More Inland Adventures ~ the Completion of Our Three Islands Tour

Piazza Armerina to Ragusa

Summary: 88.5 kms; 1350 metres total ascent

A Cool Start

For something different we woke to quite a cool morning, which was no surprise as it is a month into Autumn; we were inland rather than on the coast; and starting our ride at about 700 metres asl. Piazza Armerina was the first town or city of the tour where we spent the night away from the coast. I was quite happy with the idea of having a couple more days riding away from the sea to finish the tour as it seemed like it might provide a slightly different and perhaps more agrarian perspective on things Sicilian.

We were all delighted to see that Geoff and Roberta, who had both come off their bikes a couple of days before, were getting back in the saddle. Roberta's reappearance was particular cheering, as her crash was the more serious. Here's a photo of her in the neck brace that the medicos put her into at the hospital, and advised she should keep on for a week. (She didn't actually have it on for the day, but we thought it would look good for the blog to have a photo of her in it.)

It was quite lovely to have such a nice brisk start, and gave Di and me a sniff of what we could expect for early starts back home. 

As the first 18 kilometres of so involved little climbing and a long gradual ascent, most of the riders were wearing warmer gear. Here's a photo of Di cruising along in a long-sleeved jersey and over-the-knee knicks ... 

Marcello had told us that we were likely to see some Prickly Pear in cultivation in southern Sicily and sure enough we came across a plantation of the stuff ...

There must be a niche market for this "fruit" I guess but I found the one taste I had of it entirely unappealing.

One thing that really surprised us was how fertile Sicily is - although thinking about it I guess we might have imagined it so. In any case we were much impressed with the agriculture we saw. And despite being early autumn and the year being very dry, there were some very green fields in this area which didn't look like they'd been irrigated. I guess the elevation must contribute to that. Here's a photo showing a large area of fields at various stages of cultivation and a very green one in the middle background ...

Warming Up and into the Limestone

One of the luxuries of being on a supported tour like this is having access to a van at morning coffee and lunchtime. Both Di and I had put a short sleeved jersey in our day bags to change into when we got to coffee. Here's Di powering along in her dragonfly jersey after a jolt of java ...

The next photo shows the extent of the limestone walls we were starting to see. They lined the roads we were riding along and you can see them dividing the fields on the hillside in the background ...

This part of the world has had people come and go for so many centuries but I still have trouble getting my head around the amount of homes - some small, some grand and many in between - that have been abandoned and fallen into disrepair - not necessarily in that order. And the fact that this part of the world has periodically experienced warfare must also be a big factor in that equation. Here's a place that must have been quite a grand residence in its day ...

Lunch and Beyond

Something different about the organisation about this tour compared with Caesar last year is that we have tended to stop beside cafes where Ride & Seek has organised for food to be prepared specially or for us to order from what's already on offer. Here Richie supervises our arrival and gives us the lowdown on what's happening ...

Just after lunch I snapped a photo of a place which might have also provided some other diversions had we stopped there instead ...

... and here's another photo showing the ubiquitous limestone walls in this part of the countryside as well as another startlingly green field ...

Our arrival into Ragusa was quite exciting: a fun twisting descent into the old city from the new city above. Here's an image I took from one of the bends ...

Negotiating the maze of narrow cobbled laneways to our way to the hotel was a little tricky, but it was wonderful to be situated right in the heart of this ancient town.

A Bit Extra (another 28.8 kms)

An extra out and back ride to the historic chocolate-making town of Modica was on offer, and it was an offer too good to refuse from my point of view. Here's a look at the route ...

In the town I just decided to pause long enough for a coffee and another instalment of the wonderful Sicilian indulgence of a pistachio cream croissant with a cup of coffee. Almost immediately after getting back on the bike I stopped again to take a  photo of this attractive streetscape ...

On the way back to Ragusa there was a stoppage for a train to cross, the first such occurrence on the entire tour. After what seemed like ages the barriers finally began to rise again ...

... allowing me to continue back to Ragusa and a well-earned rest.

The Final Day: Ragusa to Syracuse

Summary: 92.3 kms; 1073 metres total ascent

On the Road with Andy and Mario

It's been quite entertaining for us to have Ted and Tim from Canada with us for the last two weeks of the tour. These guys are gun riders, particularly young Tim (who just turned 50 about a month ago) but also a lot of fun, particularly Tim who was always upbeat and running a commentary about something or other.

After thinking about resemblances for a while, it struck me that the two of them looked quite a lot like Andy Schleck and Mario Cipollini former stars of the pro peloton. Judge for yourselves: here's a photo I took of them at our briefing before we went foraging in Ragusa ...

Ted, on the right is as skinny as the proverbial rake - just like Andy. And Tim, the glamorous one, has legs like tree-trunks - much like Mario (also known as "The Lion King" or "Super Mario". Most days they started well behind us and cruised by most everybody as we rode along. On the final day Di and I managed to get to morning coffee - taken on a terrace overlooking some beautiful, fertile hillsides - before they rolled off in front of us again. Here's a photo of them with Di and Sarah ...

