The SS16 runs along the whole of the top/east/back-of-calf coast of Italy, and we’ve actually cycled up about half of it, now I look at the map. We started at Bari and left just before Pescara.
And here are some things that flitted through my Doris-ian mind as I pedalled along it.
We started in the “deep south” of Italy. As Sid has observed, some of these towns did not start off as “Italian” as such, because now you are at the far end of a long peninsula sticking out into the Med, and other people are pretty keen to have a base here.
Nowadays there are (is) a whole chain of little towns built from creamy marble, with green shutters, looking absolutely beautiful as long as you are in a car with spongey suspension and decent air conditioning. For Sweaty Sid and Despairing Doris these towns are less attractive because the main streets are paved in really good-looking marble blocks laid creatively and unevenly to create a quaint olde worlde effect. Soft Paws doesn’t begin to cope with it and in the end we got off the bikes and walked to parallel side streets where Mr 20th Century Tarmac made his evil presence felt. So please do go there, look at the towns, and take a photo while waving your camera around erratically so you can see what we saw.
The road itself does feel very, very old. For example, between Bari and Barletta there are a lot of old hospices set up to support the crusader traffic that came this way, probably to go via Malta. Every field, wall, beach, cliff you see has been looked at by travellers over an immense period of time. And the travellers may have been armies, traders, migrants, locals.
At first the land was divided into smallish parcels by a mixture of stone walls – drystone walls vs cut stone, with little circular shepherds’ (?) huts in the corners, it felt like another visit to the Troy archeological site. As we worked our way north the soil got better and the crops switched to wheat, tomatoes, courgettes – but still olives whenever the soil quality dropped.
Mediterranean pines are here whenever there is poor stony soil, with cicadas (WILL YOU keep the noise down?!) and also colonies of parakeets – yes, those same ones that have colonised Richmond Park. Bougainvillea everywhere, we wonder if it is actually an invasive plant like rhododendrons are in parts of the UK.
And after the Parco Nazionale del Gargano (aka Ayers Rock On Steroids, or Why, Exactly, Doris, Did We Decide To Cycle Up This?) we get to the Emerald Coast, the Azure Coast, and the Italians Go To The Seaside Coast. Almost all the coast is beaches (some sand, some small pebbles) but not all of it is easily accessible from the SS16. But the determined Italian family group parks up on the side of the road, unloads the umbrella (Dad), the picnic (Mum) and the inflatables (kids) and fights their way determinedly down through the steep tough sandy vegetation to the gently-shelving beach.
Sid and Doris eschew this behaviour (sand in the cleats plays merry hell with the pedals my dear) and we drop into the beach clubs for our refreshment pauses – well worth avoiding if you have any alternative.
If you are thinking of doing this route, there is a lot of work underway to tarmac the old railway line and convert it into a splendid cycle track. Whenever you are reading this, it will only be better than it was when we cycled it, and bits of it are fab already. It’s not signposted, but it’s between the sea and the road, so keep an eye out for it.
Finally, and bizarrely, we have been going past signs reminding us that winter tyres or snow chains are needed down stretches of this road. We pause to apply some more factor 50 sun cream while admiring the little icon of a snow plough driver.
In conclusion: an interesting and varied road with plenty of places to eat or stay. Definitely worth including on your to-do list.