Woke up perfectly today, right when the
alarm rung. Dad calls it a submarine attack warning, but it's just an
alarm. Went down to a breakfast buffet and after Jon tested two eggs,
one of which was near to raw, I got a nicely boiled egg. Dad was
still tired and had to get his bike to work again, as something to do
with the back wheel went wrong yesterday.
Group 1 was ready to go at 9 o'clock
again, but had to wait a bit longer as Sepp received the GPS rack for
today from my device. He didn't have it on his for some reason. Set
of a bit late in the direction we took yesterday, but instead of
following the short cut steep road we took the main road uphill.
Turned right at one point and instead of taking the lift like the
people had done on the track before we went up the road. Karin had
some problems with her gears but Hopsing managed to repair it in no
time. Good that Hopsing is with us, he seems invaluable as a scout,
mechanic and friend. Up and up it went again until we reached a
second lift. This one we took as the next passage was unbikeable.
Weird thing was that bikes up to 20kg were allowed up and bikes up to
30kg down. Everyone with bike reached the top and Sepp and me
refilled our water supplies at a restaurant.
Then it went downhill, after some
discussion, along a very gravely road. Even saw a car come up at one
point, no four wheel drive. Hopsin got a flat tire on the way
downhill, but that was repaired in a jiffy. Skidding down we reached
a tarmac road and continued along that. Stopped again as we had
missed the track at a curve somewhere, me being at the front this
time. Biked back uphill a bit and then down exactly the same road
again. Turned out the trail was a bit to much for some and there was
a warning sign anyway. Reached an intersection of the tarmac road and
the rail so Paulina, Inge and me went down the trail while the rest
continued down the road. Inge and me slipped on a long and went metal
pipe, but got our feet out in time. Met up with the rest at the
bottom and while Inge explained the road to a caravan the rest
continued.
Along the main road it went until we
reached the same crossing as yesterday. And like yesterday we went up
and up the tarmac road. I was stuck at the back but nearly managed to
catch up to Moni in the end. Instead of going down the trail to the
lift like the day before we carried on uphill. And uphill it went for
a long time. Had a quick lunch in the shadow of a huge climbing
mountain, I think the name was Trofana. Carried on pushing most of
the rest to a restaurant between to mountain were we had lunch. We
could see an apparently very famous mountain called something like
Marmolada.
After lunch it was downhill again, as
we had reached the highest point of today at about 2400m above sea
level. First bit downhill was a wide, rocky and steep ski piste.
Everyone else pushed and I somehow got down alive without using my
brakes. Those had been rendered unusable in that steepness. Had a bit
of a adrenalin shake at the bottom and thank god nothing bad
happened, that could have ended really ugly. Carried on along the
side of a mountain with marmot warnings sounding all around us.
Paulina is the only one I heard from that saw a small one scurry
along the path in front of her.
After that along some of the most
beautiful mountains trail I have done up to date. Biking downhill
through shrub field with the Alps in the background. Really felt like
mountain biking in a film there. Down through the wood along woodland
trails and at the bottom the rest in front of me stopped. I couldn't
break in time so I evaded and went down another long, gravely and
steep track. Seems like they want to catch me today. Survived that
smaller one to the bottom as well and biked through a river. Jumped
of my bike at the end and got a few pictures of the rest biking
through the water. Went a bit downhill after that, but we reached the
main road fairly quick.
Then it was back uphill again to get to
the top of the Falzerego pass. Had a short stop to refill our water
supplies at a fountain whilst being passed by a police car and a fire
brigade truck. Reached the top after some convoy biking and managed
to create a traffic chaos by trying to cross the road. Pushed uphill
again, as the track said we were supposed to do that. When we saw
that it would carry on quiet a bit longer and it was 16.00, Sepp put
his foot down on it and we turned round again to continue down the
main road. Whizzing down the road we saw a lot of old military
vehicles come the other way, some collectors items. After leaving the
road we trailed the rest back to Cortina, me going over the handle
bars once. Nothing bad happened from that.
Time in saddle:5 hours 50 min.
Distance: 49.1 km
Average speed: 8.4 km/h
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