The porridge crisis eased a little this morning as I managed to cobble together a few oats for my brekkie. I needed a big meal because today’s ride was a seriously long one. We planned to cycle 65km to the next campsite near Piacenza- hopefully it won’t be too bad!

Tim joined me for the epic trip today. I spruced up the bike with oil because I’ve been having some issues with gear changes. Check me out below!

At the start of the ride we made our way back towards Pavia along the dusty cycle track we took yesterday. This turned into a main road but it didn’t last too long as we found a sign for the Francigena This is the old Pilgrim route that Dad always goes on about so we thought we’d best check it out!

It took us the wrong way but it wasn’t a big deal haha.The route took us a through some quiet villages along quiet roads but these soon subsided into big main carriageways. There were lots of trucks and the road surface was very poor so we had to concentrate a lot.

Google Maps then took us through the middle of nowhere. The road was a farm track so it was tough to cycle on. We ended up miles away from anywhere on a farm with nobody about. There were quite a few dog warning signs so we made our exit very quickly!

The last 20km was tough. The wind was against us and we were feeling tired. We powered on and made it to the campsite before the storm landed. We cycle for 4 hours and covered 76km (11km extra of getting lost!). What a ride! It smashes the previous best of 58km to pieces! I’m really pleased to have finished such a long ride. Luckily it wasn’t too hilly so I managed it well. I’ve got another long one tomorrow so it’s time to rest up!