A bunch more riders arrived ...

... and then Dianne and I rolled out. Just as we were leaving, Chris ...

... followed by Ian ...

... arrived for their coffee stop.

Once Dianne and I were out on the road, as expected "Andy" and "Mario" cruised by us and I took a photo of the two of them with the view to which we had become accustomed to seeing ...

... we would not see anything more of them this day until we arrived in Ortigia and joined them for a drink at a bar near the hotel.

Garmin Misadventures

Readers on the home front will be familiar with the fact that I have a penchant for rounding rides up, so if an outing is, say, 78 kilometres I will try to ride an extra couple of k's to get to 80. Or if a ride is in the 90's it seems a bit of a waste to me not to ride a hundred. Looking at the day's ride and seeing that there were a couple of longish climbs I thought I might be able to get at least close to the mark on this day by going ahead of Di on the hills and then riding back down for her. My plan was scuttled by my Garmin. It decided to switch itself off after about 40 kilometres, losing all the data up to that point. I was able to switch it back on and it worked well enough for a while as we rode through some attractive countryside, on quiet roads lined more often than not with rock walls ...

Just after the underpass in the photo above we rolled into lunch at Canicattini Bagni. There was a great cafe there honouring one of great philosophers of the Enlightenment ...

Tucked away inside on the way to the toilets was this statue ...

The Last Afternoon of the Tour

It looked like an uneventful hour and a half or so ahead of us to finish off the tour, although we'd been warned that the traffic would get busy for the last 5 kilometres or so. It started out that way. There wasn't so much attractive scenery to look at, and there was a bit more rubbish appearing on the sides of the roads after a couple of days of seeing almost none of it. 

We were riding along a road that have become heavily overgrown with vegetation, to the point that in places almost a whole lane was taken up with it - a mixture of hedging and blackberries. Shortly afterwards we were descending towards the coastal plain. I was out in front going sedately around a corner when my back wheel almost slid out from underneath me. I called out to Di to watch it, but then realised that there was nothing on the road that should have caused me to slide so I wondered if I mightn't have a puncture, perhaps from riding over a thorn. Upon pulling over I discovered that I did have a flat - my first of the tour. 

After fixing that we descended the rest of the way to the plain, at which point my Garmin decided t turn itself off again - twice in quick succession in fact. I decided just to leave it off and follow Di. Eventually we made our way onto the island of Ortigia, which is the historical centre of the ancient city of Syracuse, founded by the Greeks more than 700 years B.C. As it turned out, the route to the hotel wasn't nearly as bad for traffic as had been suggested. Here the two of us are upon arrival across the road from our hotel ...

... and yes, we were delighted to be there.

Here's an image showing the route we covered in Sicily ...

... and one of the famous Temple of Athena, originating ~ 500 years B.C. and modified extensively by subsequent occupants of the city ...

... where we enjoyed a specially organised guided tour.

The tour officially concluded with a wonderful dinner at a very high-end restaurant with the rather prosaic name of "Don Camillo" (how many of them are there scattered around the world, I wonder?). As has sometimes been the case on our epic adventures, my darling couldn't quite hang in there for the dessert course so we said our goodnights, thus concluding another epic adventure. 

Many thanks to all the riders we shared the road with over the course of the past three weeks. And very special thanks to Dylan for putting the tour on, Simone and Marcello for conceiving it in the first place, and again to the three of them as well as Ben and Richie for their untiring support during the course of our adventure. 

Saluti!

Two Ripper Days of Riding: Days 3 & 4 in Sicily Done and Dusted

Selinunte to Agrigento

Overview: 110 kilometres; 1400 metres of elevation gain

I thought it might be an idea to include an overview map from Strava of Sicily, with our route traced out on it so that people could be oriented as to where we're up to ...

The Story

Today's ride was a great journey, unfortunately marred for our merry band in general and two participants in particular when Geoff Hastings and Roberta Bailey crashed during the course of the day. The good news is that neither seems to have suffered significant injuries and hope to be back on the bike again tomorrow, but more of that later.

Today's forecast was for no rain after some heavy showers overnight and more not long before we headed out for the day. This meant that the roads were rather wet in places, so most of my photos for the day are spotted due to spatters on the lens protector of my Shimano sports camera, which is mounted on the bike.

The skies were clear and the air fresh when we set out but in places there was quite a bit of water on the road ...

Here's a photo of Di cruising along in front ...

We arrived at morning coffee to hear the news that Geoff had crashed. It turns out that he had a bit too much speed on at a sharp right-hand corner and the bike slid out from under him. He turned up in the van just after we got the news. Here he is with wife Wendy, who had decided not to ride today due the the roads being wet and the forecast of significant winds ... 

