon the first 3 days of the trip..was delicious. I also made sure to try all the pies and all the homemade jellies. A lot of the hotels had their own jellies - but I always hate that saying "homemade jellies". Who the hell's home are they making it in and transporting to the hotel. Are food inspectors coming to this jelly making persons home and ensuring it is up to code? Just so many questions. I hope they just mean made in the restaurant.

World's shortest neck next to worlds longest neck?

the first trip we took our bags with us on all of the days

There's my neck! And my thumb pointing unnaturally at the camera. I don't think my dad has seen a camera berfore

About 10% into the day's ride we came to one of my favorite parts of the whole trip. So let me set the scene - months before, Shruti and I were planning the route as we always do. Going inch by inch and trying to find a mix of the best roads, least elevations, routing us around or into a town depending if we need a break etc. It is tedious work - a lot of time it is painful, but it's also quite enjoyable as you can get ready and daydream about the trip before it happens. So we usually trade days to plan and someone maps a day and then the other person examines it etc and then we look together to work out any issues and just get another set of eyes on it. So we are looking at day 2 and I'm like, I think google routed us over a river and i don't see anything there? Well we checked a few diff mapping softwares, plotaroute, komooot[ which is Shruti's new "darling" of mapping tools - i prefer plotaroute ] and finally we were able to zoom in on one of them and it looked like a log! Now why were we stressing over this - well if we didn't take this Temple of Doom bridge we would have had to route into a town and go on a main road and well it would have been crap. So we decided to let Matt know what we had planned and we were going to go for it. I don't think Matt listened to us the next time and mumbled something like "google google maps... reroute.. .google" - so we decided to go for it.

Well we got there on day two and it was great - a rinky dink bridge, Matt's mom and dad called us as we were about to go over - of course I said hi to John and Janet... pictures were taken and we were up and over in a few mins.

Easy Leon... easyyyyyy

I had to include this one... shaadi.com here we come!!

why do i look like a young boy and my parents are filming my first steps?

After a bit of riding and zigzagging through Italian streets we stopped and had a coffee

Coffee checkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk - Dad and Shrutis coffees are so tiny - do they even count?

The next part of the day was riding through some really nice country side, we saw a lot of Italian residents taking pictures with the fields... so obviously fomo set in and we had to take some too. 

Matty def has the best selfie skills but Shruts is a close second.

the old big left thigh on the top bar trick - makes me look at least 5'9 and a half

After a series of selfies and more riding we hit the middle part of the day which brought us to a pretty steep climb that on the graph doesnt look too hard, but was quite steep. Of course we then had to turn off into the mountain and push our bikes up an off road section. The below pic was on the very narrow residential street. The corrugated roof are little outdoor parking spaces for the houses. The view was fantastic

The below pic is after we reached the top with the Tyrrhenian sea behind us. Honestly i had never even heard of that sea before. We also had to climb over a gate and lift the bikes over... what a struggle... but unforgettable. 

Steve's selfies skills...not so good. But i captured my shiny forehead nicely in this pic

Then we stopped for lunch at probably the busiest time this place had ever experienced. There were two servers who were so angry at life...and us :)

The food was ok - had some seafood, lots of breads and of course coffees and pastries. of course dad had to have iced tea - wldnt be a meal with out that. 

They were running out of food because it was so busy.

Can't keep our spirits down ... we are cycling in Italy!

mmmm fried sea bugs... yummmm

I dont think i really need to comment on this

Matty doing matt mappy things - right before
he performed a full split on the side of the road

Now that we were full and somewhat rested from lunch we had a steady ride on pretty comfortable roads. Further we moved from Rome[ larger city/town] the more comfortable the roads were. The final climb of the day was a snakey hill with pretty steep sections. Once we got to the top of "Mount Grosetto" - im just kidding, it wasnt called that, we rolled down to the town along suburban streets. 

beauty of a view from the top of the climb

So we get to the hotel "Albergo San Lorenzo" and it has pretty dated furniture and a bathroom that can barely fit my height, I dont know how my other 3 companions managed since i am the shortest. Below is the room i shared with dad. So we head out to dinner in the old section of Grosetto which was super nice - way nicer than the rest of the town, had a pretty good dinner where the owner kept massaging my shoulders[ awkward ] and headed back to the hotel. Wouldnt you know it i was still hungry and me and matt stopped and had some pizza. Ok - we both stopped but I ate all the pizza :) what is the point of riding your bike across a country if you cant eat two dinners??

