St Tropez-Lago d'Orta-Lago Maggiore-Milan

SEPTEMBER 2, 2010

I set out pretty early along the Cote d'Azur, from San Tropez through Antibes, Cannes, Nice, and Monaco. I had never been in this area, so was kind of looking forward to checking it out.  To see the sights I had to stick to the coastal road rather than the highway, which meant that it was very slow going.  To make a long story short, Antibes and Nice seemed very nice.  I didn't take many pictures, really nothing remarkable, although I did have to get a shot of the famous Casino at Monte Carlo:

The coast just past Monaco is also pretty spectacular:

Shortly after this spot my GPS directed me to turn left off the coast road to start north toward Italy.  I expected to end up on a highway, at least for a while, but I ended up on probably the twistiest mountain road I have ever been on, with more hairpins than a New Jersey beauty salon.  It was actually pretty brutal, but of course mercifully little traffic.  After a couple of hours of this, the road turned onto a slightly larger road through a beautiful river valley.  Really, nice, here is one pic:

At or near the border between France and Italy there is a really cool, long tunnel—very narrow, small, it felt like I was riding through a mine shaft.  Anyway, once I got into Italy I decided to pick up the pace, it was getting toward late afternoon, so I got on the highway and about 50 tolls later arrived at the beautiful Lago d'Orta.  I decided to stay in Orta San Giulo, which as far as I could tell is the nicest town on the lake.  It is quite nice, with a quaint old town and lots of artwork placed around the city.  Here are lots of pix, it is a very photogenic city.  Supposedly the island visible from the city (first pic below) is the "most beautiful lake island in Italy," but somehow it just reminded me of Alcatraz:

 

An un-Photoshopped sunset pic:

Nice city, but rather sleepy.  Next morning, on to another lake!

 

SEPTEMBER 3, 2010

Did not have far to ride at all today, just over the Lago Maggiore, so I basically decided in ride in loops a bit.  Rode up to the north end of Lago d'Orta, then over the Lago Maggiore near Stresa, then down around the south end of Maggiore and back up the eastern shore via Angera (very relaxing day not withstanding riding through "Stresa" and "Angera").  From Angera, up to Laveno, and caught the ferry over to Verbania, then up to Cannobio.  Here is me on the ferry:

I had more trouble finding a hotel in Cannobio than anywhere I've ever been, very few hotels, and the ones I found were full.  Finally found someplace with a moldy-smelling room, but my only alternative was to ride to another town, so I took it. Kind of a pretty town, see the pix below, but utterly boring—don't think I'll be back here, ever, unless I'm just passing through somewhere…

SEPTEMBER 4, 2010

Was not eager to hang about in my crappy hotel in Cannobio, so I left early, thought I'd try to do some shopping, maybe see if I could find a hotel in Laveno for future reference.  Took the ferry again, no shopping, no decent hotels in Laveno, just headed down to Milan.  I checked into a hotel in the middle of nowhere (near Mototouring), and then headed downtown to check out the sights.  The city seemed really dead, lot os stores closed, etc.  I stopped for lunch by the castello and then went and dropped off the bike at Mototouring and walked to the hotel.

The area around the hotel was remarkably boring and sterile.  I noticed that even the neighborhood strip bar was closed on a Saturday.  This place is boring!!!  I probably walked for an hour trying to find a place to sit outside and have dinner, but no luck.  The few bars with outdoor tables were fully of very seedy-looking characters.  NOTE TO SELF:  next time stay downtown…  Anyway, as I walked around I poked my head in a few Italian restaurants, but all of them looked to be run by Koreans.  Finally I gave up and had an average dinner in one of the Korean/Italian places.  I also noticed that most of the local populace walking about on the streets were carrying take-out pizza boxes.  Kind of funny.  Later on, I didn't even bother looking for a bar, I knew it was hopeless.

