Tyrol - Sardinia
You can safely consider Tyrol as one of biker's heaven on earth. It's a rare combination of beauty and safety. I follow the non toll road as usual leaving behind Innsbruck on the 182 and a few km before the Italian border at Brenner I really start considering urination as top priority. I stop behind the trees where I enjoyed both a relief and a nice view:
Fancy that bridge? Me too. belongs to the A13 toll road:
As beautiful the route was on its first part heading South, the second half (mostly in Italy) was quite boring. I stop after 320km at St. Michele in Bosco, a village between Verona and Parma right by the river Oglio. This way I wouldn't be too far from Livorno to catch the ferry to Sardinia the next day. By not too far I mean 250km. It feels like Greek hot summer again in these lowlands and I have a nice sleep at a cozy BnB run by a sweet Italian girl.
Next morning becomes today's morning and I rush to finish my breakfast and jump on the bike in order to arrive early enough at the port of Livorno. I didn't search much about the most scenic route but luckily the one I took via the Avventura Cerwood Park had nothing to regret about. Especially the part around Monteduro really motivates you to finish your tires on those bends where my luggage almost reached the tarmac while cornering. Never forget though that even in the most ideal situations you must always back it up a little bit cause shit like this can happen:
A stop at Passo del Cerreto was necessary to breath some more beauty:
I arrive at Livorno and I find the port much larger than I expected. The area has some nice places, among them the medieval fortress which caught my attention easily:
As I was driving to enter the port after a short mediocre meal I had two guys on a scooter scream at me "Yasou! Ti kaneis?" in not so broken Greek (which means "Hi, how are you?"). I describe them my trip so far making the long story short as possible and they go in surprise "Monos!?!?" (Alone?). Two letters in your number plate can make a difference and in my case it was G and R...
The Austrian guy you see below invited me in his delicious sausage supplies. Great guy.
And...I find out that we actually have full moon!
After hours of wait we're finally allowed in the ferry and I don't hesitate to pitch my tent on the deck for one more time:
Moby's nice large ferry painted in Looney Tunes approaches the port of Olbia at Sardinia. A full moon night was over and a new pretty day was just starting:
I pick some breakfast stuff from a mini market and consume them at this point:
Predictably fantastic weather (finally!) combined with riding by the sea (finally!) makes me feel like home (Hellas offers both infinitely). The island of Sardinia has lots of beaches but even in the middle of September it still had lots of tourism for my taste.
I stop for a swim at Marina Maria:
The place was nothing ultra exciting especially considering where I come from but it was much less crowded than others. Or maybe the dump masses have already left leaving obvious signs of incompetence and indifference behind:
I take the sandy way back to my AirBnB:
This was a full day spend on the sea, on my bike, in the sea and on my bike again so I didn't struggle to fall asleep at night. Still much more to explore around the island of Sardinia so stay tuned - See you in part 6!