So, somewhat ironically, Geoff and Wendy spent most of the day in the van together: Wendy unscathed thanks to her decision not to ride, and Geoff a bit sore and sorry. Scans determined that Geoff had no cracked ribs or significant rattling of the brain box. He was rather rueful, calling his accident a "rookie error" but it was something any of us could have had happen to us. There hasn't been any significant rain in any of our three islands for months so the road no doubt was very slippery due to a build up of exhaust emissions. Just a few kilometres per hour can bring a rider undone in those sort of conditions.

Anyway, here's a couple of photos of building around the piazza where our coffee stop was located ...

Everyone was generally in cruise mode, pedalling along relatively leisurely. The wind was predominantly at our backs and it seems that most of us had decided to just be out cruising and enjoying being pushed along. However, there were a couple of long, quick downhill sections and with the wind behind speed could build up rather suddenly. One one of those straights without really trying I got up to 78 kilometres per hour. Luckily, I happened to have my Garmin on the map screen at the time and glanced at it about halfway down the descent and noticed that there was a very sharp right hand turn onto a minor road. I yelled out to Di who was behind me at the time and we both made the turn safely. Unfortunately, this corner caught Chris and Roberta Bailey unawares. Too late, Chris realised he had too much speed on and wasn't going to make the turn. Roberta, who was close behind, clipped his handlebar and came a cropper, landing on her head (Chris somehow managed to stay upright). Roberta lost consciousness momentarily and prudently, as should be the case with any accident of this sort, an ambulance was called for. Our post-lunch ride was a sombre affair, worrying about Roberta's injuries. 

However, before we reached lunch there was some lovely riding through the countryside. Di took this photo of a lovely old bridge now in disrepair and not used as the road has been re-routed ...

Arrival and Dinner

The rest of the ride was very pleasant, largely with a tailwind, and we were very relieved to eventually hear that Roberta escaped serious injury. The quote from Dylan was that she "happened to land in the softest grass in Sicily". When we were told at the briefing that she and Chris would be meeting at our dinner venue. And what a dinner it was! Dylan had "made a late call" to book us into a very high end restaurant overlooking this edifice in the Valle dei Templi, perhaps the largest archeological site in the world ...

The food was fantastic and the venue sublime, but more importantly we were all very happy when Roberta arrived with nothing worse than a very stiff neck - ameliorated a great deal by a glass or two of good Sicilian wine. Thanks must go to Simone for his sterling service in getting the Baileys from the hospital to dinner. As ever, we are all very appreciative of the excellent efforts of our guides who often have problems to deal with after regular hours have finished.

Agrigento to Piazza Armerina

Summary: 110 kilometres; 1900 metres elevation gain

With a substantial bit of climbing on the agenda for today's ride Di thought it would be better if she rode with Sharon and left me to my own devices. The ride included a climb of about fourteen kilometres so that was probably a good idea. I switched on the bike camera when I started the ride. Here are a couple of images that I took early on ...

... and a nice one that Di shared with me ...

I passed by some fields that have been readied for planting ...

... and then the Ride & Seek van went by ...

My stop at morning coffee was short but it took me a while to get out of town because there was a water tanker moving slowly through the narrow streets, holding me and the car in front of me up ...

The roads here in Sicily can change very suddenly from being in quite good repair to being pretty worrying. Something not at the extreme scale but that we are seeing quite a lot of is longitudinal cracking as in the next image where, if you aren't paying attention you could drop a front wheel into ...

I got some photos of two rocky peaks that I thought were quite reasonable ...

... but the one that Di took a little further along was much better ...

There was a tunnel along the way, happily devoid of any traffic ...

A little further up the hill there was an abandoned house that made me wonder about its history, and the dreams and disappointments of its inhabitants ...

Prickly Pear, which is a scourge in Australia, grows prolifically here on the Mediterranean islands we've been traversing. We've seen it all over the place. Last night Marcello told us that we would pass places where it is in fact cultivated deliberately. I didn't notice that, but did pass by what seemed like a wall of the stuff ...

I only stopped for a quick bite at lunch because the headwinds that seemed to present for most of this section were increasing in strength and cooling things off. Exiting the town was a long section of road with huge flagstones ...

Shortly thereafter the battery on my sports camera died so I just kept on rolling until Piazza Armerina came into view. I thought I really out to take a photo so I pulled out the phone and took a snap ...

A last, twisting climb took me up to the southern edge of the town and then it was a descent to our accommodation for the night which is a wonderful villa in the countryside. We've had a marvellous dinner provided by our hosts and everyone is now settled down into their rooms for the night. The really great news is that Geoff is feeling well enough that he thinks he will do the full ride tomorrow, and Roberta plans to do a least a part of the ride - perhaps up to morning coffee. We've got two more days of riding before we arrive in Siracusa, the final destination of our tour. Bring it on!