Friday, 30 August 2013

Day 14 - Monticiano to Bolsena

Sadly for personal reasons, Jane isn’t writing the blog herself today and the task has been taken over by Guest bloggers Chris and Jeff.  So today this won’t meet the literary standard Jane has been setting and which has been so complimented by her readers.
Today Jane was told that her loved friend and constant and adorable companion Beanz had to be put to sleep.  It was very sad for all of us to see Jane upset.  Beanz was well known to many, and will be sadly missed.  Tomorrow we will ride to Rome to commemorate the memory of the Beanz.
  
It was a tough day out for the peleton today, which had a number of us reduced to walking the bikes up a short but very grippy section of Etruscan countryside.  Over 3.000 feet of climbing in one hit after a couple of early warm up climbs was challenging but by lunchtime the task was accomplished – a testament to how we have all got stronger over the last couple of weeks.  The compensation was some sublime countryside with views straight out of a “this is the best of Italy” guide.  The compensation for the hills was a number of coffee stops, which gave us sufficient energy to move on to the next coffee stop and the next one.
And at the highest point of the day when the grey mist of exhaustion was blanking out the views our wonderful support crew of Elizabeth and Angela had laid out a fantastic picnic which restored our spirits and set us off on the final stretch of the day.
One final coffee stop with added  ice cream was sufficient for us to glide the final few miles to a lovely campsite by a lake.  When we have forgotten the hills we will all remember a fantastic day.


The only other incident worth noting was Matt’s effort to knock an Italian car off the road.  Good try and probably honours even but we’ re giving the win to Matt on the basis of the weight discrepancy.

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