In late October, when it was still unseasonably warm, Sandro and I managed to find a day and a half to get away from the city and explore some locations that we will certainly add to our enchiridion of trips and peregrinations, so that we can expand our forays into the tangible and metaphysical landscapes aboard our awesome machines.
This was a BMW powered test run into Umbria, landlocked, prospering and green, so green! It's hills rather than mountains, and the shallow valleys that separate them offer postcard-worthy views at every corner. It's hard to keep track of all the small fortified hamlets that are built on the hilltops, each with stone walls, turrets and imposing gates. Each is very pretty in its own right and would merit a walk through their narrow cobblestone alleyways.
Drink responsibly: don't let your beer get warm in the sunshine.
Small castles are also found occasionally in a landscape that can't possible have changed all that much since they were built; even the roads we travel, trail-braking into corners and powering out of them with our flat twins, probably follow paths that were originally cut into the ground by merchants, officials and farmers on foot, horseback or carriages.
The air was cool enough in shaded portions of the trip, but plenty warm in the sunshine. Being mid-week and very much off season, there was hardly any traffic and we had peace and tranquility every time we stopped for a break. Some of the places we saw were truly impressive, such as the remains of a Roman river port on the "Nera" river:
This type of itinerary would definitely suit our British classics, as well as the Sportster of course. The roads are sometimes a little rough, but we have seen much worse elsewhere in our neck of the woods. Staying at Sandro's family home meant our luggage was very small and light, which always contributes to a more enjoyable riding experience throughout the day.
Later in the afternoon we headed over to the next town and stopped at a small butcher's and a groceries shop to buy meat, bread, tomatoes, red wine and anything else we needed for our evening meal: it came to eleven euros each, and was worth so much more than that. As we still haven't figured out how to safely transport cold beer on the bikes in large enough quantities, we opted for a bottle of local red instead, which went very nicely with the barbecue and was the perfect closer for the day.
I like this formula and hope we can open the next riding season soon with something similar. Only a few more months to go, come on.
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