From the end to the start, life is incredible!

The last day of cycling I pushed myself to the limit to reach Rome. I had traveled 140 km/ 85 miles from Montefiascone to Magliana Vecchia and went to bed with temperature. I hit my target. I expected that the success would make me feel extremely happy and fulfilled. On the contrary I was dispirited and downbeat. I was experiencing the feeling of a small death, when the story has come to the end. I had relished every single second of my journey but the arrival in Rome opened in front of me a vast emptiness. That very moment I got struck by a new awareness, which just daring to live intensely can make it happen. For ten days I lived heart and soul, unhampered by ideologies (which I believe are venom). My mind was one with my body, clear and healthy, absorbed in practical duties. I was only a human, but complete. The awareness of my humbleness in this vast world was my biggest strength and energy. Who would ever imagine that the power of life lies in the most basic verb and human action? Being is the matter that gives consistence and force. I realised how vain was my life when I was so absorbed in reaching targets forgetting to be, or to appreciate what I already had, thoroughly possessed by my focused mind which was stuck in sluggish ideologies. Focus is indeed when all the attention is driven on to one detail and its surrounding is simply non-existent. Achieving something as if that was the matter, while the only matter is being. I am, that’s it. I’ve got myself hence I’ve got everything in life. This understanding was the true achievement of my journey and shifted the attention to my real self rather than to my mind’s self. I started to acknowledge myself.

To put it briefly life is made up of lots of small births and deaths. So was my journey, it was planned to end in Rome but actually it didn’t finish there. I was in touch with Leire and at my arrival she turned up to be in my town Trieste. The following day I caught a bus to Trieste and planned to cycle with Leire towards a new destination. I succeeded in persuading her to change plan, which originally was to cycle towards Hungary. We would travel south towards Croatia instead. That’s how the new adventure got started and how I extended my holiday for two more weeks alternating cycling to sailing.

My daughter Selene joined us. The plan was to follow the Parenzana trail but we had to connect to it from my home following a route that was suggested by a friend. I was so confident in my territory that I didn’t bother checking the map and we got lost just a few miles far from home. With a lot of swearing on me, we had to face with a steep climb before reconnecting to the Parenzana trail near the brook Rižana in Dekani. The popular trail was originally a railway, converted now in cycling path. It runs for most of the Italian section on busy roads, the Slovenian section is more varied, while in Croatia it is immersed in the wild nature.

We arrived in Koper following the brook and then continued on the seafront. After a refreshing swim we continued cycling along the shore through Izola and then uphill through some galleries in Portorož. The views were rewarding, the descent to the touristy town was quick. We kept going for some miles along a busy road and arrived in Sečovlje. The Sečovlje saltpans were warmly lit by the sun and its amber limbs. It was late afternoon. Flocks of birds in the sky were silhouettes against the orange red sky, the sun slowly sinking beneath the horizon.

I wished we could have stayed there and waited for dawn but my dad was waiting for us in the port of Umag. We crossed the Croatian border and tackled the climb towards Plovanja. It was dark when my dad came to pick us up with the car and drove us to the boat where we would start the new sailing adventure.

#cycling #travel #longdistancecycling #Italy #Slovenia #Croatia #Parenzanatrail #saltpans