If you would like to see details about our journey, check out our itinerary and our bike route.
The day began kind of early, with Ken and me loading up the bikes and pedaling north out of Ancona, and Meghan closing up the apartment and hopping a bus and a train and another bus--all three of us on our way to another beach day together, this one in Senigallia.
Ken and I found ourselves weaving through more than 10 miles of city and suburbs, on busy streets and highways, in and out of bike lanes and sidewalks and parks, up and down steep hills. We finally broke through to the highway along the shore, for our final 10 or so miles. The entire coastline is noted as a bikeway, so we expected mostly dedicated bike paths, but we found only a few short stretches off the main highway. For miles and miles and miles, all we saw were beaches and umbrellas and bars and restaurants and hotels. It is August and all of Europe has crowded onto Italy's beaches.
The ride went well, the road was flat, and we just pedaled along, dodging people and cars and bikes and wrestling with minor mechanical and technical issues. I was a little concerned about my front brake, which had never stopped rubbing and was getting worse. We had cleaned it and tried, with our limited skills, to straighten it, but that seemed not to be doing the trick.
Ken was fighting with his new Wahoo. He had upgraded to a newer model and was finding the setup a bit of a learning curve.
We put all that aside when we met Meghan at our hotel, changed into our suits, and walked out on the sandy beach. The beaches around Ancona were beautiful and smaller, but rocky and dropped off fairly quickly. Here, the sandy bottom stretched far into the surf, and you could play with the waves washing in and crashing along the shoreline.
We had lunch in our chairs, bathed in the warm water and then dried off in the sun a few times, drank lots of cold drinks, read books.
When the sun started to slip down in the sky and people began packing up and leaving, we followed them, went back to the hotel a couple of blocks away, showered, changed into nice clothes, and found our restaurant at the top of a nearby hotel with views up the coast to the setting sun and down the coast all the way to the harbor in Ancona.
We had the best meal of our stay, sharing plates of seafood and laughs and memories of this trip and previous trips. How lucky we are to be able to explore places like this together.
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| At least 20 miles of beach umbrellas stretch back from Senigallia to Ancona. |
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| This building with Art Deco features is a venue for music and other events. |
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| Dinner on the rooftop. Our last meal with Meghan before she returns to Colorado. |
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| "Where have all the people gone?" Photo by Meghan. |
