14/12/24
The building was very dark and had little to no natural light. We easily slept past sunrise, but had no idea how nice and sunny it was until we stuck our heads outside. There was a little bialetti to make coffee with and we polished off the peanut butter and jam with bread.
We were straight onto a glorious paved cycle route to the actual town of Benevento, as we’d stayed just outside it. The path was going gradually uphill, and there were lots of runners out as it was a Saturday morning. Then in front of us appeared a definite railway tunnel. Once again we were riding a repurposed train track. The path carried on for about five kilometres before we were back on the road into the town. We decided to try our luck for some spokes at a bike shop. They did have them, but they were a couple of millimetres too long. We thought we could always cut them down if we were desperate and bought a couple anyway along with some more lubricant.
From the bike shop we had to climb. Up past a nice castle where someone was probably getting married judging by the well dressed people strolling around. Once out of the town we were on undulating roads. up and down we went, the Garmin often being completely unaware of the steep inclines and therefore not including it in its predictions for the day.
After ten or so kilometres on smaller roads, frequently passing more runners, we happened upon a randomly placed roundabout. We went straight over onto an unusually wide road, and though we hadn’t seen any cars for miles, a couple of them came past. Then we descended, on a road so much like a rollercoaster, plus with high side winds too, that it made Frankie’s stomach think it was experiencing weightlessness.
We were following the river now, and for about ten kilometres we rolled along bathed in sunshine. The wind was pretty strong but fortunately entirely in our favour and we gratefully accepted the boost. It was a pretty road, and we stopped amongst some autumnally coloured trees for a small snack of dates and biscuits a few miles away from, and in preparation for, the large climb that would take the rest of the day.
The climb loomed in front of us, it was five miles long and 445m of elevation. As we passed a petrol station at the bottom, switchbacks visible ahead, a man sitting outside shouted words, presumably of encouragement.
Just as we began the ascent a couple of extremely ‘yappy’ dogs started harassing us. They chased one of us then the other, barking around at our feet. We obviously couldn’t stop pedalling, the gradient was steep and only getting steeper. It soon became clear the dogs were harmless, as had they all been so far, but it didn’t stop them literally chasing their our rotating ankles for hundreds of metres.
The mountains behind us had became covered in thick cloud, the Sun peeking through but rain was evidently falling whence we’d come. At some point it would surely catch us up, and it wasn’t like we could go much faster. After two kilometres we’d ascended over half of the elevation and there was a brief lull in the climb as we passed through a town and went downhill slightly. Then the climb returned in earnest, no less steep than before. We’d lost the sunshine completely and it was hard not to look back as the dark clouds gained on us.
Unlike the climb through to Venafro, where there was a clear point to reach that was visible the whole way, the top was ever further away, round just one more corner. Unceremoniously, we eventually found a restaurant that marked the top and we stopped to celebrate with some fruit juice that we’d collected from a B&B at some point, bananas, and a few biscuits.
It was as though we’d entered another world up in the hills. The world was now 600m above sea level. We could see the town of Ariano Irpino, even higher above us on its perch. The road followed the top of the hills, avoiding having to go down into the deep valleys, and leading us round towards the town. It was hard to go uphill now, our legs struggled to get going again even though the climbs were small in comparison.
We started to hear the occasional patter of rain on our wind jackets. As we rode up the final stretch of hill into the town we passed a huge pack of hounds lurking down a driveway. They were caught off guard as Jonathan passed by but were ready to say ‘hello’ to Frankie. It’s quite unnerving to have dogs so aggressively barking and chasing you for no reason. They seem to be completely unperturbed by cars or pedestrians but go wild for cyclists. Even if you stop pedalling, or get off and walk. There doesn’t seem to be a good explanation that we could find online.
Luckily we weren’t going another 100m up to the old part of Ariano Irpino and instead we dropped off past the supermarket where we bought bread, tofu, milk free basil pesto, jam and peanut butter. The affordable agriturismo ‘Tre Collie’ that we’d chosen to stay at was just a km further down the hill and despite the rain getting heavier we didn’t bother dressing up and just rolled our heavily laden bikes down as quickly as possible.
The atmosphere was lively in the bar of the restaurant. Stereotypical Italian men, that could have been actors in The Sopranos, were having sherry poured for them. There were lavish Christmas decorations all around and it was a comforting place to be a fly on the wall for a few minutes. The owner took us to our room, and upon us querying the storage of our bikes kindly gave us a room with a balcony that we could store them on.
We had a hot shower and watched the unnecessarily large television with our dinner. We were famished after our long ride and easily wolfed down a kilogram of bread between us. We were able to get some hot water in a perfectly shiny silver jug to make m some tea and polished off chocolate and biscuits too. Outside on the balcony we could see the lights of all the houses dotted up and down the valleys. There was a cold breeze and we hoped it was an omen of a clear day to come tomorrow.
Surly They Won't Make It 