Scintillating Sirmione

Italy Stage 06- Sun 3^rd July 2016 – Brescia to Sirmione (40 Km)
Weather: 22⁰C min – 30⁰C max, fine

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“It never gets easier, you just go faster” ~ Greg LeMond

With just a short ride of 40 Km planned for today, from Brescia to Sirmione, I was in no hurry to leave Brescia this morning so I decided to give my bike some much deserved attention. Laying the bike down on the laneway’s cobbled street, I removed and sanded the brake pads, scrubbed the rubber off the rims, then washed all the dust off the frame with hot soapy water. By the time I attended to my own ablutions, skyped a mate in Sydney, and packed my panniers, it was 10 am before I finally headed off.

Being Sunday morning there were very few cars on the road. People were either at Mass or were recovering from Italy being beaten in a shootout by Germany in the European Soccer Championship quarter finals last night. Not many shops open on Sundays in Italy, so when I came to a supermercato I took the opportunity of stopping for some provisions including olives, crackers, and bananas for lunch.

Like yesterday the terrain was flat and my Garmin route directed me along good sealed bike paths and country roads through some beautiful farmlands and lots of cornfields. Cyclists were everywhere, not just the lycra-clad variety on their flash Cervello and Bianchi racing bikes but also families riding on flat-bar hybrids. A new hazard I encountered today was two horses trotting along the bike path.

Tonight I am staying at the very attractive small town of Sirmione, one of the most popular holiday resorts on the shores of Lake Garda, the largest and possibly most beautiful lake in northern Italy. Being a hot day in the peak of the holiday season there were tourists everywhere, particularly around Scaliger Castle which dominates the landscape of the town. The castle was built in the 13th century and is considered one of the finest examples of a medieval fortification. There is a large number of ristorantes, trattorias, bars, gelatarias, pizzerias in the area around the castle and they were being well patronised today.

And so ends another enjoyable day of riding in Italy. The only thing that spoiled an otherwise perfect day was that my website’s hosted server was not allowing me to upload any media or text to my site, which is why I have not been able to post this blog until the next day when the problem magically fixed itself. Better late than never!