Lake Como, Italy
What a tumultuous year 2023 has been for biking. It seems like at every turn things have gone wrong; I crashed three times in the spring, including getting hit by a car, got covid not long after that, and to cap off the season had to have surgery. After last years debacle in Girona, I wasn't sure if my streak of bad luck would continue on unimpeded or whether it would finally lose steam and begin to turn in my favor. More than any other trip before, I felt pretty anxious about this one because of how bad last years trip to Spain went. Before deciding on Italy, I had actually planned to head back to Spain for a redemption tour but certain things didn't shake out, so Lake Como it was. To be honest I didn't do much research about Lake Como prior to booking the trip. I knew it was a good region for biking because Il Lombardia is raced there; which is part of the reason I planned the trip when I did. That being said, it only became apparent after the fact while planning routes that the region is extremely hilly and I was destined for a week of suffering. This was also going to be the first biking trip I had ever done where I was going to bring my real camera along with me. I bought a strap that allows me to bike with the camera, which was an exciting proposition because these trips always take me to some extremely cool places that are never truly captured by the camera on an iPhone.
Day 0: Travel Day
I've done some long travel days in the past and although this was a non-stop flight to Italy, this felt like the longest day ever. It took a couple missed trains to figure out the Italian train system. If you ever go to Italy, "RIT" refers to how late a train is and "BIN" tells you the track number. I was getting these mixed up and wasted a bunch of time. When I eventually arrived in Como, I stepped off the train and my first impression of the place was, "wow, this place isn't what I imagined." I had heard so many people rant and rave of the area, saying it was gorgeous; somehow I just wasn't seeing that. The Lombardy region has a smog problem and it was one of the first things that stood out. The city of Como itself was much busier than I had expected. I've been to other touristy European locations before during off peak seasons and they have been ghost towns. I had expected much of the same here, even though it was only early October. I couldn't have been more wrong, this place was buzzing with tourist; I can only imagine what summer must be like. I had arrived around 1pm and had planned to do a short ride (~20 miles) to stretch the legs after picking up the bike but I was so tired that I decided to scrap that plan. I figured going on 36 hours with no sleep, it probably wasn’t smart to go out riding.
Day 1: Ghisallo and Sormano (52 miles, 5,817 ft of elevation)
I don't think I've ever done such a one eighty about a place. After being severely underwhelmed yesterday, I was blown away today. I discovered once you leave the city of Como, it truly becomes quite magical. Today's route went from Como up the coast to Bellagio and then looped back around to Como. The ride to Bellagio has a couple hills along the way but nothing major. The real climbing begins once you leave Bellagio. The Madonna del Ghisallo climb starts immediately once you leave Bellagio and it continues for roughly 6 miles at an average gradient of 6%. Although 6% gradient might not sound crazy, the climb itself has a downhill, part way up, so in reality when you are climbing it averages closer to 9% or 10%, with kicks up to 15%. Although the climbs in the region are similar in length to places like Mallorca, the gradients here are so much more cruel; which makes it feel way harder. On Ghisallo I found a rhythm and tapped out a pace. It was the warm up for the real star of the show, the Muro di Sormano; which literally translates to the "The Wall of Sormano." This naming is no lie, it's a 1 mile hill at 17% with pinches up to 25%. It's inconceivably steep and the best context I can give to non-cyclist is, imagine the hardest hill you rode up as kid and multiply that by three or four times. After having just climbed up Ghisallo, the legs were already a bit tired so facing this brute was going to be a challenge. The road is blocked from cars so you have to go around the gate at the start. I had to put a foot down to do so but the gradients weren't steep enough at this point for this to be a problem. Off I went; the climb is so steep that they painted the elevation on the road so you can see how much (or lack of) progress you've made. I quickly ran out of gears and was trying my best to grind my way up the hill. This is one of those climbs that forces you to put down stupid watts just to keep on moving forward. You don't dictate your pace, gravity does. There were a couple moments I nearly crashed because as I went to pull on my handlebars, the bike began to wheelie due to the steepness of the hill. To add to the difficulty, the road is quite narrow so you can't weave back and forth which would enable you to cut the gradient. For most of the climb I was going ~4 mph, giving it my all, which feels disheartening in the moment. About three quarters of the way up, my legs were smoked and I had to put a foot down to stop for a second. If you've ever biked with shoes that require you to clip in, you'll understand the difficulty of clipping in while climbing up a hill. This was about the worst possible scenario for attempting that. You need to gain enough momentum to get your foot clipped in; to do this however on a 17% grade you need to create a shit ton of torque which in turn causes you to wheelie. I have no clue how I did it but after only a couple tries I managed to get clipped in and going. From there I made it to the top which felt like a massive accomplishment despite it only having been a 1 mile hill. Technically it was the steepest climb I've ever done, but in a weird way it's not the hardest, in part due to it's lack of length.
