This was expected to be a good vacation, if you can call 850km of gravel riding up and down 16,000 metres worth of hills a vacation… however I’m on top of a hill near Ljubljana in the pissing rain and careless mud, precisely the very same hill I was at the top of what seems like bloody hours earlier, due to the fact that it most likely was. I’m just about 10km into that 850km and it’s all gone to shit, rapidly.
I’ve been offered the Seven Serpents gravel occasion by my partner Claire, who went to the location a while back and proclaims that it’s a beautiful location to ride a bike. Pictures do appear to support that claim, plus it’s a location of Europe I’ve never ever checked out prior to and I’m constantly eager to colour in brand-new little bits of the map.
The Seven Serpents is an unsupported bikepacking obstacle with a set path that begins in the Slovenian capital of Ljubljana and snakes its method down through Croatia, throughout the top of the Adriatic by means of ferryboats and the islands of Krk and Cres prior to ending up in the port city of Trieste in Italy. It has a sibling occasion called the Mini Bite that’s run the week formerly over a much shorter, more unwinded 500km range for those that desire a good warm-up to the season, or those less experienced in bikepacking. This year it was kept in ideal conditions, with riders pedalling up bright off roadway hills and through dirty deserted towns.
It looked like Claire was right, it was going to be beautiful… till the weather report believed various, and an enormous bruise-coloured mass of rain was going to sweep throughout Europe in the nick of time for our Severn Serpents journey. And so we discover ourselves on the start line in the rain, with a long day of rain ahead of us and plastic bags in between our socks and shoes. If I desired this sort of thing I might have remained home in the UK.
We’ve not even summited the very first hill when my rear tire feels a little squishy. It’s the prefect damp and gritty conditions for something sharp to weasel its method into a tire, so appears sensible. I inform Claire to continue while I pump the tire up, hoping the hole seals and I’ll capture her up.
I’m riding the Seven Serpents together with Claire, and while we have actually both done great deals of multi-day occasions individually and loads of bikepacking journeys together, we’ve never ever gone into an ultra occasion as an authentic set.
Riding in a set brings with it the advantages of safety, the shared experience and shared snacks, cheering along the other individual when they’re having a bad day in the understanding that it might be you the next day, preparing where possible and a thousand other bonding experiences. The drawbacks are that you need to share any bad luck also, and while often they’re unanticipated and effect both riders, working as a set can relieve the escape and after that as soon as a while, the fault lays directly on someone. This is where we are, due to the fact that this is totally my issue and it isn’t simply my issue.
There doesn’t appear to be any apparent hole or damage, so I whack some air in and trigger down the hill. I’m ideal off the back of the pack now so haven’t got other riders to follow, and my Garmin is making all sorts of sounds as I switchback down the hill, which it typically carries out in trees presuming I’m off course. When I get to the bottom and into the clear, I discover that I am quite off course. Bugger.
I grind back up the hill and head down a course I missed out on at first, and this feels much more incorrect than my very first descent as the GPS is doing hardcore Belgian techno beeps, and I wind up in the very same location I was a brief while earlier. Fus’sake.
My tire is flat once again so I put much more air in, hoping it requires sealant all the method to the edges so I can really make development. I zoom and scroll out on my Garmin and attempt to get myself back on track, barrelling along a primary roadway into a residential area where I need to put some more air into the sickly tire, and after that once again a number of kilometres later on, and after that once again when I lastly confess defeat and put an antiquated (however really able to hold air) tube in.
Lord understands where I am, apart from in a bus stop. I cross recommendation my Garmin and where Claire is on her triggered phone area beacon and she’s a long method away. I might head directly down the roadway to the little town of Ig and obstruct her there, however that would indicate I’ve cut off a big area of the path and would efficiently disqualify myself from the flight within the very first couple of hours of the first day, indicating our Seven Serpents effort wouldn’t count. I deal with to be the hero and punch Garmin buttons to get me back on the path.
Along the roadway, turn right, up a space in between your homes, into the woods once again and up the hill once again. I’m following a line on the screen when all of it begins to look terribly familiar, and I’m heading down the track we showed up very first thing today. Swear, turn round, swear, pass by where I initially stopped to tend to the soft tire, swear and murmured swear once again as my Garmin chooses to lastly identify the small right-hand man turn it missed out on, swear and start to follow the spaghetti mess of tire tracks from everybody else that passed by doing this.
