Friday 27th – The Riviera

On the Riviera bike way

The Italian Riviera in this area is lucky in that it the railway that used to run along on the waterfront has been shifted inland, leaving a long level track. This has been turned into a major cycleway, and we spent our morning cruising along it. We rented bikes down at Arma di Taggia (1€/hour), and set off west to San Remo, about half an hour away. The bikes were very average, their seats were shockers, and I couldn’t get mine high enough, however the day was pretty nice and the experience a lot of fun. At San Remo we had our first good look for a “mother-of-the-bride” dress, with surprisingly little luck. Plenty of clothes shops but they were mostly too casual, and this year’s hem length in Europe is shorter than I am looking for. So no go.

A bit of a tail wind had come up, and our return ride was appreciably faster, though punctuated by bum-easing stops! We headed past Arma di Taggia on the eastern leg, but the wind was whipping up, and we didn’t like the prospect of a long slog back home, so turned a bit short of the end. As it was, the shortish ride back to Taggia was pretty testing in the wind, especially with no gears. Of course my bike had more wind resistance because of the lovely wire basket on the handlebars! Good fun. By now around 2pm, and we couldn’t hand the bikes back until 3.30pm (Italian siesta) so we parked up in a bar where we were able to watch a couple of hours of the French Open – the first we have managed to see (Fognini – a local – vs Garcia-Lopez, then Wozniacki looking like losing to Hantuchova). We are missing having our TV for the tennis.

Cheap tools in an Italian hardware flyer

Back at the area where we rented our bikes were some more decent fashion shops so we spent a good hour cruising them with some success. In one we found an attractive silk dress with a shawl, and rather liked it. Not quite sure it is right, so will ponder it over the weekend. In another a sleek ivory dress, but not quite right so will move on.

We tried to get to the beach again, but the wind was clearly too strong for comfort.