Niall's Travel Blog

Hospitality and Hills

While leaving Padova an Italian guy cycles up next to me, and on hearing I'm Irish, tells me about his cycle tour through Ireland and wishes me luck for the journey. It seems to rub off as I set a faster pace than ever before, flying around Venice. At a petrol station I stop to top up my water and a group of Italians, after my explaining my exploits, treat me to coffee and broken conversation - at one point a man saying "Albania e Kosovo" and pointed his fingers, gun-like, to his temple before shouting "BANG, BANG!".

For the duration of the day I cycle with the majestic snow capped Alps on my left. At one point a squadron of Italian fighter jets, flying in formation, pass over me before breaking up at the Alps and swerving in and around the peaks. The only downer of the day is that I discover my tyre has buckled under the weight of the panniers and is about to blow out, needing to be replaced.

At dusk I pull into a house driveway, asking to camp in their garden. After some confusion they allow me and later invite me in for a delicious home-cooked meal. We chat afterwards for about two hours, despite the language barrier and they introduce me to their pets - a cat and parrot. After having a shot of a locally brewed lacquer and a welcome shower we say goodnight and my faith in human kindness is reaffirmed - I'm going to do this more often.

The next day I take a detour to the Adriatic, the last sight of sea before Turkey. The combination of Mediterranean and lagoon with small islands on the land side makes for some beautiful cycling, one island even having a full basilica on it - only in Italy.

I cross into Slovenia at an obscure border post and the landscape changes almost immediately, the bare trees and vinyards reminding me of Sardinia. Slovenia's star is obviously on the rise, it's the first recent EU entrant to adopt the euro, there are a lot of new cars on the road and everyone seems to be making improvements to their house - all adding up to a feeling of confidence in the future.

Having been spoilt by flatlands since Lake Garda, I find some of the steeper hills tough going. I camp a mountain pass and come to the house of Boris and Suzana who let me sleep on their couch and again I am treated to food, wine, a shower and information about the road ahead - flat to Ljubljana.

Flat, I can only guess, must be a mistranslation from some Slavic word meaning "steep uphills followed by steep downhills, but on average your altitude stays the same". I struggle with some of the hills (but am showing signs of my fitness improving) and have to brake heavily on some of the downhills, at one point reaching 52km/h - at that speed I would reach Kyrgyzstan in three weeks.

For lunch I cook myself a gorgeous meal. Mozzarella to start, penne pasta with sun dried tomatoes and mozzarella served with fresh baguette and chocolate for dessert. Accompanying wine was Fanta Orange, 2006 vintage. And so, it was with a full belly that I cruise into Ljubljana, ticking over one thousand kilometres.

posted by Niall at 3:21 p.m.