Cycle Europe 2008

Day 47: 4th August. Rest Day Genova

Day 48: 5th August. Genova - Albenga 58 miles

Day 49: 6th August. Rest Day Albenga

Hello from Albegna,a small town about 60 miles west of Genova. I’d have struggled to write this a few hours ago as Marco & I had our first real night out last night, the messy results of which I’ll describe below. We’ve both been feeling a bit delicate today but it is was worth it. Enjoy the blog, cheers, Jon

Day 47. 4th August. Rest day - Genova

A rest day, especially on the coast, may sound wonderful but, as I’ve said before a) we are not tourists b) we normally have to complete various bits of admin before we can enjoy the day. This morning we recorded a 2min video which we emailed to the organisers of the SITE Young Leaders Programme which is taking place in New York this weekend. I’ve attended the last two YLP’s in Colorado and London and am friends with some of the committee. They had kindly offered to help raise some money at the event and had hoped to set up a web cam but technology issues and the 6 hour time difference meant that a ‘hello from Italy’ video had to do which took about 10 attempts due to babies crying, crickets cricketing and Marco passing wind. I hope it is usable.

After doing the laundry we did manage a siesta in the shade of the top floor of the small office complex within the wooded gully the site was situated in. After pasta we freewheeled down into town and enjoyed an hour on the seafront as the sun set.

We haven’t seen much of Genova. We did meet a couple from Holland who said that the old town was quite nice but we are camped in a suburb on the western extremes of the city. I all know is that instead of the glorious first view of the Med I was looking forward to yesterday as we rode down from the hills the reality was in fact of peering to the sea through the rusty skeletons of the numerous dilapidated and long redundant dockside cranes and almost seconds after we’d passed 5 abandoned cars.

It is with a certain amount of trepidation that my blog enters the murky world of European toilets. A blog about camping would not be complete without it but it is not in everyone’s taste. So, if you are likely to be offended by such talk or sensitive in any way to the often ignored but vital area of ‘human waste disposal’ then I suggest you move onto day 48. You have been warned!

Let’s be honest our bodies all produce and dispose of what we don’t need in the same was at roughly similar intervals (unless you climb Mt. Kilimanjaro when most of the group I trekked with didn’t ‘go’ for nearly a week.) All over the world designers spend millions on creating the right environment for us to do our deeds in. Air-con, marble walls, printed toilet paper, gold plated flush handles and even self cleaning rotating toilet seats. From numerous experiences I can relay that when camping things are slightly different. Some experiences are retch inducing, some mildly smelly, some dangerous and one in particular requiring the flexibility of an Olympic gymnast. The toilets themselves vary. In the UK a loo without a seat would be as unlikely as Elvis photographing the moment aliens from Mars landed their craft on the back of the Loch Ness Monster. No so here. Squatting over a hole is common but sure the obligation to wash below your ankles having used one, such as here in Genova, is in itself proof that it isn’t particularly hygienic.

One of the interesting thing about those with seats however is that the pan seems the wrong way round. Brits are used to the ejecting object disappearing into water but on the continent they seem rather prouder of their produce as hey tend to land on a tray where they sit proudly as if asking to be studied before a flush pushes them forward down into the watery hole. We’ve nicknamed these ‘pay and displays’ but at least they beat the squatters!

The inevitable closer inspection that the ‘pay & displays’ promote have led to names for the differing oblutions. This started on holiday when I was 14 but the family of names with different characteristics has somewhat worryingly been added to on the trip. I will not go into too much detail as I have to continue a working relationship with some of the the people who will read this but Gary Golden Gate and Derek Diver are two of my favourites. need i continue….?

Day 48. 5th August. Genova - Albegna 54 Miles

An early start saw us fed and watered and on the road by 9:25am. A brisk south easterly breeze pushed us along as well as the low whispy clouds that hung around until the sun’s rays got hold of them by late morning. The breezy conditions on the coast has seen a drop of several degrees throughout the day. Today we saw a high of 34 degrees as opposed to the 39 we had a few days ago.

The breeze put me in a good mood as i love doing 18mph with little effort. this was only achievable however at certain times as the scenic windy coast road also rose up to 100m above the sea as it wound its way through bays and coves. Packed beaches to the left contrasted with the rugged mountains of northern Italy whose summits speared the clouds to the right.

Time and miles flew by and the plethora of camping signs on the map gave us a variety of options. We settled on Albegna as we wanted to get some afternoon sun and there were £ campsites marked. Soon we were pitched at the Piccolo Paradiso site which as 28Euro was just affordable and included a free deck chair and umbrella - life was good.

Life was good until about 11pm when the increasingly high tower of beer glasses indicated that we were making mammoth inroads into the Drink Europe campaign and things got a bit messy. What started out at 7pm with no one around and Marco & I with little energy and even less money but ended up as a night not to be forgotten.