Ghisallo/Sormano were the last real hurdles of the day, the rest of the route back to Como was mostly downhill. I love downhills but I quickly discovered that downhills here weren't going to be very fun due to their technical nature. All the roads in the region are narrow, with blind turns and switch backs which meant I was on the brakes the entire time. I probably could have sent it down the descents but being on a bike that isn’t mine, in a foreign country, with my history, led to the decision to play it safe and stay upright.
Later that night I took walk across the city to the funicular (cable car) which brings you to the top of a mountain on the other side of Como. Despite the hazy conditions it was pretty cool. There was a lighthouse which on the map looked close but ended up being a half hour hike up a steep ass hill. From the top of the lighthouse you could see most of the lake. On a clear day with no haze, I could imagine this would look amazing. There were a bunch of kids at the top as well and when they saw I had a camera, they wanted me to do an impromptu photo shoot which was kind of funny. It was a small space so definitely not the greatest photos but they enjoyed it. On my hike back down from the lighthouse, I met a guy from Bolivia, who had been traveling around Europe and we chatted for a bit. We parted ways and I sat at an observation post and watched sunset over Como. I'll say it once so I don't keep repeating it, but having an actual camera is a cheat code when taking pictures. At no point during this trip did I feel great about any of the photos I took. However because the files are so flexible you can take bad photos and turn them into things of beauty with a bit of editing. On the harder days such as this (as well as day 4 and 6) I opted to leave my camera at home because I didn't want the extra weight of a camera while climbing big mountains. For these days I used my phone to take pictures but when you see them next to the ones out of my real camera, the difference is quite stark so I added them sparingly on this page.
Day 2: Valsassina (72 miles, 4,380 ft of elevation)
Between riding yesterday and hiking to that lighthouse, my legs were tired and I don't think I could've stomached another mountain day. So I switched up my plans and decided to ride Valsassina. This route involved taking a ferry from Bellagio to Varenna; so my day began like it did the day before, heading from Como to Bellagio. Having done this section once, I was able to take it in the sights a bit more. In doing so I rode a bit slower and missed the ferry by 10 mins. I had to sit around for about a half hour waiting for the next boat to arrive. The ferry ride itself was really cool and very scenic. It would be cool to come back to this area someday without a bike and explore all the small towns and take some photos without being rushed. I got off the ferry and the climb started only a couple miles outside of Varrena. That's when I realized all that time waiting at the dock plus the ferry ride, gave me a serious bout of cafe legs. It took me a bit to get back into the swing of things but it helped that the area was gorgeous with mountains lingering in the background. Although I set out to avoid mountains, that initial climb was actually fairly long. Eventually I made it to one of the best bike paths I’ve ever ridden on; there were huge mountains surrounding me, it was quite surreal. After that glorious bike path, things got dark. The last 25 miles went by agonizingly slow. The area south of the lake isn’t very scenic so it was a lot ugly roads through farmland. With about 8 miles to go there was a climb that was 2 minutes long but kicked up to well over 12%. This was torture and I was in survival mode, just barely hanging on before bonking. I couldn't have been happier to have made it back to Como. In hindsight I bit off more than I could chew and I paid for it in the last half of the ride. The difficulty of the ride isn't reflected in the amount of elevation I did. The 52 miles and 30,000 steps I did yesterday, caught up to me in a big way and I paid dearly for it today.
