At about the half way stage we stopped for some coffee and Struedel.
The weather held good to get us to Bolzano, home of Otze (the Iceman), by lunchtime. However, by the time for dinner the weather changed for the worse. We had dinner of roast suckling pig in an old brewery and walked back to our hotel in heavy rain.
The rain held off next morning until about midday and then began in earnest. It was also cold and on reaching Campitello, I stopped with Roberta for a pizza and a chance to dry out. The Ride and Seek van picked us up and took us along to our destination with most of the other riders to Arabba, where we were staying the night. An intrepid few made it all the way to Arabba. The next morning it was fine and I woke up to this:
From Arabba we had a ride of about 105km to Belluno. The weather remained good, but we had 2330m of climbing to deal with.
The views were spectacular, although on the long climbs, I seemed to be looking more at the road surface than anything else!
I did the first 54 km to lunch, which was most of the climbing, doing the steeper bits on foot, but was then sufficiently whacked to accept Fede's offer of a lift in the car to Belluno where we stayed in a large old 17th C building, which in the sixteen hundreds served as a bishop's residence, but now functions as a hotel.
The next morning thunderstorms were forecast for the first part of the ride, so we were all transported to a spot approximately 90km from the Venice Lido. Jose led for the first 40 plus km, going into a steady headwind all the way at an average of 35km/hour. I was more than happy to draft behind! Less than a kilometre from the spot where we were due to catch the vaporetto to the Venice Lido, we were suddenly in the middle of a thunderstorm, with torrential rain and strong winds, which made riding totally impossible. Riding by this time by myself, I was lucky to find shelter by the side of a soft drink dispensing machine and under the cover of a bit of an awning. As suddenly as it had come, the storm passed and I rode the remaining metres to the ferry terminal and caught the ferry over to the Lido and the Hotel Russo. Today, we have had a very welcome rest day. I treated myself to a Thai massage and then spent the day relaxing and doing a bit of street photography.
I will update this blog in the next few days.
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