Day 32 Radicofani to Acquapendente and Bolsena (Thursday 27 September)

(60kms)

1934kms from Canterbury - 140kms to Rome
Garmin Record: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/233176616
                          http://connect.garmin.com/activity/233176734

There are good days and tough days and experience days. Today is one of the latter. After a quick morning coffee we set off for Acquapendente. A 32km cycle that the guide book said would be easy going for cyclists. The first 10kms flew past as they were all downhill. Having said that, it was all on gravel road with very loose stone covering a rocky bumpy surface so care was needed in the descent. A short stint followed on a tarred section, then we took the turn back onto the gravel road. Barely a kilometre down the road, "twang twang" two of my spokes broke and wound themselves around the hub. Repair time.

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I still have two spare spokes but having removed the broken ones I saw it is not possible for me to replace these because, like in Lausanne, the gear mechanism must be removed first. When I put the wheel back on, sans 2 spokes, I found that the rim had buckled and the wheel would not turn very easily. The solution was to disconnect the back brakes and then ride with the tyre scraping on the frame at a point every revolution. Not good and certainly not sustainable. We turned back to the tar road and, thanks to Keith and Google maps, navigated our way gently to Acquapendente. So much for our lunch by the lake in Bolsena! As luck would have it we found a cycle shop but we arrived just on 13:00 and the shop is closed for Siesta until 15:30. So we had lunch and rested in a park waiting for the shop to open. The cycle shop owner was happy to help in an emergency and within an hour he had replaced the spokes and sorted out the buckled rim.
Fortunately Bolsena is only 20kms away and we made good time getting here. It is a lovely town on the edge of a beautiful lake. All in all a very good day despite the mechanical failures. I am blessed that I did not have the problem yesterday, that would have been very difficult to resolve. So onward to Caprianica tomorrow, our last stop before Rome.


Supper!
From Sylvia's blog I learned that the fish from the lake is excellent to eat so I was determined to try the Lake fish at a restaurant on the Lake. Be it for lunch or supper