Day Six (6/12). The Big One...and a Bonus Round!

This was to be THE BIG ONE! Today we tackle Stelvio Pass, famed for its height, at 2758m the third highest on the continent, and for its status as a worldwide m.c. Mecca. Our hotel clerk got us headed in the right direction and then when I pointed out a possible secondary road to complete the loop after Stelvio, he mentioned that it was worth a try but warned it was an old military road only recently (like the last 50 years!) converted to asphalt and not highly traveled. But he thought we should try it for its unique pass, the Passo di Gavia. Little did we know…

The pretty road out of Naturns

Then, on checkout, he reduced our room rates another 10euro, to 41! Where else in the word does cycle trash get that kind of treatment!

Looking up at about half the remaining switchbacks to the top of Stelvio

Stelvio did not disappoint! The road up was stunning with all the classic tight switchbacks and steep pulls the define pass riding, but in mind-boggling quantity.

A short video of yours truly absolutely
hammering a switchback!
Awesome watching...

However, it was the party at the top that was the big surprise: there must have been 200 motorcyclists and another 20 bicyclist, and even a few car drivers just hanging out!

What a scene at the top

These were the real hardcores - they pedaled up

A bicycling couple doing the unbelievable

The number of bratwurst and T-shirt vendors doing business indicate that this massive gathering was quite anticipated.

Gotta have a brat!

Interestingly enough, given the time of year, there were even a handful of skiers enjoying the remaining snow and the chairlift was running regularly!

Proof of Summit

We hung around 45 minutes or so to eat and enjoy the scene (had a brat mit senf und broche ever tasted better) and the crowd did not diminish a bit! What a show, especially after the relative quiescence of our other mountaintop stops. And none rivaled the overlook down from Stelvio, revealing km after km of carefully positioned switchbacks, piled right atop each other leading to an endless string of sweepers meandering to the valley.

The long road down

But Stelvio did nothing to prepare us for the next adventure just 30km down the road. Passo Gavia was the polar opposite of Stelvio, literally and figuratively. The first clue was that none of the sport bike traffic followed us at turnoff and we soon learned why as the pavement turned rutted and potholed.

Rough pavement and rough weather at Gavia

Ambient temp dropped precipitously and a light, bitterly cold rain began to fall from a darkening sky. What had we gotten ourselves into? Soon small riverlets began to run in the rutted road, splashing our boots and bikes. Intense attention was required to stay on a safe line and maintain some semblance of speed (fortunately falling off a cliff was not a danger here at least, as both sides of the road were snow walls in many places).

Just a little too easy to make a big mistake

The pass itself was barren and foreboding, again the exact opposite of the party atmosphere at Stelvio just an hour earlier! We were all on various size BMW GS models and we all alter concurred that Gavia surely met the definition of ‘adventure riding’; we had the right tools for the job here. All in all, Gavia was very unique experience and another distinctive and valued memory.

The sheep have adapted to the step slopes

After Stelvio and Gavia, it was long looping road to Bolzano (or Bozen, depending on which side of the Italian/Austrian language conundrum you fell; every sign, commercial or municipal, in the region was in both dialects). These roads would have been a challenge for us at the onset of the trip, but was now a welcome opportunity for some “easy riding”. Along the way we stopped for a late lunch at a large and ancient brewery in a pleasant small town and had a good conversation with a Canadian who was visiting with his wife’s Italian cousins. He was a nice guy and we were disheartened to learn that his wife had suffered stroke a debilitating stroke a few days before, postponing their departure til she could be medi-vac’d out. That led to an interesting conversation about the benefits of socialized medicine, both in Italy and Canada. Will we ever figure that one out?

A bicyclist is down

Speaking of airlifts, we did come around a curve and come upon this scene of a crashed bicyclist being airlifted off the mountain. This was the only two-wheeled injury we saw in all our travels. we did see a motorcyclist who threw it away right into the front of an oncoming car, but he walked away. Those are low stats for as much dangerous riding as we saw...