Imps Hop Monkey

ROUVY - Tokyo - 42 km | Japan

ROUVY - Skeena River | Canada

🚶 Imps Navigation Inn

If I’ve learnt anything on this trip so far, it’s that the distance travelled and the time taken don’t correlate remotely similarly. Day 4 is (hopefully) going to be the longest day I do in terms of distance - 120km - some 20% more that yesterday. Despite that, I was finished almost two hours earlier.

The principal reason for a much improved speed is down to the fact that nearly all the climbing was done after 10km. The elevation scale would have you believe this climb was nothing, but it was actually +600m from bottom to top - up to another summit of 2,121m, over 17 hairpin bends. The climb has been my favourite of the trip so far - possibly one of my favourite climbs full stop - with beautiful, spectacular views of the rocky cliff faces of the dolomites all the way to the top.

The cliff faces are so huge and imposing that they are next to impossible to capture the enormity of them on an iPhone. The only way to really give you an idea of them is to use the wide angle lens - in doing so, it’s possible to get more of the cliff faces in shot, but some of the world scale is lost. You will just have to visit yourself 😜

About one third of the way up I saw some more cows and I thought I would photograph them. I leaned my bike at the side of the road and I was shocked (literally!) to find out that it was an electric fence ⚡️I don’t remember making any sort of sound, but another cyclist did come over to check if I was ok. The surprise of it happening was I think the most concerning thing of all - I was ok otherwise. I think I’ll be a bit more cautious of fences from now on!

The next 32km or so was nearly all a descent. As well as losing all the altitude I’d gained from this morning’s climb, I also lost most of the extra altitude I’d banked up the day before. This meant I was down to around 500m above sea level once it started to level out again.

It was so much hotter at this lower elevation - I noticed a few shops displaying temperatures of 33-34°C. Luckily the rest of the riding would be on mostly flat terrain and I would not need to bust a gut doing anything too strenuous. The key was just to keep drinking and drinking, which meant stopping at pretty much every town I went through for more water. It meant I was wasting a fair bit of time, but without doing so I might not even finish the day.

The route to Bolzano was along the ‘Eurovelo 7 Sun Route’ cycle path, which is a 7,700km path (or quiet roads) from North Cape, Norway all the way to Malta. I then joined the Etsch-Cycle path from Bolzano to Laces - my destination for the evening. Both routes ride through some really nice orchards and vineyards, alongside train tracks and the river for most of the way. It was encouraging to see that they were being used by a lot of cyclists - actually mostly families and/or commuters. Most were on ebikes, so they could travel at 24kph pretty much unassisted. On the pure flat parts I was easily faster than them, but any sort of incline and they would be coming back past me. I saw some of the same faces quite a few times.

As I approached Laces, it started to rain quite heavily. It had rained the day before too, but this time there was enough rain to form puddles. This would make it quite frustrating to set up my tent and sleeping arrangements for the evening. Speaking of those, I am not fully convinced the campsite had any room for me - I have just been shoved on an unnumbered piece of grass next to some static caravans. They do make good shade at least.

In to town in the evening and the menu is written in German. I had been noticing that most people were speaking that language around here, but it was the first time it has been the leading language. I wasn’t familiar with what any of the items were, so I used Google Translate and found a ‘bacon plate’. Sadly it wasn’t just loads of rashers piled high, but it did the job nevertheless.

The next ride is the Stelvio day, which I’m really looking forward to!

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Gary Bray

🇮🇹🇨🇭 day 4: Corvara to Laces

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Imps Hop Monkey

ROUVY - Tokyo - 42 km | Japan

ROUVY - Skeena River | Canada

🚶 Imps Navigation Inn

ROUVY - Skeena River | Canada

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