And another day with no flats! After so many flats in Spain - what are these magical Italian roads we are riding on? I think Shruti had 75 spares in her bag all ready for il Drafto :)

COFFEE CHECK!!

So you may be thinking what madness is this? Well on each trip we usually keep track of some weird statistic. In India we kept track of the different animals we saw, maybe even the sodas per day - I forget, but it is a fun little thing we do. So being in Italy, what better thing to keep track of than the number of coffees we had per day.

Running coffee count. 

	4/22	4/23	4/24	4/25	4/26	4/27	4/28	4/29	Total
Matteo	3	4							7
Shrutin	2	3							5
Stefano	5	3							8
il Drafto	5	4							9
Total	15	14							15

Andiamo day 3!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The splendor of Hotel Albergo - insert fart noise here

one of us is WAY happier than the others to start eating

two days riding in Italian sun and i look like ricardo montelban

Random pic of the day - the water was about 1 inch high

wait a sec - i thought all water in Italy
had a bridge i could pose on while crossing?

Rome to Nice - Day 1 : It's like riding a bike

DAY 1 was finally here. Months and months of planning, talking, mapping, realizing that the original trip was too aggressive, changing locations, remapping, replanning, more talking, training, travelling, getting the bikes, packing the bikes and now we are at the precipice of pedaling our first pedal to kick off on our 3rd trip together. It has been 5 years since our last trip together and 3 years since I last went on a cycling trip. I'm sure the multiple breakfast macchiatos, pastries and Italian meats contributed to the cycling energy flowing through me this morning and the anticipation to start riding was palpable! 

Now before we get into the details of day 1, lets quickly do a recap of the day's specifics, and a reminder of the larger trip's planned itinerary. The actual 7 days of riding after we were done actually worked out a bit shorter in miles and elevation than we had planned for. This is always a good thing. The difference in planned versus actual distances/elevations are most likely due to:

1. Variations in how routing tools calculate. As an example - after we would plot out a day in either komoot.com plotaroute.com or even google, we would compare the same exact route's measurements in all 3 systems. There would always be a substantial difference in the values in at least one of the 3 systems. plotaroutes elevations just couldn't be trusted as an example. 
2. Us trying to "flatten the curve" whenever we could - translates into us making decisions along the way to see if we could shave off some miles and elevations. Doing this always makes the trip a bit more enjoyable and more time to explore.  

The below is the itinerary of the full trip. Day 1 sees us exiting Rome, cycling through Vatican City, which is the world's smallest country, I did know that tidbit before I planned the trip, what I did not know was that Monaco was the world's second smallest country which we would hit on our last day after finishing up in Nice, France. 

Planned Trip Itinerary

So now that we have the recap done, let's get to day 1.
 

First... the daily stats!

Ride Statistics
Date ....................... Saturday April 22rd 2023

Departure City/Town ........ Rome, Italy
Departure Time ............. 8:00AM Central European Time[CET]
Departure Temperature ...... 68f
Time in  Motion ............ 7:57:39
Arrival City/Town .......... Lido di Tarquinia, Italy
Arrival Time ............... 4:56PM CET
Arrival Temperature ........ 70f

Total Miles Cycled ......... 66 mi
Total Elevation ............ 1683 ft

Tour Statistics
Total Miles Cycled ......... 66 mi 
Total Elevation ............ 1683 ft

Elevations looking pretty good

The start of the ride was to head out of Rome, hitting most of our elevations before we exit the city and then cruising to the coast and heading north.

meat, cheese, pastry ... repeat

Now there were always 3 constants each day before we even started pedaling our first pedal. #1 - we all met for breakfast. Like I said in a previous post, every hotel offered a complimentary breakfast. This was all apart of the planning. HIGHLY recommended.

#2 - we had to pack our bikes for the day ahead. This entailed usually restrapping the bags to the bike every day. Especially if the bikes were in a garage/basement etc. A few days we got lucky and had the bikes with us in our rooms/terraces and could leave the bags strapped on and just remove what we needed.