On a side note the bike started making this horrible knocking noise whenever I hit a bump. It sounded like the bike was falling apart. I also managed to drop a chain on that first mountain outside of Varenna. Nothing ever came of either of these issues but it was one of those things that gave me ptsd flashbacks to Griona.
Day 3: Il Lombardia…Racing the race (45 miles, 2,539 ft of elevation)
The final race of the World Tour season takes place in the Lombardy region every October. Living in the U.S., the opportunity to go to a professional bike race never happens, so when I was planning this trip I made sure to schedule around this. Il Lomabrdia also just so happens to be the last one day classic of the year so it attracts some of the biggest stars in the sport. The big hitters this year were Pogacar, Roglic, and Remco. I'm a fan of all three of them but Pogacar is so fun to watch so I was rooting for him to take the W. The plan for the day was to walk down to the team busses prior to the race to catch the action there and then hop on the bike and race the race to Lecco so I could catch them before they started the mountains.
At 9am I went down to the team busses, which were in the park only five minutes from my Airbnb. For a race of this caliber the crowds weren't nearly as bad as I thought they were going to be; I've seen gran fondos with more people in attendance. For a race like this none of the riders needed to warm up so there wasn't a whole lot to do besides wait. As I walking past the Tudor team bus, I walked past a guy who looked like Fabian Cancellara. I did a double take and someone stopped to take a picture with him and then he disappeared into the bus. It was funny seeing the difference in team budgets represented in the size of the team busses. All of the big teams had full on busses whereas a team like Direct Energies had a camper van, which looked so hilariously out of place. Since I was rooting for Pogacar at this race I decided to wait at the UAE bus. It didn't occur to me in the moment but since Pogacar and UAE won the year before they were the last team to be called to sign on. As I was waiting at the bus, all the other teams rode past, so I still got to see all the other riders. It's pretty appalling how rude some fans are; forcibly trying to take selfies with riders who are just trying to make their way through the crowds. Eventually UAE came out and as Pog was stepping off the bus, an Ineos team car drove in front of me and blocked my view. By the time they moved he was gone like the wind. I thought about running to the sign on but decided against it because I wanted to make sure I made it to Lecco in time.
After yesterday my legs were smoked and I needed a bit of a rest so I altered where I was going to intersect the race. Originally I was planning to do a 65 mile day but changed it to 45 miles, with Lecco being the half way point. I had roughly two hours to cover 25 miles which in theory should be plenty of time but knowing that there was a chance I could hit detours or get lost, I wasted no time. Right outside of Como there was a huge climb I wasn’t expecting. I motored up it because I knew the rest of the route was flat. Not long after that I unexpectedly intersected the race, which was a nice surprise. Eventually I made it to a highway which had a bike path that ran parallel to it. It was incredible and really highlights how shit the U.S. infrastructure is for anything besides cars. There was one section of that bike path which was flooded so I rode on the highway which I’m not sure is totally allowed or not but oh well. Probably 5 miles from Lecco I met this ultra distance biker who wanted to chat. I felt bad for pushing on while he was trying to have a conversation but I was worried I was gonna miss the race. Me and the ultra distance biker guy made it to Lecco with only a couple minutes to spare. Bike races are an interesting spectacle to watch in person because they come past so fast that you see the race for 5 seconds and it’s time to go home. I cruised back home, which followed a lot of the same roads as yesterday but luckily unlike yesterday, it didn’t feel like a death march. When I got back I watched the race on my phone and Pog took the win with a solo attack on the downhill into Bergamo.
