July 24 2018

A pear shaped day. After making our own breakfast in the \”B & B\” we headed south towards a small Tuscan village called Bibbona.

For the first 20 kms the road was good and we were following the coast.

Then we had to find our way around Livorno, and everything went pear-shaped. Livorno has a large port area and we ended up going north on a four-lane road with transports passing us at speed.

Eventually, we found our way back down to the coast and followed the coast through a very pretty City.

Our second navigational error happened about 40 kms into the ride. The road we were supposed to follow should have taken us along the coast. The road-signs indicated that the road was only a motorway and had signs indicating the fines you would pay if you were on the motorway when you shouldn’t be. The garmin didn’t indicate two roads, only the motorway. The paper map showed the coastal route, but we didn’t know how to get to get there.

We went under the motorway and began to climb a beejeesus hill. Actually we pushed the bloody bikes up the hill. Half-way up Ralf looked at the Garmin and said the immortal words that I have heard so many times on this trip. “We are going the wrong way”.

There were a few bad words said, actually quite a lot of bad words and even a few tears. We turned the bikes around and headed down the 14% degree hill back to the road that said No bicycles. About 1 km down this road that was leading to the motorway, there was a right turn that joined the coastal road. We added 10 kms to a 75 km ride going in the wrong direction and it was bloody hot, 35 degrees C (95F)

We eventually arrived in a small seaside resort (Castelglione) at 12:30. We pulled the bikes into a small Bistro, that I knew was going to be expensive, but we needed food and cold water. The waitress looked at us and ignored us. We sat down and waited. We noticed that no-one was being served and other people were leaving. We asked if they were open, yes. Still she didn’t come to serve us. My patience was running very thin at this point.

We left the Bistro and two doors down we found a little fast food outlet with a wonderful lass who was very helpful, although didn’t speak any English. They kept the cold bottled water in the coolers, not in the Cola fridge, we got two bottles of really cold water and I had a slice of pizza and Ralf had a “Big Chicken” burger with fries.

With food and cold water and a “free” pee we carried on to Bibbona.We cycled through Cecina where the market was closing and left a tremendous amount of garbage on the streets.  In Germany the street sweepers would have been there cleaning.

Bibbona is a lovely small village built on a mountain. Yes we had to push our bikes up a beejessus street (18%) We then found the best B&B in Italy. Fabio was waiting for us, he opened the garden gate so that we could store our bikes safely in the garden. Our room is lovely and the shower was hot and clean.

The house was built in the 1800’s and Fabio used to come here as a boy. His English was not great but we managed to have a great chat. He laughed and said, “you must want to shower, I like to talk, I can blah blah”.

He gave us advice on the best restaurants in Town.

Bibbona has narrow, clean streets.  The streets are narrow with stone buildings lining the side.  Some of the streets are cobbled with lovely patterns.

We went for a nice walk around the village and had a lovely ice-cream, before heading to the pizza restaurant for dinner.

An amazing village in Tuscany with great views.

However, although we had a positive end to the day and we have had a few good days. A decision has been made to go home. We are not going to miss out on the other things on our bucket list, including Rome and Pompeii, but we have given up on the cycling. We are not enjoying getting lost, having to spend so much money on accommodation (even if we were camping) and for the first time on our adventures not really enjoying the cycling. We were both expecting so much more from Europe and the Eurovelo routes. They had been advertised as the “be all and end all of cycle routes”, we thought we would barely need to use a GPS or maps, just follow the signs. That has not been the case.

We have asked for an extra night in Bibbona to regroup and book accommodation in Rome and we are going to take a train to Rome on Thursday 26, 2018.

My arms and legs are covered in mosquito bites that are itching like crazy and they have all swollen to the size of quarters. Although I have Benydryl cream it is not working to stop the itch. I took a couple of benydryl tablets and I hope that will help me sleep.