I let Claire understand I’m lastly on track and will do my finest to capture up, and if she discovers someplace to conceal and get a coffee then to let me understand.
It feels extremely odd to be alone in the wake of every other rider on the Seven Serpents, and I attempt my finest to preserve a calm head. Panicking in these circumstances just has the practice of making things even worse, so I gradually and determinedly pedal on.
Conditions are dreadful, it’s still drizzling and the ground is muddy, slippery, rooty, rocky and tough bloody work, particularly when attempting to manoeuvre a greatly packed bike with tread averse gravel tires on. I am really glad that I reside in the UK and have actually ridden and raced in comparable no control wandering sideways crap a lot of times, and this feels completely regular. Even the continuous rain isn’t excessive of an issue as it’s warm rain and not near freezing. It’s almost a vacation…
I sign in on Claire and she’s still too far for convenience, so I make my method up and over another off-road hill when my Garmin passes away. Swear. Probably due to water ingress and tension absorption. That’s it. I let Claire understand about this additional spiralling down of my day, however thankfully she’s discovered a coffee shop to shelter in Borovnica, someplace she keeps in mind from her previous journey to Slovenia, and she’ll await me there.
The method things are unfolding it’s going to take me permanently if I follow the Seven Serpents path, so I detour round the huge hill in the method and time trial it round on the roadway, browsing by my phone. It feels desperate, however as I portion along the valley it strikes midday, and a chorus of churches chime the time which is a short minute of good.
Approaching the town a wave of relief cleans over me, to be followed by a tsunami of feeling as I roll up to the coffee shop and see Claire’s bike exterior. I’m attempting not to weep at the silly absurdity of all of it. She offers me a hug and orders me coffee and food, I request more food. I feel completely retched that I’ve destroyed our possibilities of formally finishing the Seven Serpents path, and it’s only simply lunch break on the very first day. Day 4, depending on a ditch in the rain with a hurty knee is a more standard time to scratch from a race. I. Am. An. Idiot.
I’ll put my hands up and admit that in the weeks preceding the Seven Serpents, my head actually wasn’t concentrated on the occasion due to the fact that of Too Many Things To Do, and I wasn’t paying much attention. You might state I was too blasé, due to the fact that it was a race that wasn’t actually someplace good. I’ve done this sort of thing previously, I understand what to do, it will be great. I’d done a general run through of the path to take down locations for food and possible accommodation and camping sites, however it’s safe to state I’m extremely underprepared compared to normal. The bike and the tire had actually been great the previous weekend on a puddly, gritty, rough gravel trip round the thrills of north east London, however today with the included weight of bags on was simply excessive. I ought to have inspected the tire that wasn’t sitting rather ideal on the rim, I ought to have changed the rim tape that was old and a bit scrappy, I ought to have simply put a set of brand-new tires on. Shoulda, woulda, coulda.
There’s no simple escape from this circumstance anyhow. We still need to leave here and make our method towards the surface in Trieste, so I end up all the food, get my willpower and we faster way it to our already booked accommodation in Postojna. This includes an 18% tarmac climb right away out of town that goes on for a long time, and it’s still drizzling.
At some point in the afternoon without us discovering, the sky stops falling. By the time we get to town and dry chain squeak our method approximately the camping site, it’s almost bright and there’s the surprise of Adam already awaiting us. Claire had actually encouraged biking friend Adam that the Seven Serpents occasion would be a terrific method to spend his valuable family-free vacation riding bikes, and presently he’s not so sure. Thanks to our early morning shenanigans he was well ahead of us, however likewise chose that 200km of riding through rain and slop wasn’t for him, so he let the train take the stress for a big part of the range to reach the location we had actually booked overnight. He even has time for a complete Chinese meal prior to our arrival.
The weather report for the next couple of days doesn’t use much in the method of break or motivation and Adam is already considering his alternatives – however we advise him of the ultra racing guideline of never ever scratching during the night, and wait to choose in the early morning.
