29/11/24
We did not sleep well at all. The construction work on the pavement started again in the early morning. Presumably to avoid disrupting the flow of tourists and prevent people from accessing the shops. We were repeatedly woken from our sleep cycle by bangs and we had very disrupted sleep. You can’t burn the candle at either end. Your REM sleep in the morning is important.
As a result, we weren’t super enthusiastic to leave. We obviously had an early start nevertheless. We ate breakfast and drank coffee then lugged everything back down the stairs to load up.
As we meandered jerkily through the people on Ponte Vecchio, we spotted a large number of colourful flags on the next bridge up the river. At the junction to the road in front of us there were police cars and further up police motorcycles. We trundled past as they were clearly waiting for the procession of marchers. We’d seen various references to the union strike taking place today for a few weeks.
As we left Firenze heading east, we were on Eurovelo 7. A route that heads south to Rome. We passed more workers striking with large colourful flags and gave them a cheerful hello. Just after crossing a rather fiddly junction a friendly man in his late 60’s on a bicycle asked us about our journey. He seemed inspired, but we could sense his feeling of being unable to take such a trip. It’s sad that not everyone can have such an opportunity.
We followed the river east before hitting a blockade and a man nearby confirmed that the route was ‘chiuso ’, closed. Still, the way round was at least on a cycle path. We first rode through pretty suburbs where we assumed the more affluent lived, then we were suddenly on SP34. A busy, slightly undulating, road that we had to endure for about 5 miles.
When we turned off onto the SP90, a much quieter road, we hit a lovely big hill. It was 2 miles long, with 200m of elevation, and got gradually steeper and steeper towards the end. It almost defeated us but we conquered it, in bright sunshine, under the watchful gaze of the castle that sat on the top. We sat for a while to get our bearings back, then enjoyed a small descent onto a nice plateau. One more short sharp climb up to Bombone and we descended steeply all the way down to the river.
We followed the Arno along a road, passing an interesting tower along the way. It is featured in a fresco in the Uffizi, not that we could remember it being in the geography room. We then had the pleasure of riding SP1 for a short way.
We were then to follow the Arno on a track, that worryingly started off extremely muddy and through what looked like a quarry. Afterwards it settled down a little bit but there’d clearly been some rain and we were navigating a lot of puddles. It was nice to be off the roads but it was slow going as we bumped along. Towards the end of this stretch we had to walk the bikes to traverse some deep puddles.
After stopping at a Lidl that was barely off route we were straight back on the gravel next to the Arno. Immediately stopped in our tracks by a ford. On the other side was a man who was also contemplating the crossing. We jumped off to walk through the river. The light green algae mostly giving away some places that were decidedly slippery. Fortunately we didn’t slip.
It was plain sailing until San Giovanni Valdarno where we left the river. We were using a mix of EV7 and Bicitalia, and expecting them, naively, to be the same. The route we had took us up an absurdly steep hill and then back down the other side, which we could easily have avoided using the road that ran parallel down below.
We continued with this route towards Terranuova Bracciolini, on the way encountering another difficult climb which we hadn’t anticipated at all. Fed up and exhausted we looked for somewhere close by to stay. A small hotel in Penna was affordable and so we accepted the 50m additional elevation and slight detour along a busy road.
When we arrived there was no sign of life and after we pressed the buzzer they actually let us into the building. Confused, we went to the bar next door but they didn’t know anything about the place. After calling the number we got through to a woman who spoke a very small amount of English and arranged to stay. Pushing the fact that we wanted our bikes to come in with us. The receptionist arrived at 5pm, just 20 minutes later, and was cheery about the whole thing. We could leave our bikes in the stairwell.
We’d anticipated the lack of any cooking appliances, originally wanting to get close to a place called Laterina and camp, so we had bread, tofu and some pepper for dinner. We also managed to dry the wet shoes on the radiator. There was a little bit of noise from the bar downstairs but nothing could be worse than the night before!
After dinner we inspected the route more thoroughly, wondering where we had gone wrong. It turned out that the Bicitalia route and the EV7 were slightly different. Not only that but that we probably should have headed south out of Firenze, to meet the EV5 instead. Eurovelo 5 was known as the Via Francigena, a popular pilgrimage that was undertaken on foot, and was potentially more developed. Reaching it now would require a little detour across the hills. Decisions, decisions.
Surly They Won't Make It 