Actually the Stelvio, Gavia etc

There's a sight that was a bit better than yesterday, all the passes open.

The morning began with a 'car stuck on 45 degree slope' incident. Over Breakfast I had noticed that some branch felling had been going on, but thought nothing of it. Until I drove onto the 45 degree ramp that separated pitches in the tiered campsite and realised that I couldn't go any further forward due to the branches and a van parked in the way.

An Italian woman was watching my predicament with much interest as I weighed up options. I could either wait, or try and back up the slope. I chose the latter option. As the campsite slowly filled with smoke from exhausts and clutches I realised that no combination of clutch and revs was going to make this work. The lady meanwhile was kindly offering me lots of advice in Italian that I had no choice but to dismiss out of hand.....language issues, it was probably very sensible.


As the smoke lay heavily across the hillside I decided enough was enough and sought the driver of the blocking van. He was just around the corner, clearly oblivious to the sounds of car engines revving etc. Let's hope the clutch holds out until England.


Anyway, I had the Stelvio planned and I headed off up the road contemplating the enormous height gain I was about to ride, pic of the crazy east side here. At 1900 metres everyone came to a halt whilst the lots of the cliff-face above a gap in tunnels came crashing down.....I would not have like to have been hit by those rocks. Video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXni0bQBR3E

After a 20 minute halt, the rocks were cleared and I carried on, through a small rain shower to the alpine meadows above a crazy section of hairpins.

The hairpins (switchbacks) are pretty hard to photograph, but I
have tried my best here. Hopefully it gives a good impression of the crazy way the Austro-Hungarians originally built the road up here, not sure they would do this sort of road-building nowadays.



I carried on and was passed by someone in full CSC kit on a Cervelo bike. Thinking it may have been a team member, I stopped to say hello and discovered that it was Dean from Australia, friends with team members but actually a bike shope owner over here for a bit of climbing.

The top of the pass at 2760 metres above sea level was the highest I have been with my bike, and the sun came out from the clouds in celebration. There were a few gift shops open where I bought some postcards and also the world's highest bratt-wurst stall with perhaps the jolliest patron.

He took my photo, he laughed alot and he served me a hotdog and laughed some more at his own jokes. They were pretty funny clearly. I had to take his picture.

The descent was cold and long and I was glad of the three layers I had on. I met up with Dean for some Italian dinner in Bormio and we agreed the next day we would climb the Gavia, it had been shut yesterday due to snow and would have been a shame to miss out on a climb that hosted a legendary stage of the Giro in 1988, where snow conditions were unbelievably extreme. The riders rode over the top in sub zero without gloves, arm warmers, hats etc....madness.

The Gavia is almost as high as the Stelvio and the bottom section dragged on for a while, but we were soon in alpine meadows and the temperature was dropping.
The scenery was still pretty snowy on the pass, but nothing compared to the postcards and pictures in the hut at the top. We grabbed a coffee and checked out the scarcely believable images of Andy Hampsten and co riding through the snow.

A summit photo and we descended, I didn't fancy the Mortirolo, now matter how easy I claimed it had been. Enough was enough.

I said goodbye to Dean, next stop Lake Como.