Ride Day 7: Passo dello Stelvio

We made it!  That is a huge accomplishment for us, riding to the top of the Stelvio on a bike that is more akin to an RV to a regular ½ bike.  It was a super hard day but both of us are so very pleased to having stuck with it and making it to the top.  Quite a day.  What fun!

There's no GPS map today because I couldn't get the website Ride With GPS to pin the Stelvio route.  But it was there, really.

We got an early start from Glurns, shoving off at a few minutes after 0600.  It was chilly, about 9 degrees, but that was much preferred to hot.  We arrived in the tiny village of Prato Alle Stelvio in about 10 km and turned right to start the climb.  We were definitely at the front of the day – nobody else was out at this hour either in a car or on a bike or moto.  That was the plan.  Since we climb really slowly we wanted to be ahead of the hordes.

On the way up, the first avalanche shelter

The route from the village is about 24 km to the top and the climb starts out at a civilized gradient of 6 to 7 percent.  We passed through a very small village of Gomagoi, where a car club of young guys with supped-up street racers, a few Porsches and two Ferraris were getting ready to roll before the hordes.  We knew that we’d see them shortly.  The climb continued, with a gradually steepening gradient.  Still in the trees, we hit the first of 48 numbered switchbacks, numbered in reverse order from bottom to top.  Great, only 48 switchbacks to go.

We heard the car club guys coming from behind.  Fast.  They flew past us but they passed us with the utmost courtesy – they gave us wide berth (well, as wide as possible on a road that is at most 1 ½ lanes wide).  Through the trees the gradient continued to increase.  Ten, eleven, then sixteen and eighteen percent.  This hurt and we still had 47 to go.  Then the motos started passing us.  These are the crotch rocket guys who literally fly up the road.  But they all seem to be very skilled on their bikes, if, without a doubt, crazy. 

At one series of very steep switchbacks two big Valkerye bikes had stopped on the switchback ahead.  A group of fast motos flew past us as we passed to by Velkeryes.  Both of the riders on the Valkeryes remarked something like “WTF, those guys are nuts!” in proper British.  I was really hurting at this point and was getting a bit flummoxed about the slow speed we could make.  Sure, it was 14 percent, but honestly…We continued on and the Brits slowed down as they passed and asked “English?”  We said, “No, American.”  They smiled and said “just enjoy!?

They turned my day around.  Rather than beating myself up at the slow speed, I relaxed a bit and started to ride for the fun of it rather than anything else.  We still had 15 km to go, but the rest of the ride was a pleasure.  A hard, hard pleasure to be sure, but what a difference a slight adjustment in mind frame makes.  Thanks to those two Brits!

We soon broke out of the tree line and into the high alpine, where we could see the cliff we needed to go up.  And the numbered switchbacks ticked off.  A few other bikes passed us, but it was still pretty quite on the Stevio.  Ten, nine, eight.  We stopped at five for a break.  At three we hit a short 16 percent section.  One km to go.  Then the road is marked with signs at each 100 meters.  Four hundred.  Three.  Two.  And then we’d made it.  Fantastic.  Super slow.  But who cares?  Riding the thing on a tandem is so vastly more difficult than a regular bike and Lorie simply killed it.  Never a complaint, other than to tell me to keep riding and quite complaining. 

This is about at switchback 25

We took very few photos on the way up as there wasn't much energy for it.  We opted for photos on top and on the way down.  The top is a ski station and tourist have and is clogged with motos, hikers, cyclists, and God knows what else.  We ducked into a restaurant for coffee as we’d had none on the day and the temp was pretty cold.  The top is at 2754 meters (8,406 feet).  We’d climbed a total of 6,554 feet over 25 km, and we were done in.  Coffee fixed all of that.  (There were a lot of ski camp kids around, too, kind of like Gov’t Camp in summer time ski camps but at a much higher altitude.)

Small reward

We wandered around a bit and took some obligatory photos.  Lots of people taking selfies – I took to calling them “selfios.”  Nice people all around, happy to take photos of us to prove that we made it.

OK, cheesy but proud

Cima Coppi, always, the Stelvio

A "selfio"

Then down.  The thing with a tandem is this: going up is painfully slow, but going down is outrageously fast.  Before we took off I tightened the brakes.  And I kept it very civilized.  While I could go down and around the switchbacks faster than cars (maybe even motos), I have no interest in that whatsoever.  But that meant that we were on the brakes the whole time.  The motos were, as expected, very courteous, and I always moved into the wide part of the outside corners to let them by.  The inside corners on the switchbacks are so tight that the damned tandem barely makes it around.

Traffic volume grew throughout the day

We took our time, enjoying the ride and stopping to give the hands and the brakes a break.  We took photos of this fascinating house that is probably at 2500 meters, across the valley, on the cusp of two obvious avalanche paths.  How, why, who?  There has to be an interesting story behind it.

Surely a good story here

Look closely and you'll see the mystery house

And art along the road.  Interesting and whimsical stuff.  Fitting that it is also the same day as the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show.

Art, ala Stelvio.  Or is it Arte?

Whimsical, for sure.  Fun, too!

We made it back to Glurns by 1400 and showered and went to town, where they had a Saturday market.  It was super fun and we bought bread, cheese, salami (from a guy who had come all the way from Puglio in southern Italy), and wine.  Time for a celebration, if a bit crude.

Cool 72 VW bus with coffee onboard for sale

Dinner.

Tomorrow we’re off to Bolzano.  We may get a hotel so we can watch the Euro cup finals (France v Portugal).