Bicycle Italy.org

[Trieste - Credit: mariotto52]

Ways of Access:

• Trieste - It’s connected with east Europe, and the difficult route will depend by the country start point (Romania, Ungheria, Croazia)
• Alps - If you decide to pass through Alps mounts consider the high difficult of the slopes
• Ligury - Ligury routes are more easy with a relaxing sea-landscape

Tours Idea:

• City to City: Geneve-torino, Wien-Trieste.
  When you will arrive in italy cities start to tour the most important places.
• City to natural lakes: Lion-lago maggiore
  Zurich-Lago di Garda through Alpi Mounts
• Through beaches: Monaco-Sanremo through beaches of tirrenian sea where many cycle tracks are available

Benefits: You will save up your money (link chaeper italy biking) because you don’t have to pay any transport such as train or airplain or car.

Suggestions:

• This type of long route is suitable for well trained cyclists
• Choose the right season such as spring
• You can pass from Italy to other country, for example for way back you can start from Italy places and arrive in you country: North Italy to German, France, Switzerland, Austria

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Riding through scenic areas in Italy means enjoy different types of experiences. You can cycle cultural and historic places such as artistic cities, natural beautifulness such as italian coasts and mounts.

Cultural Cycling Tours

[Rome's Cycling Path - credit: _MaO_]

Rome, The Eternal City

Why Visit Rome? The ancient Capital of Roman Empire has stored historic Monuments and Finds that represents its uniqueness all over the world.

You can ride through some attractions:

• Vaticano with its S.Peter Church, where lives the Pope
• Coliseum
• Roman Forum
• Costantino Emperor Arch
• Pantheon
• Caracalla Spa
• Portuno temple
• Fosse Ardeatine, caves near Ardeatina road, where Nazies killed 335 italian civilian.
• Mura Serviane, near Termini station, defense wall built by Servio Tullio, the sixth roman king of VI century before Christ.

[Biking in Florence - credit: mcgurme]

Florence Bike Tour

Tour Attraction:

• Historic center of Florence
• Churchs
• Squares
• Historic palaces (LINK historic tuscany cities bike tour)

[Biking on a Venice's Canal - credit: Gregory Williams]

Venice Cycling Tour

Tour Attraction: This will be a particular cycling because Venice is a unique city all over the world. You can cycling on the lagoon through streets without cars, enjoy the quiet all cyclists dream for their tours.

Benefits: You can see the most important Historic places of the most famous cities all over the world

Drawbacks: Cycling in the city will not be healthy because the smog. You must be careful because it is dangerous for a cyclist going through the cars traffic

Coast Cycling

[Bicycle path on Garda Lake - credit: CasteFoto]

Biking on Sicily’s Coast: From Temples Valley in Agrigento to south Sicily coast of Marina di Ragusa (LINK west sicily bike tour)

Sardinia Coasts: You can choose which beaches to visit, as Cagliari beaches or Alghero’s beaches (LINK sardinia coasts bike tour)

Coast Lake cycling: a tour around Lago Maggiore or Lago di Garda

Campania Coast: Cycle through the coast line of Amalfi and Capri (LINK sea-coast Campania bike tour)

Islands will be another good idea for your cycling, because the quiet and the beautifulness of the territory:

• Elba island
• Capri island (LINK sea-coast Campania bike tour)
• Eolie island tour
• Sicily Bike Tour
• Sardinia Biking Trip

Suggestion: for island tour choose summer period, because these places are more glad

Mountain Cycling

[Dolomites Biking Trail - credit: Don Martin 37]

Mortirolo and Stelvio mountain Passes (LINK th hardest Italy bicycle routes)

Mt. Etna tour, achieving the highest Europe’s crater (LINK noth sicily bike tour)

Dolomites

West Alps: you can try the hard rise of Bianco Mount

Appennines mounts: Hill Areas of Umbria and Abruzzo

Biking in the Countryside

[Tuscan Hill - credit: keylosa]

Tuscany (LIN generico)

Apulia (LINK generico)

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[Bicycle Home Training - credit: ?keaggy.com]

Training tips to Bicycle Italy

1° Evaluate your fit level doing a test: Bike for 5 Km at your maximum speed noting how much time you employ for this route

• If you employ a time between 8 and 10-minute you have a good level
• If you employ fewer than 8-minute you have a higher level

If you are satisfied with these limits you have a good basis to face the hardest routes, but you have to follow an appropiate training.

2° If you want to try this adventure you have to rise your resistance force.

1. Before starting your training, warm up on a level route for 30-minute.
2. On the first your biking will consists in low number of spin pedal up no hard slopes.
3. Progressively increase the spin pedal number and the hardness of slopes.
4. Start to train on long routes of 20 Km about 10 % medium slope: this level is the goal of your training.

If you can repeat more times the n° 4 point you are ready to try the hardest bike routes in Italy

[Mortirolo, one of the hardest bicycle tracks in Italy - credit: renschmensch]

3° Alternate the training and rest days: during a week you can ride four days. Repeat this practice for 2/3-month

4° It is better to assure of your health condition by a physical examination

5° Combine the training with the correct nutrition LINK ALIMENTAZIONE

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[Italian Spaghetti - credit: Gio JL]

You need to pay attention to nutrition to train well and bike on difficult routes.

