Biking Beyond Bologna

Up before dawn to cycle our packed bikes across a just awakening Bologna to the train station. We are off to the northern reaches of Italy to begin our 2 weeks of cycling through the Dolomites and back to Bologna. The terrain is a lush green, the rivers are very full, and the mountains are very high. A bus journey up steep winding roads (I was getting a bit nauseated by the winding and the heights and I’m NOT one to get sea/road sick nor agrophobic) brought us to Castelrotto. The iconic black onion topped bell tower marks the town center. We arrived there at noon and the bells rang, literally for 8 minutes! Then again for that long at 1 and 2 pm! Enough with the bells already. We seemed to have crossed an invisible border into Tyrolia, although it is Italy, it is every bit German/Austrian = language, food, architecture. We realize how much Italian we know because we are totally blank faced when people speak to us in German, of which I know zilch.