I started from Nice in early June 2013. At that time most of the highest passes of the French Alps were still under deep snow, so I had to keep a bit west of my original plan. Perhaps for the best, since this was the first time I did bike touring, and the Alps are highest by the Italian border. My strength climbing up, and skills cruising down high passes were very limited.
My first real pass was Col d’Allos. It was a real thrill when I realized I was strong enough to climb passes that figure in the Tour de France! I’m sure I broke a speed record going down to Barcelonnette.
Later on I arrived in Briançon, which is perhaps at the center of biking in the french Alps. From there you can reach most of the famous passes within a day or two of biking.
I also climbed Col de la Croix de Fer, which for many years was the toughest pass I’ve ever done. There were long stretches of 10% where I was just about to give up and push the bike, but fought myself all the way to the top.
It was raining when I reached Cluses further north, so I took a day of rest. This is also where I could have died in a car crash with two lesbian women on our way home from a weird local disco.
Later on I biked east into Switzerland and then south, going from Altdorf to Andermatt.
The next day I biked over the St Gotthard pass, on my 50th birthday.
Next day I came to the stunning Lugano lake at the border of Italy. I will never forget it.
In Italy I took the ferry from Menaggio to Bellagio, then the epic climb to Madonna del Ghisallo, a small chapel dedicated to the official catholic patroness of bicyclist! I wish all bicyclists get to see this place. Outside the chapel is a slab of stone with inscribed names of people who have died while biking. Inside, up by the ceiling, were crammed row after row of famous bikes, for example the bike which Francesco Moser used when beating the one hour world record. I don’t have a single religious bone in my body, but that was as close as a religious moment as I’ve ever had.
Closeby is a bicyclist museum. Lots and lots of bikes, but also a photo of famous italian biker Fiorenzo Magni, who since then has been my absolute favourite bicyclist. Here is an incredible incident from his life as a bicyclist (from Wikipedia):
In the 1956 Giro d’Italia, stage 12, Fiorenzo Magni famously broke his left clavicle and still managed to finish second overall. At the hospital he refused a plaster cast and refused to abandon the Giro in the year of his announced retirement. Magni continued the race with his shoulder wrapped in an elastic bandage. To compensate for his inability to apply force with his left arm, he raced while holding a piece of rubber inner tube attached to his handlebar between his teeth for extra leverage. Since his injury prevented him from effectively braking and steering with his left hand, Magni crashed again after hitting a ditch by the road during a descent on stage 16. He fell on his already broken clavicle, breaking his humerus, after which he passed out from the pain. They put him in an ambulance, but when Magni regained his senses and realized that he was being taken to the hospital he screamed and told the driver to stop. Magni took his bike and was able to finish the stage in the peloton, which had waited for him. Of the evening that followed Magni said "I had no idea of how serious my condition was, I just knew that I was in a lot of pain but I didn't want to have X-rays that evening". Just four stages later, the infamous 20th stage of Giro '56 dawned where Luxembourg's Charyl Gaul would execute his legendary mountain stage victory in Trento, haunted by snow and ice over the Costalunga, Rolle, Brocon and Bondone climbs. That day 60 people abandoned the race, and Gaul went from 16 minutes behind to winning the 1956 Giro; Magni, despite his injuries, placed second, 3 minutes and 27 seconds behind Gaul.
