CALABRIA
... Go or not to go into Tunisia?
31st March - 3rd April | 2022
Waking up in the morning it was just raining and the weather forecast was not really motivating to make a move even out of bed. We checked the weather forecast for the next days and the availability of the hotel and decision done: we stay another night! We just watched movies via wifi, Steffi catching up on our blog, resting and hoping the weather is getting better.
We needed to find somewhere open for some lunch at lunchtime - not an easy task again. It took us 40mins within 2 villages to finally find an open beach bar that served some hot sandwich snacks!
During the afternoon we were looking into places to visit in Tunisia, but texting with Pave aka "Far and Further" ( see his Youtube videos about attempting to enter Tunisia ) the rules getting into Tunisia haven´t really improved; at least not for our way of travelling. Currently, you need a return ticket (surely as I do want to come back ;-)!), the covid paperwork and the most important piece of paper: hotel VOUCHER! Meaning you need a printed off receipt of a paid hotel (not an apartment or similar) for the duration of travel! Meaning in our case, paying a cheap hotel for us (a good deal ca €15/night) for 3 weeks just for the voucher, but maybe not even staying at the place, plus the real accommodation along the tour. This is totally out of our budget and not realistic for travelling around the country.
Also, James has to leave for Portugal end of May, which leads us to only 8 more weeks together, and we still want to finish Calabria, Sicily and Apulia to go over to see north of Albania, Montenegro and Croatia. So the decision was finally done: no Tunisia for the moment! Maybe on the way back home in November catching a ferry from Genova or Marseille, if Tunisia makes the entry easy again!
We were lucky to pack our bikes without any rain the next morning. As soon as we hit the road to go over the mountains to get to the east side of Calabria, it started to rain. Before we cross the mountains, we still wanted to visit the famous Christus Statue "Statua del Cristo Redentore" upon the hills of Maratea. Unfortunately due to road closure, we had to go over the mountains, it was raining ALL the time. However, going up to the Statue, the clouds opened up a bit, so we had for a brief moment a really nice view down to the coast and the surrounding area. 10mins later, it was raining again! All way through over the mountains! We had our lunch at a quiet petrol station, to be at least sheltered!
Many thanks to Ansalmo for the use of his video! :)
Just before you come out of the mountains, we got a glimpse of blue sky, but just to give us a fantastic view over the Gole de Raganello in Civita. Lovely old town; apparently built by the Albanians some centuries back.
We booked a small B&B at the coast of Villapiana Salo and how lucky were we! The room was big enough to put the clotheshorse in our room and the room had two heaters! Our room was immediately changed into a laundry room! During the evening Steffi finished the last blog to wire it over to our fantastic Anabela; what would we do without her internet skills?!? So that was then again 2 am switching off the light, zzzz...
The next morning we got on our bikes during BLUE sky! What a difference! Some of the mountains in the far distance had white hats - guess some of it was from last night though! To be on the safe side, we followed the coastal road until the Stongoli area. As we slowly start to learn, we searched around midday for a supermarket to get our lunch and dinner shopped - as most of the supermarkets remain closed from Saturday lunch until Monday am!
As the weather is looking good towards the near mountains, we decided to go a bit off the coastal road, as it started to get a bit boring. Also, we noticed in this area, that there is a lot of rubbish left behind in the big bin bags and not many big bin containers around. Such a difference to the North of the county; and a pity as the coastal line is very beautiful and remote around here!
We found a nice picnic spot and as soon as we were finished we headed back towards the coast as the rain started to come in again. Nearly at the coast, we decided to look a bit inland for a wild camping spot. After 1 hour of driving offroad through riverbeds (which reminds us of the Ramblas on TET Tabernas, Andalucia - read more here!) we found a small wind-sheltered spot. As soon as the tent was up, the dark clouds came in again, so we quickly added the gear shed! Just in time before it started to rain AGAIN!
It rained ALL night, but our MSR Elixir 2 tent and gear shed took it all :-) Let´s hope the weather will be dry in the morning, to pack it all away dry - please!
We know, that was not the most entertaining blog, but hey-ho, there are these days ... Follow us into the next adventure, getting into Sicily...
Places | Cities:
Maratea, Marmanno, Morano Calabro, Civita, Villapiana Salo, Círo, Santa Severina, Catanzaro Lido, Siderno, Galati
Driven km | Trip:
Total: 5965 km
Maintenance | Breakdown:
Speedo cable on Yamaha SuperTenere finally packed in.
Health issues:
Both suffering from a stuffy nose.
Special thanks to:
Anselmo and his YouTube channel ‘A Ruota Libera’ for the tip of visiting "Statua del Cristo Redentore".