Italy has a great selection of typical foods. It could be a great idea to join the health benefits of fresh food wiith your nutrition requirements.

What to eat before a cyclotour?

• Carbohydrates
• Fructose
• Proteins

These are nourishments that you should feed in the right measure also during training time.

The right diet consits in 5 meals a day

Don’t hope that doping is a real solution to replace a good training. This is a dangerous method that threaten your health. Anabolic steroid and other substances are dangerous and outlaw.? Protein supplements are the result of chemist elaborations such as freeze-dry of low quality milk, You can find good proteins in white meat and eggs.

Suggested Italian Foods to eat

Here an exhaustive list of the aliments: (Click here to read the Mediterranean food pyramid)

• Bread, pasta, rice, potatoes
• Vegetables: Spinach, Cauliflowers, Carrots, Eggplants, Tomatoes, broccoli, capsicum, capers, garlic and onion
• Fruit: Olives, Grape, Oranges, Lemons, Apples, cherries, Strawberries, peaches, apricots
• Legumes: beans, peas
• Fruit: Walnuts, Almonds, Pistachio nuts
• Oil of olive
• Honey
• Milk and cheeses
• White Meat (chicken, rabbit, turkey, etc…) and fish (fish sword, sardines, tuna, clears)
• Eggs
• Red meat (veal, lamb, etc…)
• Water

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[credit: DBarefoot]

Here some answers to common questions most cycle tourists request Us.

Where are the best cycle tracks in Italy?
Florence, Tuscany. But there are other place with natural cycle tracks in the path of the coutryside of Tuscany, Sicily coast, Apulia inland

What places are worth a visit in Italy?

• Sicily (link sicily generico)
• Tuscany (link tuscany generico)
• Campania (link campania generico)
• Apulia (link apulia generico)
• Sardinia (link sardinia generico)
• Mortirolo (link the hardest italy bicycle routes)
• Mount Etna (link north sicily bike tour)
• Tremiti Islands (link apulia coast tour)
• Historical Places (LINK scenica areas e historic tuscany cities and campania)

What’s the weather like in Italy?
The Italian weather is stable. You don’t need particular dress or other similar. You have to consider that during the winter the temperature is more hot on respect the other European country. It rains during November to March.

Consider also that each region has its typical climate. It’s not easy to find out a general pattern about Italy. The best way is to check the weather forecast fro the specifi region You want to travel in.

Take as example Mount Etna in Sicily. The Etna temperature: during a visit in the summer months it is easy to climb the Etna and find low temperatures cause the fast changement of the atmosphere conditions.

What is the Best period for biking in Italy?
Spring is the best period to avoid the hot summer temperature of south Italy, and the cold rained winter of the north

Who can do a bike tour of Italy?
Every people that is fit or healthy can bicycle in Italy. Consider your physical level before choosing a tour.

How to rent a bike in Italy?
Every place where is possible to bike has the proper bike rental service

How to carry a bike on train?
Most regional trains in Italy now take bikes. There will be a bike symbol on the list of leaving trains at the station and on the TrenItalia website (www.trenitalia.com). You’ll need to pick a destination and see which trains accept bikes.

As well as your train ticket, you will need to buy a ticket for the bikeof 3.50 Euro on regional trains. The ticket has two parts; one to attach in the handlebars of your bike using the adhesive strip and the other to keep with your train ticket. The ticket is 24 hours valid.

Suggestions: Remember in small-town stations the train stops only for few minutes, so you’ll want to be ready with your bike to get off.

Other solutions: An alternative is to put your bike in one of those vinyl bike carrier bags.

How much cost to book an accommodation?
Accommodations in Italy apply two rates:

• High season (July, August) where prices increase.
• Low season (the rest of the year) where prices are much lower

When is it possible to shop?
Usually in Italy all stores open for all the week from 9:00 to 13:00 and from 16:00 to 21:00 o’clock with a break during the afternoon. In the afternoon it is probable to find some bar or restaurants open.

• Some shops close during the last two weeks of August.
• Archaeological sites open from 9-13 AM and 4-8 PM from Monday to Friday.
• Museums open from 9-13
• Churches open in the morning from 8 till 12, and some open after 4 PM.
• Most shops close Monday morning and on Sunday. In particular period such as Christmas they open Sunday too.

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[Traveling by Bike is Cheaper... - credit: Jeff_Werner]

Cheapest Places

Restaurants - If you want to taste local food you should choose the various Agroturismi (farmhouses) attending in Italy. Fixed price of menù includes all the entreès and it is around 30 Euro. South italian places are cheaper than North Italy.

Bike Rentals - Italy is rich of not expensive bike rental services.? Renting a bike will keep You fit and cheap:

• You won’t pay for public transport ticket
• You won’t pay for a taxi (expensive in italy)
• You will enjoy landscapes riding your bike, stopping your route where and when you want
• No more difficult bus or train changes

I.E. Renting a bike in Rome is about 4 eruos on hour or 12 Euros a day

How to Save up Money

Some suggestions can be useful if you want to save up your money while having a good trip time:

• If you live in countries near Italy You can search for a route to arrive directly in Italy with Your Bike. German cyclists, for example, can choose a tour in Lago Maggiore, Alpi mounts, Mortirolo Slope, to arrive in Italy by bike without paying any flight ticket.
• If you want to do more tours in Italy, don’t use public transport: Arrive at the starting point by foot.

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