It has been awhile since the last blog, which was the second in the series that I am busy writing about our trip to Italy in July and August but my mind has been on other things. I apologize to those of you that have been waiting for the next installment. So let’s continue the journey.
Our third day in Italy began like most that week with breakfast at the hotel and a greeting of the staff, who were either happy to see us or made it difficult for us to judge whether Mario liked us or not – he kept us guessing the whole week. We then decided to make a trip into Maniago to sort out some administrative stuff. We had studied the bus schedule the day before and had made contact with our other team members as well. Taking public transport was something new for me as in South Africa I cannot do so because it isn’t accessible for persons with disabilities. Although the buses weren’t those that lower to the ground to let wheelchairs in, with Anet by my side we had a plan. I would climb on and Anet would lift my wheelchair on. Thankfully during the whole week we had some patient and even helpful drivers. The sense of freedom and achievement for me in using the public transportation system was big and made me long for such a system in my own country.
When we got to Maniago we had no clue how to get where we wanted to go, so we got out Google maps and off we set! When we reached the square where it was all
happening it was like a dream come true. I had often heard people describing European squares with the cafes on the pavements and so on and that was just what was before us. Added to that, was the fact that they were setting up the stage for the medal presentations, had all the countries flags hanging, music playing, and that there were a lot of athletes (some with their bikes) milling around. Thankfully while exploring the area we spotted a fellow teammate and his wife as well as Pablo who would be functioning as our manager for the week. It was just as well that we decided to go to Maniago that day and that we managed to meet up with some team members because we then heard that despite us putting money into Cycling South Africa’s account, our entry fees for the whole team had not been paid! This put everyone in a bit of a tailspin because we had to be registered that day before Pablo attended team meetings the next morning. Because of the exchange rate I couldn’t withdraw enough funds to pay for the registration and it became a bit of a stressful situation. Further complicating the
situation was that most of us didn’t have WhatsApp once we were out of our hotels because we were all using Wi-Fi so we just had to hope that we ran into each other or make arrangements to meet at a certain place at a certain time. After a while Pablo decided he would pay for my and other’s registration and we would draw the money over two days to repay him. I was really grateful to him because it would have been unbelievably sad if I had gone all the way to Italy and been unable to race!
After sorting out the drama Anet and I found a small restaurant down one street and had an Italian lunch. After lunch we started to make our way back to our hotel in Vajont. The heat forced us to spend most of the afternoon on our beds in our hotel room. In the late afternoon / early evening we took my trike and a bicycle from the hotel and Anet and I went for a relaxed and fun cycle around the village. It was amazing to explore new roads, landing up at dead ends, and having a good few laughs. It was so nice to just have fun on bikes before the serious racing began.
Wednesday was the official start of things. The morning was the official practice on the route and we were quite excited to see why we had come all the way to Italy to race. We managed to eventually get both our bikes and ourselves to the race route after a bit of confusion with our taxi driver (He came to fetch us with a normal car and not a van so that we could take our bikes with.) Without any manager or team official to report to or leave our bags with, we had no other choice than to have Anet ride the whole route with our backpack on her back.
The route itself is one that I will never ever forget. South Africa is a beautiful country and as I travel the country both in general and for cycling I see more of it, but that route in Italy will remain as one of the most stunning routes I have ever cycled on. Starting in the town of Maniago the route then took us out of the town and down a winding pass with a lot of trees and other vegetation and at the bottom of the pass we rode over a bridge. Under the bridge were people swimming and enjoying the summer. It was like they were teasing us from below as we were sweating just above the cool water. Once over the bridge we started climbing up again and for the next few kilometres we passed through several small villages. I was quite surprise to see so many people already lining the streets as this was just our practice session. Some people were standing physically on the pavements and other were leaning out their ground floor or first floor windows and cheering as we went by.
After winding our way through the little towns we hit a nice big open road and crossed another bridge. At this point I decided to give in to the experience and I pulled off the road and gave us a moment to enjoy the surroundings. I knew that during the next two days when we would be racing and would not have time to appreciate the surroundings. I didn’t want to look back and say I should have stopped and taken it all in. As we made our way back into Maniago I was quite happy with the route and knew that it was challenging but also quite a nice route to race on. I was delighted to be racing on a route which would be totally closed to traffic and unlike in South Africa there wouldn’t be any traffic to worry about except some official cars and motorcycles.
As we walked / cycled back to where we were going to meet the taxi driver we passed a little shop that sold fruit. A few moments later it was decided that once we had reached our pickup point, Anet would leave me there and return to the shop to buy us these beauties.
We returned to our hotel room to have a shower and something to eat and to put the bikes away and have a really short lie on our beds before we started to get ready for the opening ceremony.
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