Day 13 of possibly 17 cycling days along the Via Francigena from Piacenza to Rome.

We woke up during the night due to the noise of heavy rain and strong wind. It was still raining as we got up, but it settled. We ate a good breakfast (from the supermarket) and made strong coffee using the Moka. A good start. We got fully wrapped in wet weather gear. It was chilly. We are at 775m and are towering above the scenery.

The rain stopped, but it was very gusty. We are starting our day without Ruth & Masoud as they are returning home with their (damaged) bikes.

We started with a long 12km downhill run. Very nice after slogging uphill yesterday. We crossed the river at the bottom and started to climb. Shortly after, we went on a gravel road, but this one had the Wrong Gravel. Too big and pointy. Or too small and sandy. All of which made it arduous to pedal uphill. Alistair walked a bit and wasn’t much slower than pedalling. The rain was never very hard today, wetting and spotting but not overly troublesome. We trundled along the gravel road until a pretty hilltop fortified town which had a scenic pilgrim’s cafe and another Via Francigena stamp. We already have done half today’s distance. We frequently come across walking pilgrims and it is nice to chat and find out where they are from and their plans.

We enjoy another descent but then got floored by our steepest uphill yet. Beautiful new tarmac but impossibly steep to pedal, so we both walked. Lunch in the piazza at Acquapendente. Another pretty fortified town.

Steady cycling took us to the edge of a volcanic crater and our first view of Europe’s largest volcanic lake. We set off down the hill. Our planned route went left after about 500m but Anna had shot ahead and missed the junction. To be fair, it was a great downhill to the lakeside. Fortunately the road went around the lake to Bolsena and our luxury four star hotel on the lakeside. There was a strong wind, white horses on the waves and boats bobbing in the little marina. It clearly has a lovely “riviera” in the summer, but it had a very out of season feel. We checked in and got sorted with clothes drying everywhere. We wandered into town and popped into a great bike shop which happened to have a spare chain for Anna’s bike. We went back to fetch it and the owner changed it for us. Onwards into the old town and aperitivi in a delicatessen. This was a novel approach. We chose a wine from the shelf and pointed to various cheeses, hams, olives etc from the deli counter. Perfect. Back to the hotel for dinner. We have decided to squeeze the next three short stages into two and hope we made the right decision. There is still a yellow wind warning and thundery showers forecast for tomorrow.