101.9km, 1,157m ascent
An auspicious start to the trip as we manage to depart the airport without the traditional spaghetti trail of U turns and beeping Garmins (and beeping of expletives). Airports are understandably not designed with cyclists in mind. On previous trips, we’ve come close to hiring an Uber lead-out…
Bikes are hatched from bubble wrapping, and wheels, pedals, seat posts fastened. Every trip someone has a bent rear mech hanger, so we straighten this trips’ and head off.
To start, a pillow of bright, warm air gently buffs us along the sandy canal towpath of the river. Spirits are high; after many months of planning, we are finally on our way…and the terrain is comfortingly flat. The land here is arable, ribbons of wheat and maize growing for future pasta carbo loadings. We turn north onto a dusty A road, and attempt to ride as a group, but there is giddiness in the pack, like a herd of excited bullocks, the front starts to race off. We enter the Treviso, skirting around its inner ring road. Steeped in snappy Italian cool, this is the hometown of the exquisite Pinarello bicycle company, but also Benetton clothes, Diadora (football boots), Geox (trendy shoes – I had to look this one up), Sisley (posh face creams) and trendy coffee machine makers De’Longhi. Even Tiramisu was born here. It couldn’t be more Italian. We off-load our entire Italian vocabulary at the stunning architecture: bellisismo, bella, Dolmio…
We continue another ~20km north, hitting the very first climb of our trip, a mere hiccup of ~100m at into Susegana, a pretty village with old stone buildings, and a white tower and the foothills to The Alps. With fresh legs, we soar over and swoop down into Pieve di Soligo with tummies rumbling. A few more kilometres and lunch presents itself in a shady café/wine bar.
Sincere apologies here, but there was a complete dearth of cakes, not even a sniff of a tiramisu. The world’s smallest Cokeacola bottles and some savoury nibbles sufficed. But don’t worry Reader, I promise to track down double helping of cake tomorrow…
Post lunch, we follow a gentle ascent through Follina: I Borghi più belli d’Italia (one of the most beautiful villages of Italy (Wikipedia). We’re enjoying today. We’re on holiday!!! The route starts to pull up as we hit the foot of the ‘Marble Run’-isque (a favourite with my kids, and shout out to Granny & Grandpa for provision) San Boldo Pass (~600m).
The gradient quickly quells the chit chat. San Boldo Pass is an amazing feat of engineering. We nose through a series of white-washed U-bends. We’ve gone up the swanny! It’s not a ‘big’ big climb, but it’s a taster of what’s ahead. There’s particularly climb on everyone’s mind, and the source of numerous WhatsApp memes and leg pulling over the last 12 months. The Zoncolon. Rouleur magazine calls it the Giro’s Most Feared Climb. It’ not even on the horizon but is already overlooking our minds…
The summit weather is dark and close, maybe a storm approaching? A fun, descent into Trichiana, then over the glittering waters of the mineral-rich river Piave, and into Triva. A short pull brings us to the rather institutional-looking front of the Park Hotel in Mier.
A few mishaps to report today, as with every one of these trips, there are a few first day mishaps. Kerry mashed his palm into his chainring, Dave L. did a classic ‘fail to clip in-while starting off on a steep climb’, and his brother Pete was caught on a tight bend in a sprawled spooning session with Mark P. Fingers crossed we all stay upright tomorrow.
Brilliant as ever, Liz!