Wk 14 – Northern Italy into Switzerland

Sun 14 to Sun 21 August
Livorno – Levanto – Orta San Giulio – Bellinzona – Disentis

Sun 14th – Livorno to Levanto – 160k

We enjoyed a lovely breakfast before heading north on a pleasant morning.
Just 20klms up the road was Pisa of leaning tower fame. It was only 9.30am but already very busy with tourists. We did what the rest of us were doing.

We took our pics and headed NW for the Cinque Terre which isa coastal area within Liguria and is a string of 5 centuries-old seaside villages of Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore on the rugged Italian Riviera coastline.
To get there we traversed some delightful less-used roads before stopping at La Spezia for a break.

We took the easy SP370 before catching the SP51 with it’s countless corners which we chased through the Cinque Terre National Park.
We dropped down into Monterosso al Mare which was wall to wall, cliff to cliff, packed with holiday makers. Seems we’ve managed to arrive on a week long public holiday of some sort. That would explain the exorbitant accommodation prices.

Its only 45klms from La Spezia to Levanto via Monterosso al Mare, but it wasn’t the fastest of journeys.
Levanto is at the northern end of the Cinque Terre and not considered to be part of it so it isn’t as busy nor as hectic. We’d stopped here for a few days in 2019 and enjoyed it so much we thought we’d do it again.

The back end of our 4 month odyssey is planned to be less hectic than our sometimes previous frenetic travel pace. Hence we’ve planned 3 nights here.
So we lazed on the beach in the mornings adding to our sun tans before retiring to the shade for the afternoon. We caught a boat back to Monterosso al Mare mainly for the ride and something to do. It wasn’t as busy as Sunday had been.

Wed 17th – Levanto to Orta San Giulio – 300k

One of our longer travel days so we hit the autostrada and paid our tolls. There’d been some decent rains through here over the last couple of nights so temps were in their mid 20s.
The long weekend was still happening so everything was closed. We pulled into Villa Gaia Gandini for a pic.

And continued on to Gallarate with it’s Basilica of Saint Mary of the Assumption. It was as quiet as the tomb so we figured everyone had headed for the coast for the long weekend even though it was Wednesday. We found a small café and spoilt ourselves with coffee and a wee cake, each.

From here it was an easy 50k to World Heritage Listed Orta San Giulio on Lago d’Orta where we had an affordable apartment virtually over looking the main Piazza Mario Motta with Isola San Giulio right there.

Today, the town remains famous for religious pilgrimage due to its position on the slope of Sacro Monte, one of 9 sacred mountains in Northern Italy. There are over 20 chapels built into these cliffs, all dedicated to Saint Francis of Assisi, and UNESCO has classified Orta San Giulio on its World Heritage List

We now knew where all those folk who weren’t in the other places we’d been today were, they were right here, and it was market day.

Lay Days in Orta San Giulio

By evening the crowds had mostly gone were ever this crowd went, leaving behind a very pleasant old town with typically narrow cobbled streets and an abundance of restaurants and ice-creameries. It started to rain quite fiercely, and continued to rain all of yesterday Thursday 18/8/22. We didn’t mind too much but it certainly killed the restaurant trade.

We took a ferry to Omegna and spent an hour walking in the rain before catching the same ferry back to Orta via it’s various stops – what we in New Zealand would call ‘the milk run’.

By the evening the rain had gone and we took a long walk south around the lake side then up the hill to Sacro Monte of Orta.

Today is Friday 19th August and it’s strange to think we’ll be home in 3 weeks; but there’s still a lot to see. This morning we continued to explore this popular haven.

We took another ferry trip, this one around the southern end of Lago d’Orta, visiting Pella for 45 minutes,

and then stopping off at Isola San Giulio. (If you stay at Orta it is inevitable that you’ll take lots of pics of the Island)

Then back to Orta

Last night, Friday, we enjoyed a spritz

then went out for dinner and watched the sunset while listening to FelexSax as the lights of Isola San Giulio came on. A lovely end to what was Norma’s ‘must see’ choice. She was glad we did see it, and so was I.

Over our three motorcycle trips to and through Western Europe we’ve spent 53 days/nights in Italy, so we’ve seen a fair bit of it and loved every moment. Today we head for Switzerland.

Sat 20th – Orta San Giulio to Bellinzona– 140k

A fairly easy day today. We took our time leaving then fuelled up before stopping at Omegna for an early coffee.

We followed the northern shore of Lago Maggiore before heading up into the foothills of the alps.

Crossed Ponte Falmenta

Then continued on the SP75 to the SS337, took a left then did a U-Turn at Santa Maria Maggiore before stopping at Re with it’s Santuario della Madonna del Sangue. This is very small town with a very big church. We had coffee and panini, took our pics and moved on into Switzerland.

We bought our vignette (40SwFr) just to be on the safe side and booked into our budget hotel at A$240 for the night with breakfast. Welcome to Switzerland.

They have a pretty good castle/fort in Bellinzona. We took a long walk.

Sun 21st – Bellinzona to Disentis– 170k
or, the day of 91 hairpins and/or switchbacks

There’s just something magical about riding into and through the Swiss Alps. They have an amazing road system – if you want to do it easy there’s freeways and tunnels, long tunnels – if you want to do it the old fashioned way the old roads are still immaculately kept which makes it a joy to ride them. Like I’ve said, today was a day of 91 hairpins and switchbacks, I counted them on TomTom. What a joy, and the scenery is just so picture postcard perfect Swiss, but you really need a drone to see the roads doing their splendid dances up and down the escarpments.

We stopped somewhere for a brew.

Checked out a couple of bridges

And enjoyed some more scenery with the high Alps playing hide ‘n seek behind the clouds.

Disentis doesn’t have a lot going for it but it’s a great jump-off point for the Passes we’d exhilarate in tomorrow. It does have an impressive Abbey.

So that’s week 14 done and 2 riding weeks to go, but still 1750 kilometres to go.