Day 15- Telgate to Lecco

As I sit here at the end of the day of riding, I am waiting for the washing to be done in the laundromat and I am enjoying the view above…. Wow!

Today was a shortish ride with our normal early start at 6.00 am and breakfast at the hotel which was quite good.

The day today was punctuated by me attending an Alkira Board meeting and Chris attending a Prostate Cancer Foundation meeting. Both our attendances were virtually rather than in person.

To do this Chris delayed his start to the ride by a couple of hours which left Steve and I to make our way to Lecco with the hope that Chris could catch us up along the way…. More about that later!

Our start was at about 8.00 am and there was a bit of rain for the first 20 kms or so. This meant we had our wet weather gear on. Despite this the tepees in the low 20’s which made for reasonable riding conditions. Like yesterday the route included some care in navigation and in our case, Steve was chief navigator.

At the 30 km point we stopped for coffee so I could join the Alkira Board meeting by zoom. The connections worked perfectly and it was good to see all the board members in cold Melbourne again. They were all pleased to see me and enjoyed the update on the travels so far. I was pleased to report that we are making good progress on the fund raising for the cafe and that I was hoping we could get around $50 k for the cafe….So please keep those donations coming in!

Unfortunately after about half an hour I had to bail out of the meeting as my phone was overheating with the zoom meeting.

After this it was on further to Villa d’Alla to cross the Adda river which flows from Lake Como…. The crop was to be by ferry but to our shock the ferry was not operating due to the rising river levels… so what now?

Well the best thing to do is to have lunch at a cafe and adopt a plan B. Which we did!

Steve and I had a very pleasant pasta lunch in a restaurant overlooking the ferry pier and planning the route ahead AND informing Chris who was behind us of the problem.

After lunch it was off on plan B to Brivio which turned out a relatively easy fix. To be honest I was thinking we might have start climbing big hills as the valley’s were closing in as we went through the day!

At Brivio we managed to pick up the route again along the river…. All was going great until we came across a big tree which had fallen across the path! We the only way out was to unload the bike panniers and lift the bikes over the tree which worked perfectly!

A little further on I said to Steve that we were lucky that the river was not in flood as the path might be under water! Gosh I should have not said this as sure enough the trail ahead was flooded! No matter we simply went through the water on the trail with the water coming up over our shoes and socks in some parts! Yes wet shoes, socks and feet! Yuck! This is all part of the adventure!

After this the trail was quite good on the way to Lecco but the scenery was unfolding before our very eyes with each pedal stroke! I have tried to capture the sights with the photos below! It is truly a lovely place to be but the hills look ominous!

The views of the start of Lake Como were amazing but only dampened by a thunderstorm which was requiring us to take shelter.After this the sun came out and we enjoyed the ride.

We made a short stop at the Decathlon store in Lecco which was near our accommodation and I got the store to check my bike chain which was ok thankfully.

The last 3 kms were an uphill to our accommodation which was a bit challenging after the day. No matter we made the climb and found our accommodation….getting in to the apartment was something else! The apartment complex is very hip and everything is done by remote including the key entry. It took Steve and I several goes to get the gate open… I still don’t know how we did it!

Shortly after arriving , Chris arrived safely and it was good to see him! He had much the same adventures as we did along the way.

We arrived at our destination at about 4.15 pm after riding about 70 kms and climbing about 450 metres.

Steve did a great job of navigating today with all the challenges we faced…well done Steve! Also well done Chris for doing it all on his own for the day.

The pictures today are:

The route

The ferry station…. Not working!

The restaurant where we hatched plan B

Have a look at the pastry lunch this lady is having….seafood dish. It was her birthday!

Oooops there is a tree blocking the past

….and the path is flooded!

But…. Look what is ahead . Wow the views are really worth the trouble!

Last photo is our accommodation which is very hip!