Day 2

August 5, 2003

Colico, Italy to Aprica, Italy

72 Kilometres

Because of the heat, we decided to start earlier, so on Tuesday we got up at 5:30. I went to start the stove, only to discover that the fuel bottles we had bought didn't fit our stove.

We headed east from Lake Como, and the road was very busy, until we could get onto a secondary road. But the secondary roads aren't as straight, so it adds time, and it was getting very hot. Luckily there were fountains in Italy like the ones in Switzerland. We could drink and fill our water bottles. And Ursula would dunk her head in the fountain to cool off.

We rode to Sondrio, stopped at a grocery store, and had lunch. We rode into the centre of town, looking for a store that might sell fuel. Ursula stopped a letter carrier, and he directed us to a place away from the centre. As we were riding there I saw a hunting store, and thought they might have fuel. They didn't but directed us to a place back in the centre. It took a bit of doing, but we found it.

Meanwhile, we ran into a British guy who was looking for a bike shop to get local information on an alternate route. The last time he had climbed the Aprica pass, it was in freezing rain. I quizzed him on the pass.

By the time we bought the fuel it was noon. We decided to ride until 1:00, and then hole up for a couple of hours to avoid the worst of the heat. But it was already way too stinking hot. Ursula was hurting badly. I kept looking for a place to stop, but there was nothing. At 1:15 Ursula was near collapse, so I made her stop and rest in the shade of a building while I rode ahead looking for a place to stop.

Just up ahead the road paralleled a river. There were trees lining the opposite bank, and it looked like just the place to stop. I crossed a bridge, and rode through town, looking for a fountain, but there was none to be found.

I rode back to Ursula and told her about the place. We rode up. She didn't want to go down, because it was private property, but on the other side of the road there was no good place to sit, so I finally convinced her that no one would mind.

The river was lined by a stone wall, and there were trees for shade. Ursula laid down for a nap, and I climbed down to a lower level, under some trees for a nap. But I lay in some stinging nettles.

Later I walked across to a store to buy some water. Ursula told me to ask for Aqua minerale naturale, which is what I got, but it turned out to be naturally fizzy. Finally we went to a bar, and had gelato.

It was 5:00 when we set out, and we still had to climb the pass. And it was still damn hot. So we started up the hill. Ursula was sweating buckets. We came to a little village with a fountain, and she doused herself. We kept going. About half way up, the trees cleared and we could see down to where we had been. It was spectacular. We kept going. Ursula was dying. We stopped regularly. Finally we got to the town. We thought we were done, but then we saw the road kept winding its way up. I thought Ursula was going to cry. She doused herself in another fountain, and then we started up the final ascent. Finally we hit the town proper, and the top of the pass. 1181 metres. Aprica looked like a very nice, touristy town.

We started the decent on the other side of town, when we ran into the British guy walking towards town. He said the campground was just up ahead. We got there at 7:55. The office was closed. The sign said it was open till 8:00. We rang the buzzer, and eventually a guy came to check us in. He took our passports, told us where to go, and said to come back in half an hour to pay and pick up our passports.

We set up the tent. I showered, and then headed back to the office. The guy said "Beuna sera." I had a blank look on my face. He said a bunch more stuff in Italian. I still had a stunned look on my face.

He asked, "Do you speak Italian?"

"No."

"You come to Italy and you don't learn Italian?"

"I just got here yesterday."

"Beuna sera means good evening."

"Ah. Buena sera."

"And?"

I was flabbergasted. I didn't know what he was looking for. "Good evening?"

"What is your business?" he snapped.

This stunned me. Surely he knew what my business was, since he had told us to return. "We left our passports here..." Spotting them on the counter I reached for them.

"Don't touch anything," he shouted. Then after a pause. "Well?"

Again, I had no idea what he wanted.

"What is your name?"

"Oh, Stockton."

He started shuffling through papers. "Stockton." He started shuffling through the passports on the counter. He passed ours. "You're not Canadian."

"Yes," I said.

He went back to our passports. "Ah, here we are."

He presented me with the bill. "Do you take MasterCard?" I asked.

"No," he said. "It costs too much. Especially MasterCard." Which is fair enough, except that the write up in the camping book said that they did.

Anyways, I paid, and then Ursula and I walked up to town for dinner. We were too tired to do laundry.


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