Day 91 was a very chilled out day (for me)! Tim and Dad went for 40km bike ride to the coast in the morning. Impressive stuff! In the afternoon, Tim and I went into Pisa to check out the local football stadium. It was old and run down but had a rustic charm that I liked. We also took a few snaps of me in front of the tower in my Harry’s Beer House tee shirt. The bar is in Korea and run by my good friends Marty and Soo. They’ve been very supportive throughout the whole project and have promoted the ride in their bar. Thanks guys! Check out the photos below.

Day 92: Time to get cracking again! I’ve only got three weeks left of the trip- I can’t believe I made it this far! We’ve got a few more cool places to check out in Italy before arriving at the finish line. One of these places is Florence so it was time to cycle inland through Tuscany. We will return to the coast again but that won’t be for a week or so. Tim joined me today and after I applied a lot of pressure, he decided to wear a shirt. Here we are trying to do our best leaning pose at the start of the ride.

We quickly made our way out of Pisa on a quiet road but it still had the classic Italian road feature- potholes. We cycled towards the mountains so we prepped ourselves for a big climb (see below).

The road took us to the city of Lucca. The old part of the town is surrounded by an ancient wall and moat. The buildings and streets inside were charming. We decided to ride around and explore the sights. There were thousands of tourists so we had to be on full alert when pedalling near the centre. We rode along the city wall and then made our exit through a secret tunnel Tim spotted! Check out the photos below. Lucca looked like a cool place- it would have been great to spend some more time there!

The first half of the ride had been successful but the second half was difficult. We left the city on a very busy road through numerous industrial estates. A series of traffic lights didn’t help matters nor did the strong headwind. When we got closer to Montecatini Terme the Tuscan scenery started to work its magic. Rolling hills with buildings perched on steep cliffs were scattered across the plain. Our campsite was located on a hill so we had a challenging last few kms uphill. The views from our camp spot are spectacular- some of the best of the trip (see below).

Overall it had been a tough ride (see data below). The strong winds and concentrating on the busy roads had worn me out. Time for a lie down!