Day 4: Val Cavargna (70 miles, 6,388 ft of elevation)
Of all the rides on this trip, this was the one I was most concerned about. On ridewithgps it said the route was 69 miles with 7,200 ft of elevation. That combination was on the wrong side of the 1,000 ft climbed per 10 miles formula which generally indicates how hard a ride will be (the actual ride was 70 miles and 6,600 ft of elevation). The reason I was concerned about this route was because my legs were dead from the last couple days and Val Cavargna is quite difficult. The first 20 miles and the last 20 miles are basically flat, so you are doing rough 4,600 ft of climbing in 24 miles. In the lead up to the majority of the climbing, there were two “small” climbs; "little" bumps in the road compared to what was to follow. I’ve climbed mountains of this size before with no problem; I think Puig Major in Mallorca has more elevation gain. The difference though is the gradient. On the climbs themselves the gradients were averaging above 8% and kicked up to 15%. On the website I found this route, it said there wouldn’t be many cars and you’d be alone with nature. In reality for a climb in the middle of nowhere, there were more cars than I expected; not a lot but definitely not zero. There were some nice views along the climb but it certainly isn’t picturesque. It's not like it would have mattered anyhow because there wasn't a lot of time to ride easy and enjoy the views. Most of the main climb was essentially on a single lane road, which made it a little complicated when cars came from the other direction. This also meant you couldn't cheat and cut the gradient by swerving. I did most of this climb in the small ring, easiest gear and it was just enough to prevent me from grinding my way up. At the top there was zero view, which was incredibly disappointing. The descents weren’t very fun either because of how technical they were.
Today was the first day I explored the west side of the lake and it was a nice change of scenery from the Bellagio route I had been doing. This area seemed to have many more of the mansions Lake Como is known for. I was glad I didn't take my camera with me today; besides the weight savings, I just wasn't in the mood to take photos, it was all business today. On my way back from Val Cavargna I so appreciated that Italy has water fountains everywhere. It's such an obvious thing more places need to take note of. One last random thing, people on motorcycles suck. I'm not sure why but no matter where you go in the world it's always the moped and motorcyclist that are the worst/most obnoxious people.
Day 5: Loop Around the Lake (102 miles, 3,862 ft of elevation)
This route was as straightforward as it gets; a big loop around Lake Como. The one part of this ride that I altered was the section from Lecco to Varenna. That stretch forces you to ride on a highway through a big tunnel. If I was on my own bike, I’d probably have just done it but knowing my luck with biking abroad, it was better to just play it safe. The new route still had me going from Bellagio to Lecco but then I would double back to Bellagio where I would catch the ferry to Varenna. This detour luckily equaled the same distance, so I was still on track to hit 100 miles for the day.
The day started off strong, I had ridden the Bellagio route a couple times already so I was pretty familiar with the roads and made decent time. Heading to Lecco there were some long ass tunnels, that luckily didn't have many cars in them so it made for a pretty unique experience. As I was nearing Lecco the wind kicked up significantly. It must've just been that area because no where else on the ride was it nearly as windy. I made it back to the ferry and was feeling good. Around the 60 mile mark things were still on track but I was in for a rude awakening. Mentally knowing there were only 40 miles left was comforting but I soon discovered it was nothing but a mirage. Coming into this ride I was aware that I had been under fueling for most of the trip. I was having trouble keeping up with the calories burned. Add in the fact that I couldn't stomach eating another fig bars (in the last couple days I had eaten ~20 fig bars) and I could feel trouble brewing. In the very north of the lake, I stopped for some gelato, in hopes of delaying the inevitable bonk. The north side of Lake Como isn't the greatest. There were some nice views of the mountains especially north of the lake but the towns paled in comparison to what’s in the south. A lot of the area was farmland which isn't the most enjoyable to ride through.
With about 30 miles to go, everything finally caught up to me; the fatigue, hunger, and tiredness. Those final 30 miles ticked by so incredibly slow. On the upper north west side of the lake there were a ton of tunnels. I’m not opposed to riding in the shorter tunnels as long as I have lights. You can usually circumvent the longer tunnels by going on side paths that run parallel. There was one tunnel in particular though where it looked as though there was no side path/or maybe it was closed, I forget which one it was (looking at Google Maps after the fact, I somehow completely missed the sign that said bicycles needed to go through a separate tunnel). Anyhow I didn’t stop to investigate so I just rode into the tunnel. I was not prepared for how long it was; it just kept going and going. The tunnel itself looked super cool with the lights stretching on forever. If there wasn’t traffic, I would’ve 100% stopped to take a photo. With my front light shining it was easy to see how much dust was floating around in the air. It ended up being 2.5 miles long. While I was riding, a truck honked at me; which at least in my limited time in Europe means you are some place you clearly shouldn't be. The saving grace of that tunnel was that it must’ve been downhill because I was easily doing 25+ mph, so I spent less than 10 mins in there.
