Day 12 Radicofani to Bolsena
- Thomas Delker
- 7 days ago
- 2 min read
An excellent dinner and very reasonable in Radicofani the night before and a pleasant stroll back down to the hotel. We had a 7.30 breakfast arranged and so we headed to bed around 9 pm. With no AC we left the windows wide open and just pretended there were no mosquitoes (which of course there were).
We started the day with a lovely down out of Radicofani for almost 400m over 10 km. Then a tame and comfortable rolling stretch with a few punches. We chatted with some nice gentlemen from Nertherlanda who have been walking the via Francigena over the past 10 years in sections. Then some rugged gravel and before we knew it we were eating pizza at a bar in Acquapendente that was exactly what we needed at 11 am. About ⅔ way done with the day were were feeling pretty good. Then a slow resupply at the grocery store and some pharmacy supplies got us a little behind but we were still feeling confident that we had a nice easy finish ahead of us.
Well, the via francigena showed us otherwise. 20 km of tough gravel path and the hot sun sapped our energy and we were very hot, sweaty and tired as we rode past the castle here in Bolsena, a quaint town of the edge of a huge lake.
We went straight to the hotel, showered and then headed out to swim in the lake. A few hours later we packed up and headed off to the bike store for 2 more tubes, just in case, and pizza.
Another excellent dinner and we walked back through the pedestrian streets to the hotel looking at the interesting shops. Cold showers and to bed - while we have AC tonight, as is often the case here in Europe, it doesn’t live up to our standards. A cold shower just helps take the edge off.
The weather has been reasonable, especially when we have been high up, with high temps in the low to mid 80s. The sun though is very strong especially when we dont have shade. It is going to warn over the next few days to the low 90s though. Finishing early is generally the best way to deal with that.
Comments