Milan and Venice are at the bottom of a wide river valley, set on a plain, which makes them great cities for industry but take away some of the charm Italy is so famous for.
Between Venice and Florence are the Apenino mountains, which are Italy's spine, at this far north, are right on the water. Instead of the Tuscan villages we were expecting, with vineyard and olive trees, there are miles and miles of pine forests covering the hills (or are they mountains?).
To see small town Italy we got off the main highway. The roads were small two lanes roads, winding through the hills and the few small towns on the way. More great motorcycle roads! They were some of the windiest roads I'd ever seen - hair raising at bits, and definitely tough for people in the back seat to deal with.
Our Tom-Tom saved us a ton of time in Europe, by the way. I think we might have given up on our road trip without it. The one way streets, the roundabouts... hard to believe people did road trips in Europe with paper maps back in the day.
Once you arrive on the coast the views open up into a spectacular light show as the sun reflects off the water. The little towns nestled in the coves are charming. Life is slow, and if the sun, water and wine doesn't get you, the laid-back, siesta culture definitely will. It's like a slow-motion version of the California coast.
This might be as close as you can get to a part of the modern world that isn't really. Most the towns were connected with each other by horse paths until after the war, and the highway that connected them to the rest of Italy wasn't built until the 50s. For generations, the only way to get from one of these town any where was either by horse packing up and over the mountains, or else with a ferry South towards Florence and the bigger port cities.
As tempted as we were to just stop and forget our itinerary (who needs all those art museums anyway?), we did continue our cruise along the water towards Florence, through tunnels built almost a hundred years ago that were just wide enough for one car, stopping for gelato on the way as an excuse to spend some more time in this awesome place. If you want to get away from the crowds and find an escape in a corner of the world that still seems a little forgotten, this is your spot.
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This is the place for twisties.
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| Almost at the coast... |
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| Driving on the edge of cliffs.... a bit safer than Bolivia, though. |
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| Towns and vineyards from another era tucked behind the mountains and the sea. |
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| The Italian Riviera. |
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