Barcelona to Rome: Alba to Gavi and Gavi to Trebbia

Alba to Gavi

Yesterday’s ride through vineyards from Alba to Gavi was another beautiful day on the bike. Lush, green, rolling hills. Shorter climbs but still punchy, so that by the end of the day we had racked up another 1800m of climbing and about 110km.

Coffee did not eventuate at the planned stop at the medium sized village of Canelli, so we rode on and up a climb to another small village, name forgotten, where we were able to soak up the sun in the cobbled square and enjoy our morning brew. Aaron and I decided we should try the caffe coretto grappa or, in my case sambucca: a dash of liquor added to a shot of espresso. Very enjoyable.

We stopped for lunch in the old Roma bath town of Acqui Terme, where there was a festival happening with marching bands and lots of locals enjoying a day in the sun. The Piazza Bolente has a fountain with, not just hot, but boiling water - apparently the only one in all of Italy.

The ride to the finish involved a short but very steep 13% climb for over a kilometre but the result was spectacular: possibly the most beautiful hotel we have yet stayed in: La Spirina Resort. Set among vineyards, it has beautiful yellow walls and is covered in ivy - long tendrils wafting gently in the breeze as we enjoyed a refreshing soft drink on a shady lounge. Nice music coming from the semi open restaurant behind made for a very enjoyable afternoon.

In the evening we were joined by Felix Lowe. Felix, a cycling journalist of some years experience had confessed to never actually doing any riding, until, by a chance event he undertook the challenge of the Hannibal tour couple of years ago. Part of the inspiration for doing the ride was to write a book about it and so, in due course, “Climbs and Punishment” was published, no doubt with apologies to the great Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky who penned “Crimes and Punishment” a century ort so ago (don’t check those dates, they’re just a guess).

Anyay, Felix did due diligence with the Hannibal theme and researched the story of Hannibal’s crossing from Spain to Italy. So he was able to give us an enlightening historical lecture as we sipped Gavi di Gavi (an excellent white wine made in house from 'cortese' grapes) and a locally micro-brewed wheat beer. Dinner in the restaurant was superb before we all retired for the night feeling that what we had a great day. Great except for the brewing URTI cough, runny nose etc.

Aaron (our GC rider) chatting at the pizza/get to meet the newbies night in Alba

Harold getting to grips with gelato after dinner in Alba

Leaving Alba for Gavi. Snow capped peaks in the background show where we have come from.

Everywhere you look, if there's a hill there's a town on it

Passing by a church cum cafe joint on a Sunday morning.

Lush, gree and heavily planted to grapes mostly.

Harold sneaks up behind a couple of local lasses participating in a medieval festival we happened to ride through

Richard and Aaorn stopped for a look at the festival

La Spirina: our boutique resort for the night at Gavi

La Spirina courtyard

Just down the road from the entrance to La Spirina, to give you an idea of the surroundings

Everyone is starving and waiting for the plates to arrive

Gavi to Trebbia

Despite the beautiful surrounds of last night’s resort accommodation I was unable to get internet and hence post a blog update. Here’s hoping for better tonight. Today’s ride was 105km with another 1800m of climbing. Sounds easy? Not on your life. These climbs were short but nasty with gradients between 9% and 13% and the leg snapper was ‘il muro’ (the wall). Over a kilometre long and seriously steep with gradients a minimum of 13% and up to 23%. I managed to get up without getting off but wager there would have been a few walkers. I had started out not feeling the best with increasing urti symptoms including a hiking cough and thought I would just ride at my own pace and keep going. I got to coffee first after il muro and Richard soon after. We decided to press on to lunch after a refuel with water and gels.

By the time we got to lunch we had negotiated some more steep climbs and none of the others were in sight so we decided to roll on the list 35km to the finish. mostly downhill, except for, you guessed it, another steep climb that seemed to go on forever. I've got this theory about Italians being like wombats. If there's hill, someone will have built a case on top of it in exactly the same way that if there's a rock, wombat leave leave something on top of that as well. And you can be sure there will be a road leading up to it and you can be equally sure that we will ride up that road right to the (expletive deleted) top! I have another theory too and that is if Silvio had spent as much money on tar as he did on tarts the roads would be in much better condition.

Richard and I got to the finish town but our Garmins came up short with the accommodation. A bit of faffing around, asking locals etc and we eventually found it 5km out of town, overlooking the Trebbia river where Hannibal engaged the Romans in one of the major skirmishes of his entire campaign, the second punic war.

Arriving at the hotel I was surprised to find my room had been shifted rom shared with Mick to single on account of my URTI. Seems nobody else wants to share it! Anyway, a bit of a bonus as I have a huge room, with bath, which I have already enjoyed, along with a couple of beers in the courtyard. All I had to do then was wait for the van to arrive with luggage, which it has because this computer was on it.

No photos from Trebbia yet, so I'd better get on it. Until next time...

OK, so now I have some photos of our hotel and the surrounds.