It would be warranted if I loaded it in rather as we get up to discover my tire has actually totally passed away, with a big gash near the bead and a took off inner tube. Fuggit.
Claire fixes the tire as finest she can by stitching it together with floss and we push a tire boot in there for good procedure, however it actually isn’t approximately a number of hundred more kilometres of gravel. We head into town for the google-promise of a bike shop, which is shut. There’s an Intersport simply down the roadway, which is a long shot and just provides some inner tubes. I purchase them for backup, plus a handful of energy bars that would work for later on in the day.
Claire recommends popping back up to the very first shop, and as if by magic they’re open and have a big stock of tires. Mostly in the incorrect size, however after a great deal of riffling and determining I purchase a 27.5 semi-slick MTB tire which appears like it’ll squeeze into the frame, then toss the tire of much problems in the bin.
All of this mucking about has actually provided Adam a lot of time to harp on his circumstance, and the weather condition here vs that at home has actually comprised his mind – he’s returning to Ljubljana for a quickly organized flight home, where it’s bright and his partner will put him to work making a garden gate.
Claire does some sort of wizardry with her phone and GPS and creates a path to get us to Fuzine, where we ought to have been by the end of this 2nd day if things had actually gone to strategy. After a stiff climb out of town, where the routing does its normal technique of going the lovely method round, we’ve got an entire afternoon of gravel. And what gravel it is, from ideal fast-rolling, hardpacked doubletrack to tongue-out, saddle–up-bum rocky climbs up that see us pass silently through 100km of empty forest. We see nobody apart from 2 riders doing the long path, when our course unexpectedly ends up being imprinted with other tire tracks.
While the quiet nothingness is definitely terrific, there is the drawback that there’s no place to stockpile on food and water for the whole 100km. We weren’t starving sufficient to attempt the dead horse that hunters had actually excluded for whatever consumes horses in these parts…
It’s huge nation here, and there isn’t a Starbucks or 24hr fuel station at the bottom of every hill. We ultimately roll into the ski station at Platak wishing for an open coffee shop and a minimum of a water tap, however the entire location is quite out of season shut.
Claire identifies a vending maker on the edge of a parking lot that might be our saviour, however it’s being irritatingly picky. It doesn’t wish to provide us our very first options of a Snickers bar or a bag of peanuts, however enjoys to give a number of bottles of orange Fanta and a bag of Bruschette Chips. Even then it argues by hanging them in the dead air above the shipment flap. It’s not book flight refuelling, however it gets us throughout the last bit to Fuzine where we’ve booked an Airbnb for the night in anticipation of bad weather condition.
What follows is a display screen of compassion that just appears to occur on such journeys, and is what a big quantity of their appeal is for me. The owner of the Airbnb is an old man called Boris, and his dog Igor. We had actually made associate with Igor prior to we satisfied his owner, as we scuffled him in the street whilst inspecting to see if we had the ideal house.
Boris right away lights the fire in the log burner for us, and insists we attempt among the 3 flavours of his homemade schnapps that he’s left in the kitchen area. Then while we’re holed up the next early morning awaiting the weather condition to clear, he returns with 2 additional bottles as presents to take with us. We attempt to explain with our no Croatian and his no English by means of shared German (ours a mainly forgotten 30-year-old C grade O level) that we can’t take it with us, and turn to leaving a thank you note by means of Google Translate.
The weather condition is, as anticipated, godawful. It’s hammering down outside, rain gutters are gushing and it’s a fair bit blowy. We’re suggested to cross to the island of Krk, however they’ve shut the bridge to all traffic. This is an issue for the more severe Seven Serpents riders who are all gathered in a transportation coffee shop, however less of a problem for us due to the fact that we’re remaining in a comfortable room with a limitless supply of coffee pods. And some schnapps.
There’s an entire early morning of inspecting all the weather condition apps prior to we choose that there’s enough of a window to make a break for it, and we march into – let’s state – a little less bad conditions. This doesn’t last, and as quickly as we struck the long descent towards the bridge we’re struck by the full blast of wind and sideways stinging rain.
