Confusion Reigns Amongst the Vineyards 🤔

A Convoluted Journey from Nova Gorica to Sežana 

… but before all that there are a couple of things I should mention about yesterday evening that I didn’t get around to when I was bashing away at the keyboard last night.

In reverse order because the second of the two things before retiring to our room was the more pleasurable. Mooching around looking for somewhere nice to eat at the end of the day we  stumbled on a wonderful authentic Italian restaurant tucked away in a laneway near our hotel. They had a sandwich board out in the street, which was lucky for us otherwise we’d have missed it.

After we shared an entrée of grilled seafood au gratin Di had her favourite pasta, Spaghetti Vongole, which she liked quite a lot but didn’t put it up with her all-time favourites sampled on the Mediterranean after finishing the GR 5/52 …

… and when I spotted the Squid Ink Pasta with shrimps, calamari, cherry tomatoes and asparagus I couldn’t go past it …

My dish was also in the very good category but not quite as good as I thought it could be. For one, I can’t quite get my head around the fact that the French and Italians seem to prefer their asparagus white. Not much flavour in the white stuff and a bit of green on the plate would add a lot aesthetically to this dish. Also, I quite like a sprinkle of parsley with my seafood pasta. Those two changes would have made this dish magnifico  in my opinion. A nice glass of local dry white wine for each of us went superbly.

Before we had dinner we walked out to see the Piazza Transalpina (it’s worth opening this link) which is said to be a must visit if you’re in New Gorica/Gorizia and have some time on your hands. However, walking there after we’d had a warm day on the bike with some surprisingly steep ramps, which took us by surprise on what looked like it would be a pretty casual day. Dianne and I are still getting used to riding up 10% + with an extra 10 kilos or so on the bike.

If it was a warm day on the bike, it was definitely a HOT day walking about three kilometres each way to the piazza and back. Here are a couple of photos I took when we arrived …

I think this impressive building is a combination of some sort of administration centre and train station. It certainly is the main train station for the city as I discovered when I walked into the cafe to order a couple of cool drinks and ice-creams.

And here, in the middle of the circle on the pavement in the foreground in particular is what draws the  most attention …

Here is a short extract from the link above that explains the significance of of the plaque …

“ From 1947 (Treaty of Paris) until 2007 the square was divided by an international border between Italy and Yugoslavia (Slovenia since 1991). Crossed by a border wall until 2004, movement on the square is now free because both Italy and Slovenia are EU members and parts of the Schengen Area.”

In the concreted square itself there is a line of  inset bricks extending along the former border either side up to the surrounding grassed area, where there is a very low wall (perhaps 30 cms high) that represents the wall that has been removed. When one considers the animosity that existed in this region back in the Soviet era, it is very heartening to hear about the breaking down of borders, both physical and social that had been imposed on the people.

After a short break to down our fizzy drinks and eat our ice-creams - which would have been much more refreshing had we been sensible enough to move to shade on the railway side of the station! - we trudged back towards our hotel, getting hotter and hotter. At one point I resorted to taking off my shirt to cool off a bit, but a number of sideways looks from little old ladies made me realise that it was a social faux pas to indulge oneself in such a manner so I put my shirt back on and started to sweat again.

Before we left Gorizia this  morning some photos were taken …

Michael and Louise with their sun sleeves on

Duckworth and Louise

Jane with a random commuter in the background

There had been much discussion between Michael and myself, and myself and Dianne about the route between Gorizia and Sežana. There were a couple of hills that were unavoidable but also some extended gravel sections that both of us wondered whether we might jag a way around. Not to be, so we set off and had a very pleasant ride for about 10 kilometres before we hit the first stretch of gravel “road”, which was still down on the flat and finished just before we started up the first hill seen in the route profile below ….

Mostly, the gravel was just fine …

 

… and when I stopped to add some air to my back tyre it really hit me how nice it was to be riding alongside wine grapes that were growing like mad at this time of year …

But here is where some consternation began to develop. Firstly, this is really just a farmer’s track to service fields alongside the railway track and there were some quite loose sections. Thankfully no-one came to grief but it was a little unsettling, especially for those with narrower tyres. More confronting were a number of watercourse crossings, especially the two with steep entry and exit ramps. This crossing had shallow entry and exit ramps but the water was pretty muddied up and potentially a bit deeper than what folks were used to riding through so most of the team walked their bikes across …

When it came to the second steep-sided watercourse a number amongst us chose to avoid confronting it and detoured up onto the railway line right-of-way, where there was a very narrow path alongside the tracks. The leader of the group took a tumble into the weeds below but thanks to their cushioned landing emerged with only a few (more) scratches. The ones following decided that this was a good point to dismount and walk their bikes to the next point where they could rejoin the track. By the time we finished with the gravel we were nearing the 25 kilometre mark and the direction turned to the southwest as you can see in the map below … which got us started up the first of two significant hills. The good thing about this hill was that it mostly rose at a steady gradient between five and seven percent interspersed with some short sections that eased right off. Very nice as hills go.

Once we were up then down the other side of that hill …

…we soon started up the main hill for the day. It was about halfway up that hill when things got really interesting. We were ascending slightly spaced apart through a series of switchbacks past vineyards when we came to a spot where our GPS devices told all of us we should be going up a steep loose section of gravel. 

It was highly improbable and it looked like we could rejoin our route after a switchback or two a little further up. We all kept looking for an exit onto what would have been a terrace leading to more climbing. A connecting section of road never appeared and we all continued climbing, and were now spaced out.

Jane and Duckworth had flown the coup but Michael, Louise, Dianne and I regrouped then had a bit of downhill and navigated to a crossroads and stopped to ponder the maps on our bike computers when a young lass stopped to give us directions about how to get to Sežana. Very helpful she was too, telling us which road to take and then after continuing UP that road we’d eventually start seeing signs pointing us in the direction our destination and she was spot on.

The four of us rode pretty close together for a while on some very nice roads but then Di and I decided to have a bit of a breather at a relatively flat spot.While we were there I took a couple of photos …

… which were the last for the day as we concentrated on getting through the ride and to our hotel so we could sit on more comfortable seats and enjoy a long, cold drink or three. The funniest - and most perplexing - thing about the day was that, after getting left behind by the other four and having a good break at a hilltop cafe for cold drinks and a Pistacchio Magnum each, Dianne and I arrived first at the hotel where we were all staying. We had large beers in hand when the others coincidentally arrive together maybe ten minutes later. Weird. And not one of us could really explain it. And that’s it for the day apart from this image of a wheeled contraption on a counter near the entrance to reception in the hotel …