Slightly better weather this morning, but still the threat of rain as we left the hotel. (There had been some evening sunshine yesterday, so we had finally seen some mountains. The hotel was in a lovely spot).

The local geography is really complicated, but basically we wanted to descend to the Adige valley, but first had to climb about 400m to a pass. As we climbed the cloud continued to build.

Our route over the pass itself was on a tiny back road. When we reached the turn we found the road thoroughly closed – it was being upgraded. But luckily it was Saturday and no one was around. It is surprising how much motivation comes from the knowledge that the only alternative involves a huge detour with a huge amount of extra climbing! So we got stuck in to moving concrete bollards, dismantling the fencing, and generally breaking in to the building site. It took a while, but we got through. The views down to Trento were great.

There followed a really steep descent down tightly packed hairpins, as rain began to fall, to coffee in Trento.

This had been a favourite place when passed through, heading south on the Via Claudia Augusta cycle route, 2 years ago. It was good to be back, but this time we didn’t stay long. And the weather improved as we headed north up the magnificent cycle track.

Finally, some sun, and dry feet for the first time for three days! And a tail wind as well. Magnificent. We finished the day just short of Bolzano at a very nice campsite attached to a hotel. The thunder is rolling round, but at least the tent is up and we have shelter.

Helen’s track of the day:
Feeling Good, Muse
Yesterday, whilst drying out in the motel, I had a lovely time listening to some of the playlists I had put on the phone for this trip, music I had not had chance to look at in detail. On a playlist of British music I found this, a favourite Nina Simone track but with a cover version by Muse that makes me laugh. A good song for today.