As you can imagine, it did get tiring to restrap every day. Besides clothing, some tools, and paraphernalia, food and snacks were essential. A lot of times some packaged breakfast items would make it into the bags for the ride ahead.

Locked and loaded for the day ahead

and #3 - we always took a team picture before we started out. We also tried to finish every day with a team picture as well. Sometimes because we were tired and just ready to get off the bikes, and check into the hotel, we would forget to snap a picture.

team pic with flag of Italy.... check
rookie mistake to not hold down the corner!

Now that the day's constants were completed we headed out of the city. It was a bit surreal cycling through the streets wanting to hit the coast, but then realizing we are passing monuments that have been standing here for over 1900 years. Really humbling and amazing - and added to the excitement. 

So we make it to Vatican City pretty quickly -  had to be the first 30 minutes into the trip and we snapped a few pics with the flag. With all the cycling trips i have so many flags! If anyone has a suggestion on what to do with them all - please drop a comment.

columns of Vatican City

So we are cycling out of the city, make it over the main climb for the day and coast to the coast. We were on the SS1 for a good part of the day - which we normally don't like to do when we plan our trips. We usually route ourselves over small parallel roads, cycle lanes, a lot of times farm roads. You just get a better experience, less cars, better views.

The Strada Statale 1 Via Aurelia (SS 1) is a historic trade route running along the Italian coastline from central Italy to southern France. It just so happens that this is an old Roman road which we would criss cross throughout the trip. For the most part, the views were nice - especially the further from Rome we travelled.

good example of a smaller road - and two lunatics. My dad looks like he saw a ghost.

At one point we were passing a giant fort - we didn't stop, but I did have the thought that this must be "something cool" from the looks of it. So i told Shruti to keep cycling and I'm going to take a quick detour, photograph it and catch you guys. It turns out it was built in the 1500s by Michaelangelo! And the Italian armed forces still use it today! Grabbed the below from the web. 

Fort Michelangelo - Just amazing.

Fort Michelangelo was built in the 16th century to defend the port of Civitavecchia from the constant incursions from pirates, something that the city had been subjected to since the 15th century and which had resulted in it being subjected to looting, fires and massacres. 

Built under the direction of Michelangelo Buonarroti - who the fortress was namedgoog_1191016351 after – it was commissioned by Giulio II della Rovere who becaII in 1502 and who laid the first stone on 14th December 1508.

So the remainder of the day is great. Nice roads and we roll into the hotel before 5pm. One mistake I think we made was not taking one more coffee stop sometime in the afternoon. We kinda powered on from lunch to the end - we were feeling a bit tired towards 3/4pm and a coffee would have made the last bit fly by and we definitely had 30mins in the schedule. We learned our lesson and started putting an afternoon break into the schedule.

COFFEE CHECK!!

I'm embarrassed to say - I didnt know
one Cannoli was a Cannolo The guy behind
the counter corrected me twice before
i understood what the hell
he was saying :) #italianshame

So you may be thinking what madness is this? Well on each trip we usually keep track of some weird statistic. In India we kept track of the different animals we saw, maybe even the sodas per day - I forget, but it is a fun little thing we do. So being in Italy, what better thing to keep track of than the number of coffees we had per day.

Running coffee count. 

	4/22	4/23	4/24	4/25	4/26	4/27	4/28	4/29	Total
Matteo	3								3
Shrutini	2								2
Stefano	5								5
il Drafto	5								5
Total	15								15

That's it for day1, passed through the world's tiniest country, had some nice roads, ate way too much food, no one got hurt, no flats and finished in the sun.

Andiamo day 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The first gear casualty of the trip. RIP handlebar snack bag you served us well

Day 1's and the trip's first coffee stop #bearpawbegins

views from the road were great

We were on the SS1 for a good part of the ride on Day 1

Alternating green and white - Shruts had to have a mouth full of potato pizza #indianchipmunk

I can't unsee the alternating green and white - end of Day 1 pic!

My first aperol spritz - pretty good - lounging by the pool. Matty needs shorter shorts.
I order a drink and get 75 types of chips... keep em comin Giovanni!!

My mouth has to be full of risotto & dad proudly/strangely showing his bowl of food. #americanchipmunk #foodshowandtell