Faenza, Italy

We rode through wineries and country side above Forli towards the east coast of the adriatic sea. Good recovery ride. 41 miles of completely flat land.. Very hot and humid... Hard to ride.
Once we arrived at Cervia, we parked the van in a big free parking lot and head towards the "lungomare", the boardwalk with all the beaches... But we must stop at a restaurant to eat Cervia's specialty: the fresh fish of the day, fried and served in a "cartoccio" (paper box) to go. But I made a deal with the restaurant manager and we seat at the table and they served two huge bowls of this fresh fried fish with plenty water... We just paid Euro 7 each...

Afterwards we headed to one of the private beach, got an umbrella with 2 chairs for Euro 12 for all of us... and ran into the water.. Water was very warm. Not very clear, as I know, not as clear as the Tirrenio or the south part of the Adriatic... But it felt good and refreshing after that ride under that incredible heat.

Everybody was very concern of riding in the heat today.
We had early breakfast and started by 8:00 a.m.
Got to Brisighella at 9:30. Got first cappuccino and Giacomo got a sample of icecream from Bar Carletto.
Morning started well, not too hot yet... a little breeze..
So everybody decided to go ahead and ride the additional 25 km loop (part of the last year Giro stage). I really wanted them to ride this loop since the views are awesome!!
Everybody rode it fine, ad enjoyed it very much ! We used the spectacular downhills as recovery and suffer just a little bit on the 2-3 km steep hills from Brisighella, Zattaglia back to Brisighella.

We had lunch in downtown Brisighella and had an amazing "buonissima" piadina with the local cheese: Squaccherone", arugula, tomatoes and prosciutto... The piadina bread was incredible soft. We could reaally say that we are in Romagna... Then everybody got gelato at Bar Carletto.

Nice and easy pace on the way back. Got back at the agriturism at 2:15 p.m.
Molto caldo... everybody jumped into the pool!!!

In Bertinoro, after we enjoyed the view from the terrazza in the old medieval Plaza, we stopped by at the 2nd cafe' (coming down from the narrow street). The lady was so nice!! Even if we did not order, she brought a focaccina cut in 7 small pieces as starters. Her piadina rolls with arugula, prosciutto and cheese were favolosi! Then at the end she offered a small samples of pastry. She told us the story of Bertinoro, town of the hospitality. In the Medieval era, the cavalieri were welcome there since they were bringing goods and news. They used to tie their horses at big iron rings nailed inside the main tall tower... and then they were hosted by the family who owned that ring... They keep this tradition in a "local festival" every year, that takes place the first Sunday of September