Udine

After our rest we set out again, leaving the woods behind and exchanging them for the fields of the lowlands.
In the early afternoon we arrived at our B&B, where once again Giacomo proved his unique talent of choosing the accomodation with the most ascent possible - we saw it as additional training.
Because today's distance is so short, we decide to leave the baggage at the B&B and visit Udine, about 20 kms south of our accomodation. This way, we can quickly pass through Udine tomorrow, saving time on our final day to Trieste.
While Udine is stressful to get into with the busy streets, the inner city is well worth a visit, the architecture reminded us of Venice and the little cafes were very inviting - so we rewarded us with some calories.
On the way back darkness fell upon us, we were prepared and had brought our lights, but the exhaustion of the day was beginning to show. As it was already getting late we changed plans and got dinner on the way instead of first returning to the B&B for a shower - fortunately, we weren't thrown out, so apparently we weren't smelling as bad as we had feared.
As we were far off the "tourist route" the menu was only in Italian but Giacomo did his best to translate and gave me an introduction to the Italian cuisine, reaching farther than just pizza. On the bright side to being off the "tourist highway", the restaurant offered local dishes (there seems to be no limit to the different shapes of pasta!) and as we had "primi" and "secondi" we also had plenty of opportunity to try it.
After our saturating meal we returned back to the B&B, where we finally took advantage of the shower - a true highlight after our long day. We had - with our visit to Udine - covered more than 100 kms and spent almost 6 hours on our bikes - so much for our lazy rest day!Lue lisää