Our time in Brindisi (Italy) was a nice way for us to recover, after so many (cold) miles in just a few days We arrived on Good Friday, and many stores were closed for our entire visit. Fortunately, we found a few coffee shops and a restaurant that we liked, and generally had good weather over our four days there, which was a treat after too many days on the bike with chilly temps and severe wind. Next stop along the way was a small B&B right next to the seashore, in a town called Schiavonea (don’t worry we never heard of it either!) Sadly, upon arriving we found no restaurants open for dinner, just pizza or gelato.

A double cheeseburger from MacDonald’s, minus the bun for Kat and no fries for either, since I’m trying to be supportive of Kat’s efforts of staying away from carbs. BTW, she looks amazing, and has lost about 10lbs. Anyway, our $24 room was surprisingly large and it was a nice change from “civilization!”

The next day we got to the Calabria region and pushed onward to the ferry at San Giovanni which took us over to Messina. That was a long ride, 180 miles, but since we were heading SOUTH and along the coast, we thought we’d be in warmer temps.

WRONG!

There were two mountain passes at high elevations that gave us pause, but, no rain. Until the third. The climb in elevation was barely noticeable until we watched the temperature gauge keep dropping and dropping. And then the tunnels came on like an army brigade! First one, then another, kept climbing, and then down the other side. All that was OK, until we found ourselves in a sudden downpour that I thought was heavy fog until Kat said, “pull over we need to get rain ponchos on,” which we did. A bit awkward trying to fit them over helmets and backpacks, but she rocked (again), and over the next few minutes we kept going lower and lower in elevation, the clouds parted, the fog cleared, and we found sunshine again! Let’s just say it was a memorable experience.

The ferry experience, however, was NOT one of our favorites due to a lot of traffic trying to fit along narrow serpentine streets, but since the ride through the Strait of Messina was just 20 minutes, it was a small price to pay.

So now we’re in the Sicilian town of Milazzo, in a really nice, larger than normal, AirBNB. We have TWO bedrooms and three balconies, and are situated on a peninsula with water along both sides of us. It took us just a few walks to learn our way around, but discovered a very sad fact of life in SOME Italian towns.

Everything (almost) closes at noon (or so) and doesn’t reopen until 7:00 or later. Restaurants, too. Since we like to eat earlier, that took some adjustments, but we have a nice kitchen, so Kat’s got back into the cooking groove. Which is fine with me. We’re eating healthier and cheaper, and except for cappuccino indulgences (all of $2), we found little to splurge on.

I did however take an island hop to Stromboli, about two hours away, and hiked up the mountain volcano. The volcano IS active, which gave us a little show with visuals as well as audio booms. That’s the new profile picture you see above. Let’s just say it was fun, exhausting, and coming down from 1400 feet elevation in the dark, with headlamps, was a bit daunting. Some might think I was crazy to take it on (including one current wife), but hey, I thought, we only live once!