Riva Del Garda

We woke up at 7am and it was just 3°c outside and 8°c inside. I put the gas fire on because the electric we had paid for ran out at 6am and then made coffees and we both sat under the duvet whilst Wanda warmed up.
At 8:30am we decided to head to the co-op and it was beautiful outside with blue skies, white fluffy clouds and a gorgeous Mountain View, the air felt really fresh.
Just before 9am we left our mountainside park up and headed just 15 miles down the road to Riva Del Garda and lake Garda. Here there is a Motorhome park up for €1 an hour, we could stay overnight but I was only here to ride the hanging cycle path and we didn’t want to pay for a park up unless we had to.
Once we had parked at 9:30am I got changed into my cycling stuff and got my bike off the back. I’d had this route planned since may whilst watching the Giro De Italia but I knew about the cycle route before that.
I left Ellie in Wanda googling crap on her phone and cycled down the road to the edges of lake Garda and turned right. You would think for a famous cycle route it would be well marked but it wasn’t and when I did find a sign it was tiny. I managed to pick up the red cycleway running next to the pedestrians path and cycled through the Riva Del Garda plaza and out the other side and then the shops stopped and the cycleway went through a tunnel and in the other side I should have gone through a longer tunnel but it was closed off with locked gates.
There was a road next to me that had a cycle sign on it and I took that and it did a big loop of 360° bringing me into a gravel track but I was on top of the tunnel I should have taken.
Now I didn’t know where I was going but I presumed it was just a diversion and carried on.
This route was actually part of the mountain bike route of lake Garda and was gravel all the way. This track just climbed and climbed and went through a series of tunnels, the gradient was 10% all the way. After nearly 45 minutes of climbing on gravel and with just one switchback left until I reached the top I stopped and checked to see where I was and realised I was miles away from where I wanted to be and even if I made it to the top I’d be in main roads to get to where I wanted.
I gave up and cycled back down and back to Wanda. I’d only cycled 15km but done 300 meters of climbing.
Back at Wanda it was now 11:30am so I put my normal clothes back on, ate Ellie’s left over pizza for lunch and then we left Wanda in the car park and walked along the banks of Lake Garda to the plaza. It was 21°c but felt much hotter.
At the plaza it was now 12:30 and most of the shops were closing for siesta. Here they close from 12-3pm or 1-4pm. It’s mad that when we get to these places most of the shops are closed.
We were looking for a souvenir shop to buy an Italian mug for our collection but they are all closed but we did find a gelato shop and it would have been rude to pass without buying some so I had snickers and pistachio and Ellie had cherry and mango and got brain freeze from eating it so fast.
From the Gelato store we took a slow walk back to Wanda, paid for the parking which came to €3 and then headed to our park up for the night.
Obviously we didn’t want to break the cycle of free park ups as the challenge has now become can we do this whole trip without paying for a camp site, so I’d found a free aire 30 miles away from where we were down the eastern shores of lake Garda and 3 miles inland.
We had a stunning 27 mile drive around the edges of lake Garda with amazing views and we went through about 15 tunnels. Some of them were 2km long. Finally we left the shores of lake Garda and started heading inland to Gavardo.
We’d found a decent little spot on the edge of a retail park but it’s made for motorhomes and the area is huge. When we arrived there were just 2 other motorhomes here. There is also a big park out at the front of us and considering it is a very busy area it’s actually really quiet.
In Wanda we plotted where we were going to head to next. It should have been up and to the Stelvio pass and then Switzerland but because of the bad weather recently the Stelvio pass is closed and we think Switzerland is already having snow so we’ve scrapped Switzerland to head further east in Italy and then down towards the coast and around the maritime-alps into France.
Our next official destination would be just outside Turin but we’ll have to stop on route and find a laundrette, that will be our first job tomorrow.
At 5pm we had dinner of Beef Noodles and after washing up we settled in for the night closing all the blinds and shutting out the world until tomorrow.Read more