Day 9, Pompei - Rome

Last riding day, unfortunately! This morning we left Pompei, heading north, and our first stop was by the sea in the nice little port of Baia, near Naples, before reaching Sperlonga where we had lunch. After that, the wonderful "Carpinetana" road through the Lipini mountains was waiting for us, what a great ride! As we approached Rome the traffic became more and more intense, but there was no risk of getting lost... all roads lead to Rome!

Thank you Oscar, Milo, John, Kathleen, Craig, Karen, Leonard, CJ and Lawrence, ride safe and see you hopefully soon!!!

modern horses have to give way to the original ones!

Day 8, Amalfi Coast and Naples

Too many options for this rest day! We decided to ride the Sorrento and Amalfi Coast and then, for the evening, we chose a walk and a pizza in Naples... according to Domenico one of the most beautiful cities in the universe!

Day 7, Maratea - Pompei

Just leaving the parking of our beautiful hotel, we were on the spectacular coast road around the bay of Policastro. After a ride in the Cilento National Park, we reached Paestum where we also had a picnic with fresh buffalo mozzarella. After that, we took the shortest ride possible to Pompei where we enjoyed a guided tour through the ruins of the old roman town frozen in time by Mount Vesuvius in 79AD.

Day 6, Tropea - Maratea

Long or short route today? What a question, of course the long one! We left Tropea and followed the coastline until we reached Amantea, a nice little town where we stopped for a coffee break... and then thousands of curves took us to Altomonte and then back to the coast, quite a challenging ride! Before finally reaching our beautiful hotel in Maratea, we could not miss a ride up the famous "Redentore" (Christ the Redeemer) statue, one of the biggest statues of Jesus in the world... and what a view from up there!

Day 4, "Rest Day" on Mount Etna

The weather forecast for today was not very good (actually, it was very bad!), but everybody wanted to ride on mount Etna, the biggest volcano in Europe, currently 3,329 m - 10,922 ft high! Very beautiful roads took us up to the Rifugio Sapienza, from where most of our group decided to take the excursion to the crater. On the way back we stopped in Taormina for our last "granita break".

Day 3, Cefalù - Taormina

Today we have discovered that also in Sicily there is fog and the rain can last quite long! Anyway we had a very good day and the mood was really great when we reached Taormina!

What a forecast for beginning of October - definitively suitable for shorts and T-Shirt

Castelbuono, location of our first coffee break

life in Sicilia

Day 2, Agrigento - Cefalù

Today we crossed the island from south to north and, a few miles after leaving Agrigento, we were already riding in the middle of remote rural areas of Sicily, where time has stopped!

Day 1, Catania - Agrigento

And here we are again, in beautiful Sicily, the biggest and most populated island in the Mediterranean sea, where another Edelweiss tour is about to begin, a group of New Yorkers exploring southern Italy!

On the first riding day we went from Catania to Agrigento, in the south of the island, a city famous for having some of the best preserved greek temples... built around 2400 years ago!

no we did not get a ticket by the "Polizia Municipale" as we parked in the middle of the main square....... However our bikes were really attractive even for the Police to take selfies on them...