6-8 May 2019: Packing, Travel, and Arrival Day

I prefer an ad hoc bike tour approach that creates a sense of adventure, at least for me. However, commercial tours have their place and contribute much by enticing thousands to sample bike touring and often become participants. For this planned tour, I give full credit to Ciclismo Classico. Our plan is to generally follow their routing without the 4-star hotels, guides, and baggage support. However, I offer their description as an overview. Our mileage and route is likely to vary. We will be using the maps.me app to set our daily routes. Other than the 2 nights in Rome and 1 in Pesaro, we will book lodging a day in advance once we target our overnight destination.

TERRAIN

Rolling to hilly

START LOCATION

Pesaro

END LOCATION

Porto Ercole (We plan to cycle south from Porto Ercole to the Rome airport. I'll return and Christopher will board a train towards Florence.)

MILEAGE

Average Daily: 35 milesTotal: 346 miles

ELEVATION

Average Daily: 3,863Total: 38,632
Their description: This spectacular 11-day coast-to-coast bicycling tour across the fabled heartland of Italy winds through lush, sweeping countryside and charming medieval villages. Our route from Pesaro on Italy’s Adriatic eastern shores to the west coast Costa d’Argento passes through: Le Marche, Umbria, Lazio and Tuscany. Four regions celebrated for their rich history, distinctive local cuisines and stunning panoramas. We’ll explore the awe-inspiring Grotte di Frasassi, Italy’s largest cave system, and ancient underground Etruscan settlements. 

Google lacked a cycling option, so this is the "Walking" option. Both maps are approximate.

Getting to Rome

Like most flights to Europe, my connection require three segments, Bozeman to Minneapolis to New York-Kennedy to Rome-Fiumicino. All went well but I have a 1.5 hour wait for Christopher, who arrives via United. 

Observing Fellow Air Travelers

• Huge number of Hassidic post-passover travelers, often with many children.
• NY-Kennedy connections & Security: You have to exit security, walk outside to another terminal, then repeat TSA security. 
• Lufthansa must have unloaded a crew bus. 30 flight crew members were passed through the TSA-Pre line to the annoyance of many of the waiting passengers. Apparently, Kennedy lacks the usual separate crew entrance. 
• Watching an older Asian man leave his luggage in the center of the line, forcing all 30 Lufthansa crew members to circle around his bag.
• Watching a large, 4'10" Italian woman crowd her way down the aisle, past passengers waiting to exit the airplane.
• Alitalia passed out the Kosher meals after an hour of flight. No early beverage cart. They followed with a general meal distribution after 1.5 hours, then nothing. Bring your own water!
• Rome-Fiumicino is huge, sprawling, with limited markings to direct arrivals through various security, customs, and luggage collection procedures. However, it all worked, just in what I'm learning is the normal Italy way.
• Members of tour groups appear to wear pins with a photo of their tour guide. Probably a better option than umbrellas when in crowed airports.

Christopher arrived earlier than I anticipated. We rolled to our hotel, just a few blocks away. We stored our bags and immediately left on a walking tour lead by Christopher, who had done his research and had Rick Steeves' audio guides loaded on his phone. Lots of photos, so I'll end the verbiage.

Dog of the Day #1

Horses of the Day. Nice hats.

When parking is limited, select the right car.

Constantine's Arch. Next to the Colosseum, Constantine declared Christianity the official religion of Rome, A.D. 312. Arches were constructed to commemorate triumphant military campaigns and major events.

Colosseum. View of the largely reconstructed north side. 

Crowds and Construction. Tickets to tour many of the major sites are available from three sources: on-line, stand in long lines, or scalpers. Their entire business model is to purchase tickets in advance, and then work in concert with tour guides. We did not bite. 

Arch of Tipus. Built after conquering Israel and the razzing of the Temple, leaving the Wailing Wall.

Oh my God. Look at the crowds. Or, Who inspired, Is anybody out there?

Larry & Christopher. Yes, Italy has craft beers.

Christopher was right. This is a thru street.

Italians DO understand merchandising, at least they did in this store.

Campo de Fiori Market

Campo de Fiori Market Offering. The green liquor is pistachio-based.

Piles of Pizza on Offer.

Campo de Fiori Market Flower Vendor

Tour groups abound

Never know who you might encounter in Rome.

Pantheon. The Roman's temple for all the gods until the Roman Catholics corrected the heretics.

Panthenon Dome. As an architect, this really got Christopher excited. Too much to explain here.

Trevi Fountain. Designed into the facade of a normal building, this immense fountain drew huge crowds.

Spanish Steps. 

Matching sculptures on facing street corners.