Bangi Italia was an innocuous looking outdoor beach bar and as we headed home at about 8pm we thought we’d have a swift half so we could add it it to the list. Soon other people drifted in and a live band started doing REM covers and the place livened up. I know we’ve been drinking a bit but Marco and I have rarely been out after 11pm due to either fatigue after riding of in preparation for the following day. Having decided to stay on for as rest day we initially set out buying the 5 beers that qualified you for a sixth, for free via an overcomplex hole-punching system with yellow cards.  Soon we were each the proud owners of a cap as we completed the 10 drink card and set about our second.  The Italians had seen nothing like it and are ever growing beer glass tower coupled with the fact that we could still walk was commented on by the leader of the band between songs.

The night was going well the only odd event a man who befriended us who whilst knowing Marco only spoke Italian unfathomably and seemingly uncontrollably would changed to German half way through.   This went on for nearly 15 minutes, much to both our amusement.

Our wardrobe collection grew, as in addition to the caps t-shirts were presented for two full cards and suddenly we were a walking (staggering) advert for the local Forst Beer whose share price had trebled since we drank 25% of their annual production.  Having calculatedly plied us with drinks, Marianna, the British bar lady, then mentioned the worst thing possible - karaoke.  Yes the beer convinced old Lennon and McCartney here that they could sing and after half-hearted refusals the free beer convinced us to get up and subject the Italian audience to Hey Jude.

As we started singing, the smiling faces and clapping hands stopped and as slurred “….sing a sad song and make it better…” out of the corner of my eye, I could just make out the emotional faces of the crowd.  Unfortunately for us the emotions were a mixture of horror, disgust and sympathy as we shrieked through one of The Beatles’ classics: My toes curl in embarrassment as I write this as I recall the moment, not 24hours ago, when we decided to dispense with the auto cue and improvise the ‘ da da da da’ part of the song as Cycle Europe entered Italian X factor. It will be a moment no one present will be able to forget and unfortunately that means us too.

In theory it was a competition with a clap-o-meter controlled by the keyboard player who played a higher or lower note depending on the level of applause. As he cast a deathly look of disgust he changed the key the keyboard played in so make sure he could achieve a note low enough to leave us in no doubt how we’d ruined the evening. Those of you who have seen the reaction to the famous dance scene that David Brent does in ’The Office’ will be able to imagine the rection we got from the Italians. We’re sorry Albenga.

But more, there’s more. Not satisfied with having made complete fools of ourselves in the singing dept we decided that we could and should dance too. Was there a dance floor? - of course not but just as my old IPOD favourite ‘Africa’ by Toto started there we were pogoing around like two demented battery powered toys. To be fair we got most of the stragglers dancing, by now it was nearly 1:30am on a Wednesday but the 40 or so people left joined in. i knew we’d had too much when Marco grabbed the oldest lady there (over 70) and, with a rose between his lips, danced with her. Messy.

Another bar followed where a man bought us a drink for our singing efforts (which I was amazed to find wasn’t laced with arsenic). he insisted he knew a great bar and off we went with him. Foolishly we found ourselves on a muggy Mediterranean night, our heads fuzzy with beer, rushing around the same coastal bends we’d cycled along at 60mph with a very drunk Italian at the wheel. Marco stood on the back seat his upper torso completed out of the car through the Fiat Bravo’s retracting roof. I don’t knew where we ended up but it was shut, or at last closing and after having run off we found a taxi and the 25Euro ride sobered us up a little. As I lay in my bed the world started spinning and I cursed the fact I’d let myself get into this position. I remember reaching for the tent zip as I though the numerous beers were making a bid for freedom but luckily I must have passed out as soon it was 7am. You can imagine how I felt.

Day 49. 6th August. Rest day Albegna

It is 8pm as I write this outside the camp reception. The breeze has kept up all day which itself has been mainly cloudy and as you can imagine we’ve not done a lot.

I woke feeling unusually cool and was amused to find both the inner and outer tent fully open and my white backside on view to anyone walking to the toilets. Clothes were strewn everywhere, luckily they were all mine but I’ve no recollection of derobing, especially how the shorts got in the hedge. As the previous nights events came back to me I initially thought I’d lost the Blackberry but was relieved to find that the only things missing were the caps, t-shirt, tracksuit and trainers we’d won drinking Forst last night which I’d managed to leave in Michael Schumacher’s car. Funnily enough he re-appeared at the camp site this afternoon  asking for us. He’s lost his phone and car keys and I think he had his suspicions. He asked us if we knew where he’d driven us as he had no recollection of which place or which bar he gone to. It was then that I realised the madness of last night, especially when Marco recalled how near the cliff edge we’d gone. A lesson learned.

Today has been a lazy day.We find ourselves several days ahead of schedule so we may choose to take a couple of days off soon. I’m looking forward to France though as I speak French well and need to brush up a bit :)