Valcamonica & Iseo Lake (Italy)

By tandem for 180 km from Passo del Tonale to Lake Iseo along the Ciclovia dell'Alto Oglio, 14-17 May 2019





STAGES
14.05.2019
Passo del Tonale (1884 mslm) - Capo di Ponte (363 mslm), 62km/H+679m/H-2200m
15.05.2019
Capo di Ponte (363 mslm) - Iseo (189 mslm), 67km/H+318/H-492m
16.05.2019
Iseo-Sarnico-Lovere-Pisogne, 50km (pianeggiante)
17.05.2019
Pisogne - Tonale by train+bus

Dear Conrad,
thanks for posting recent tour photos from Alpine region I know very well during summertimes. I'm astonished about transporting a tandem by an Italian bus. Is it usual in the Italian Alps to transport the bicycle in a bus? (I just know it regulary in Switzerland, partially in Austria). Or depends it from drivers mood?

Hi Matthias, I very well understand your "astonishment"
However I'd like to point out a few things:
1. Even in Italy and, believe me or not, even in Sicily we could load our tandem on a train ... without necessarily disassembling it!
2. Our tandem is a Koga "foldable" type so we've normally no problems to load it on a train, or in the booth of the car ... or on the usual tow-hook bicycle rack
3. In this specific occasion, however, on the 17th there was a train personnel strike ... so, with a huge pacience, we couldn't take the train from Pisogne to Edolo and finally resolved to leave the car in Pisogne and take 3=THREE buses up to Passo del Tonale where we had parked the car three days before. A bit complicate ... but absolutely worthwhile!!!!

Actually on buses I've never tried ... but if I fold it ... why not!!!

Dear Conrad,

not only your night trips are very interesting . Thank you for the nice pictures, which make me wish that 1st of June will come soon - then, I will start my own tour, also with a lot of mountains. I like your tandem. Unfortunately, up to now I could not convince my wife to also use this type of bike, which would equilibrate our performances.

As a possible extension to the previous route, it might be worthwhile to take into consideration even the following:

Trentino – The Lakes Valley
The 80km round trip starts from Torbole on the Garda lake and arrives to Terlago very close to Trento. From Torbole to Sarche it follows the Sarca river which is the main tributary of Garda lake. The path is almost entirely on its own place, well paved and signposted, always very accurate.
Once arrived to Sarche I continued to Toblino leaving the lake on the right; over there there’s a pedestrian walkway so there’s no need to use the main road (strada statale) that is just a few meters away. From there on up to Terlago there are roads with a very little traffic. On the way back passing through Calavino following a very quiet road I arrived back to Sarche where I returned to the starting point.