There were a couple more tunnels on the way back but nothing as long as the one described above. One of the funny things that happened was that I kept entering tunnels and thinking to myself, "wow this tunnel is dark, my light barely works.” Then it would dawn on me that I still had my sunglasses on. I'd like to chalk that up to being absolutely cooked by that point in the day. Eventually I made it back to Como but I was spent. There's a little hill to get to the Airbnb and I was having a tough time walking up that.
Part of what got me through that ride was the thought of stuffing my face with pizza. I ate at a highly rated restaurant that serves pizza. The waiter came over to get my order and I told him I’ll take an order of bruschetta, a margherita pizza, and a pepperoni pizza. It was clear that I was a party of one, so after ordering all this food the waiter kinda awkwardly looks at me and I tap on my stomach and go, "I’m really hungry." It was a funny moment. Out of principal I finished off all the food even though I could’ve stopped after the first pizza. The extra food didn't hurt, I'd need it for my final ride of the trip the following day.
Day 6: Lake Lugano (58 miles, 4,682 ft of elevation)
This was the final day of the trip and for all intents and purposes my Italy adventure was a smashing success: no crashes, no flats, and beautiful weather throughout. For the last ride, I planned to head up to Lake Lugano which is a bit northwest of Como. Supposedly you can get to Lake Lugano via a flatter route that passes through Switzerland but where is the challenge in that? In all honesty though I thought today was going to be a cake walk; something easy to end on. Oh how I was wrong. Since I knew there was a bit of elevation involved I decided to skip bringing the camera and what a wise decision that was.
After riding about 10 miles north of Como, the climb up to the Lake Lugano began. It wasn’t as brutal as Val Cavargna from a couple days ago but it was still difficult. Not counting the brief flat/downhill in the middle, it was a 7 mile climb at 6ish%. For someone who rode 100 miles yesterday and had 350 miles in the legs during the last 5 days, this took its toll. Even though I knew there was two main climbs (one from Argegno to the summit and the second from Lake Lugano to the summit), I mentally only focused on the first one. I did the first climb and I instantly felt this sense of relief; my day was over. In my head it was like the last day of school, I was home free, no more obstacles on this trip. After getting to the summit I descended to Lake Lugano. I’ve said it before but descending here isn’t fun because of the terrain (switchbacks, blind corners, etc). There was a lot of descending, so I had time to think and figure out why descending here feels so unnerving; part of it is you accelerate so fast due to the gradient, that it can feel like you could lose control quickly. At home there’s a slow build up in speed whereas here the gradient is so steep that you pick up speed at an alarming rate which complicates braking. I made a second revelation during that descent after thinking, "wow, I've been descending at 25 mph for 10 mins...fuck this is gonna be a bitch to climb back up." I made it to the bottom, found a spot along the shore and fueled up like any top athlete, eating knock off yodells because I had finally run out of fig bars. I wanted to hit 400 miles on the trip so I begrudgingly rode an extra four miles in order to hit that goal. While doing that little side quest, I was on the search for a water fountain because I was running low. I never found one so I headed back up the mountain a couple ounces lighter. This ascent from the lake to the summit was nothing short of soul crushing. It never seemed to end and knowing it was truly the final hurdle of this trip, somehow made it drag on forever. This route reminded me of Sa Calobra in Mallorca but what separates it from that climb is that you have to do this one twice. The climb from Lake Lugano was harder than from Argegno due to the gradients/fatigue in the legs. Eventually I got to the top, descended back down, and finally found some water by the shores of Lake Como. I made it back to Como, returned the bike and called it a wrap on this trip. Overall 10/10, highly recommend Lake Como to anyone, whether biking or not. I had an amazing time and wouldn't hesitate to come back.
Final Stats:
Miles: 405 miles
Elevation: 27,668
Active time: 27h
Elapsed time: 34h
Miles: 405 miles
Elevation: 27,668
Active time: 27h
Elapsed time: 34h
Extra photos from the trip
