Marsure - Giais

Disclosure: I didn't ride this route. My wife rode it, while I followed her walking our two dogs.

She started in Marsure 0n our lovely bikeway, which runs from Budoia to Montereale Valcellina (see http://www.itinerariciclabili.it/index.php?id=138 ). Every time she starts to ride away the dogs go nuts & start barking, trying to keep up with her. I run as fast as I can so they can try to stay with her, but once she builds up a head of steam and pulls away, they continue pulling until I tire out and then we resume walking. My wife usually rides a half kilometer or so down the bike path, & then rides back to join us. The dogs are happy again once she comes into view. "Teddi's ears perk up when she sees Mommy from a distance." We repeat this process over and over throughout the ride.

My wife wishes to add "Mommy gives the babies orange juice water from her camelback into their little plastic cup. They think this is so fabulous.

Summer wildflowers were out, purple lupine, purple clover, & small white daisies or margarites. The grass was very tall & dense & rather boggy due to the last 2 or 3 weeks of rain. On Italian tv the weather people said this was the rainiest May since 1978. I don't know if this is true because I remember 1995 as raining every single day. We heard frogs croaking, I tried to see them but couldn't. There were ravens out in the farm dirt trying to eat something. The smell of acacia blossoms from the trees was everywhere, smelling fragrant & sweet. The bees go to the blossoms, eat the nectar & make delicious Italian honey."

The bike path is quite popular. Today there was also a large group having a picnic, followed by a pick-up soccer match by San Biaggio, a very old church in the middle of nowhere. I've read that our town used to be near this church, but to avoid foreign invaders, the town was moved over the hill to its present location.

We continued past the centrale, which is a disused hundred-year old hydropower plant. A couple of 3-meter diameter rusty, riveted aqueduct pipes cross above the path, which decades ago carried pressurized water from the dam high above at Lago di Barcis. Apparently none of the electricity was used in our little town- it was all sent to Venice.

After returning to Marsure, my wife and dogs hopped in the car to drive home, and I rode the bike the back way up the hill. It's only a 50 meter climb, and they've recently paved the backroad, so it's quite easy. We do this ride often on Sunday afternoons when it's not raining.

A little park that someone built by his vegetable garden, by the bike path

My wife riding away, (dogs going nuts not visible)

The map