Text: Anurag Ashok Pictures: Sunny (MotoGrapher)
We slept like a log the previous night and got up at about 8. It was a well deserved rest considering that we had walked in our riding boots and with all the camera gear for a good 7-8 hours. Today’s ride will take us into the Alps and we were looking forward to the respite from heat and humidity of the plains.
The day started with the usual breakfast. Most small hotels have a pretty set breakfast menu almost all over Europe and we had our usual Croissant, Hot Chocolate, Bread and Jam. As the ride was expected to be apprpx 250 odd kilometers, we were taking it easy. We had stuffed our luggage in the bikes at the Ducati factory on Day 1 and had rushed to Venice. Now, the priority was to find a more scientific way of packing our luggage ! The soft panniers in the StreetFighter for example had got stuck as the rear cowl did not open and hence could not be removed when we had arrived at Alle Torri. We had avoided wrestling with this rear cowl lest we damage something. Sunny of course had managed to get his panniers off and we had taken all our luggage inside the hotel.
We packed up everything in plastic bags which would be stuffed inside the panniers and removed with ease and re-arranged the luggage between the two bikes for optimum load balancing and ease of use.
We started our bikes and they roared into life! The muscular chugging of the pistons in the L-Twins was beginning to sound like music… a carefully orchestrated symphony penned by the likes of Beethoven. It was around noon now and Sunny set course in the GPS towards Cibana di Cadore where our hotel was booked. Cibana di Cadore is very close to Cortina di Ampezzo but we had chosen this hotel because of its tranquil location.
We were soon sweating profusely and the pressure cooker effect was terrible. we took a small stop to get Benzina (fuel 95 Octane) in our bikes and kept riding. We straight away hit the Autostrada (toll expressways) and both of us went to the self service lane and got the ticket marking the point of entry. On the way, I took the ViaCard which is a prepaid card for a value of Eur25. When you reach the desired exit on the Autostrada, one has to first insert the ticket that we got at the entry and then the ViaCard to get the requisite amount debited. While we had been successfully using this, at the exit leading to Bossano, we entered the wrong lane (drive through lane using a Telepass) and did not know what to do. So parking the bikes on the side, we walked back to the toll gate. There was nobody to be seen at any of the counters!! After having waited for a while, one attendant walked up to us and took a manual payment from us. Speaking with him, we found that this happens quite often and there was no cause for worry.
Italians are cheerful and helpful people
We kept riding on towards the Alps and the scenery soon gave way to beautiful villages seen in the distance nestled in hillocks.
The road continued to climb from here on and barring a couple of stops where construction workers stopped us to clear the road of rock slide, we kept riding. We noticed that there were waves of big bikes zipping around in both directions. There were Kawasaki’s, BMW’s, Honda’s, plenty of KTM’s and Aprilla’s but not many Ducatis! We rode through many small tunnels and a few long ones that went on for kilometers !
It was 4 PM and we were getting hungry having not eaten anything so we decided to stop at a beautiful place called Fiora di Primiero where the next 40-45 minutes were to be spent. While we ate, it rained and this brought the temperature down to more bearable limits. Primiero turned out to be the first town of the foot hills of the mountains.
From here the climb started and the ride became a pleasure. The route we had taken took us via Bossano del Grappa, Mount Grappa, Agrodo etc.. The Alps revealed themselves in their full majesty and there were some beautiful mountain peaks that we captured for you. There was so much to shoot that we kept stopping briefly along the way to take pictures.
We are traveling with many lenses and two Canon 5D Mark II’s. Sunny wanted to shoot the ride and at one place in a as usual beautiful location, he managed to fit one Camera onto the handle bar of the monster using his Gorilla pod. From hereon, we would shoot continuous video in full HD of the route while we rode and captured the ride as it actually happened ! At around 7 PM, we rode past a mind blowing alpine village around a very beautiful lake. Houses around this place were sparkling and had some sort of teak finish on the facade.
We had a feeling that we were about 13 kilometers from our hotel and so we stopped at a Restaurant by the road side, besides the lake of course. We sat and had some great Italian coffee and then took pictures again. The temperature had fallen to a fantastic 20 Deg Celsius.
Sunny spoke with the people in the restaurant and we found out that the hotel was still some 50 Kilometers away! Estimating that it will take us approximately an hour to reach there, we started riding again along the twisting and curving roads, we crossed the dolomites and picturesque snow covered peaks. At one point, the dolomite peak was illuminated with light as if God had decided to turn the spotlight on only for us and only at this peak so that we could enjoy and photograph the view. The whole Alpine ride seems to be a choreographed stage and I suspect that the assistant of God who was given the task of designing this part of the world was non other then van Gogh.
With the temperature falling steadily from the earlier 20 to 14 degrees and finally we finally managed to reach our hotel at approximately 9:30 PM with the temperature at 9 at an altitude of about 1200 meters.
This ride was approximately 7-8 hours long taking out the two stops (without taking out the photography stops) and was 285 Kilometers long of which approximately 150 Km’s were in the mountains.