Next morning, I woke up and got the hell out of Milan via a very expensive ($125!) taxi ride to the airport (NOTE TO SELF:  Next time get hotel downtown, near express train to airport…)

Cascais-St Tropez

Evening, August 29, 2010
I didn't leave the hotel in Cascais until about 20:00, but thought that maybe I could get to Spain before it got dark, or shortly thereafter. I wanted to get as far as I could, because the next night I wanted to stay in Zaragoza, which was a long way off, and plus I thought it would be cooler riding at night rather than the 100+ temps I expected riding through the center of Spain the next day.

In fact, I was at least 100 km from the Spanish border when it got dark, and I was plenty tired from the day's activities, so after riding in the dark for a while and not digging it at all, I decided to stop in a city called Evora. While it may sound like a planet from a Star Wars movie, Evora is in fact an ancient Roman city, and I would have liked to check it out, but unfortunately I didn't arrive until well after dark, and in the morning I had to get moving early, because I had a lot of ground to cover to get to Zaragoza.

August 30, 2010
I left pretty early in an effort to beat the heat--I was going to be riding more than 500 miles right through the steamy middle of Spain, and was afraid it would be above 100 degrees for most of that distance. As it turns out, the heat wasn't that bad, I think in the low nineties. The ride was long and tedious, with the worst part when I tried to go around Madrid but instead got sucked into the middle of town (thanks GPS!) and then seemingly rode around the city a couple of times on various freeways, it was horrible. I finally succeeded in breaking free of Madrid's orbit and headed off towards Zaragoza.

Frankly this day was pretty much a blur, zipping along the freeway, and certainly not memorable. After the long ride, however, I wanted to spoil myself with a nice hotel in Zaragoza, which I had picked out and selected on the GPS. Of course, once I got to the city, the GPS could not find the hotel (a fair number of one-way streets and pedestrian zones got in the way), so I drove around for half an hour trying to find a place to stay. Finally I found a rather shabby if centrally located hotel (Hotel Inca) and took a room. Finding a decent place to eat with tables outside was also a challenge, and in general, I have to say that I was not that impressed with Zaragoza, it was just not that lively and didn't really have any other major redeeming qualities.  Here’s a view from my hotel room:

 

Here are a few more pix of Zaragoza:

August 30, 2010

No breakfast in the lame hotel, so I had to scrounge around to find something to eat, and then left Zaragoza, destination:  Andorra.  The Pyrenees start pretty soon after Zaragoza, and the road was pretty nice after a short stretch of freeway.  I had heard that there were some good bike shops in Andorra, and thought I'd stop there for lunch and some shopping, although not like I really needed anything.  Of course I got there around 13:00 or so, and most of the shops were closed for lunch…I'll never figure out Europe.

The road after Andorra got even better, and was quite nice, through the mountains.  As usual, when riding through the mountains, it is hard to get pix of the stunning scenery because there is no where to stop.  After Andorra, I really didn't know where to go…hadn't done much research on this area.  I saw Carcasonne on the map, liked the name, and so decided to head there.  It turned out to be a pretty cool city, with a Foreign Legion base and a cool old castle:

And here a few of the city itself:

Carcassone is a nice enough town, but pretty sleepy.  The hotel I stayed in (Pont Vieux) had a great roof deck though, so I could have some wine, smoke a cigar, and watch the changing light on the fortress.  The old town, inside the walls, is super touristy, but pretty cool as it got later and the crowds thinned out (to zero).

 

September 1, 2010

Today I decided to head to St Tropez, just because it sounded glamourous and fun.  So off I went, with most of the way on the freeway, very boring.  But, once I got off the freeway I was on a rather remarkable road leading to St Tropez's back door.  Very narrow, twisty, uneven, off-camber, it was very interesting little road.  Pulled into St Tropez and found a hotel easy enough, with a courtyard to park the bike.  Walked around town quite a bit, it is a nice town, obviously very wealthy, with some seriously, seriously large yachts.  Here are some pix:

St Tropez was nice, but nothing super special, I didn't even see a beach in town, I guess they are somewhere nearby.  Oh well.  Anyway, after one night it was off to Italy!