Piemont and back

What a nice date to start maybe the last tour for this year, the Autumnal Equinox. The sun is shinning but the temperature remains single digit for the most of the morning. I've prepared a curvy track down to Italy, took the first stop at Passo di Resia.

Drove up the Offenpass, then down to Brescia  and then over the Passo Mortirolo.

The track continued over Passo Vivione, I had done this one a couple years ago found it beautiful with all it's wooden sculptures but then forgot it's name and where it was, glad I found it again.

I used a tool to calculate my route all the way to Cuneo, it avoids large roads, cities and gives preference to curvy roads, sometimes however, with challenges in between.

Cuneo is a strange city, with a large unspectacular square and a wide pedestrian zone with the interesting aspect that the sidewalk is completely covered which is very nice to go shopping while it's raining.

After visiting Cuneo it's was time to have fun in the Piedmont mountains.

The next day I drove the over the Col de la Lombarde and then Col de la Bonete.

The following day the track took me into a road block due to a rally race taking place, apparently the all day.

 Not willing to wait until 16:30 or go back all the way, I took tried to get to the road where there was nobody watching.

Short trip to Italy

The plan was to enjoy a couple of passes on the way to Italy but regardless of the warm temperatures in April the most part are still closed in mid May.
The officer at the Swiss border asked me where I was going and I answered "Umbrail pass", he replied "it's closed". It was silly not to check first but now was too late, the fastest way was to pay the 12€ and cross the tunnel to Livigno, too bad I had filled up in Austria and could not profit from the tax free petrol in Livigno for just 1,04€ each liter. Later I came across another unplanned delay as the Mortirolo pass was also still closed from winter and arrived in Zone much later than expected.

The next day we decided to go for a hike on Monte Isola, the island in the middle of lake Iseo.

It was a beautiful day but the weather suddenly changed getting us by surprise as we eared the thunders not so far away. A little later we're able to have a look at the storm heading towards the island.

The next day we had a look at the pyramids near Zone.

Back home

The the north of Spain is also wet and cold these days, just going to have a look at how the coast looks like around here.

Today I had again a surprise road to ride on the calculated track.

After touching the coast it's finally time for the main destination of this tour, the "Picos de Europa", they've been on my list for years but for one reason or another I had never made it this far. The roads and scenery are amazing around here, too bad that the tarmac was still wet on the north side and could not fully enjoy the curves.

Arriving in Lisbon over the Ponte Vasco da Gama.

Cabo da Roca, Europe's western most point.

This is it, final destination, Mafra.

Crossing the Pyrenees

August is proving to be one of the worst times of the year to travel around Europe without previous reservations, (almost) every place is fully booked. Funny thing is, when I ask if they have a room, they go and ask if I have a reservation, dumb question. Besides that a lot of restaurants also profit from this weeks holiday to close for vacation.

The calculated track continues to surprise positively.

Despite the weather forecast announcing good weather for the day the sky was cloudy and after a while it started to drizzle, it was so weak that I didn't care to stop and put my rain suit on, in Portugal this kind of rain is called "wets the silly". With time though it became stronger and stronger and I was the silly who became all wet. I crossed the Pyrenees over a nice twisted road through an old beautiful forest.