I’ve done some silly things on a bike in my time, and this is up there in the leading 10 of frightening. The roadways are rivers and the wind is having fantastic laughs pressing a greatly packed bikepacking bike throughout the roadway, as frame bags and big seat packs make efficient sails. We’re eliminated to be securely down at the bridge we need to cross, however there’s no chance we’re blending it with the cars and trucks and trucks hammering throughout. We require to pressing our bikes along the tightrope of a pathway that’s separated from the traffic by a insufficient barrier, and from a 60 metre drop to the Adriatic on the other side by a worryingly low fence.
Even pressing our bikes throughout is a battle, continuously covering the brakes in case a gust threatens to whip it from our grasp – or in Claire’s case, raising the back of her heavy bike clear off the ground at one point. This is a circumstance where it’s finest to keep a calm head, and the only escape is through. We totter off the bridge and ride a couple of kilometres to a shopping center coffee shop, where we can get random pork and cheese-filled snacks and reset ourselves.
From here on in we’re going to be following the Small Bite path all the method to Trieste, and while it’s not always simple, it’s much easier than the complete Seven Serpents as it bypasses the needless climbs up and hike-a-bike areas. The weather condition has actually likewise comforted a lot also so we don’t need to use all our clothing, and our bags are greatly stuffed complete with the additional thicker layers we the good news is don’t require anymore.
A big part of the draw of doing these occasions is that whatever path you do, they take you to parts of the world that you’d never ever generally go to. And, due to the fact that they’re pre-planned, they take all the uncertainty out of landing in a foreign nation and questioning where to go, and ideally the organiser’s GPX will take you to some unique locations. This does indicate that you need to flex to the analysis of what the organiser thinks about a great time on a bike, and there may be times when your viewpoints vary.
Usually you wind up on roadways that nobody’s ever become aware of that are much better than any of the popular ones individuals have. This is among my preferred things, and the very first little the singletrack roadway to Beli on the island of Cres satisfies this requirements. It’s a definitely incredible swoosh off the primary roadway, swinging right and after that a sharp left with a view throughout to Krk. Then there’s Beli itself, a small warren of a town – although town is too huge a word as it has a heaving population of 35. It’s someplace I’d never ever have actually experienced if it wasn’t for experiences such as this. Then there were the vultures…
There are long roadway climbs, however the tarmac is ideal and cars and trucks are irregular, so it’s not totally a task. There are some long gravel climbs up. The 18km one continuing the already chunking roadway climb out of Lovran back on the mainland was especially screening in the heat, and appeared to take all afternoon – however cresting the hill to the view over the Adriatic and the ferryboat we’d been on earlier in the day deserved the effort and a take a seat to chew on the emergency situation bag of cashews/M&Ms mix.
Our Mini Bite path crosses courses with the correct Severn Serpents enough that we run into other riders at ferryboat ports, and inside dining establishments where they point at our food and state “That”. It’s constantly a likelihood for everybody to ignore any challenges, unwind for a couple of minutes and swap tales. The sweat and dust-caked rider we pass who is exhaustedly zig-zagging up a little increase, and who doesn’t have the strength or disposition to return my motivating welcoming, is the exception. Poor chap.
Thanks to a range of social networks channels we can keep tabs on riders and buddies who are working their method round the complete path with differing degrees of enjoyable and success. One unfortunately needed to take out due to the fact that of Achilles discomfort, that ultra racer’s preferred, particularly when there’s great deals of pressing a heavy bike included.
The surface in the big open Piazza Unità d’Italia in Trieste brings with it a particular quantity of culture shock in needing to unexpectedly blend it with swarms of scooters and individuals after a week of primarily peaceful and privacy – however quickly a huddle of finishers gather together, and supply a safe space for us to lounge around and exchange anecdotes and bring ice creams.
Everyone is understanding to our story as mechanicals can occur to anybody at any time, however I feel an empty imposter and amateur silly, and likewise feel deeply sorry for Claire that we didn’t get a possibility to even try the complete path.
Could we have finished it? Maybe. Would we have had a hissy fit on among the hike-a-bike areas? Probably. Would we have said sod this and turned to the Quick Bite path eventually anyhow? Who understands. But we still had a fun time on our truncated path, had a little battle up a few of the climbs up, whooped on the descents, saw beautiful things, chuckled and shared memories, and the extra time we had at completion suggested we might hop up to the Soča valley for a number of days and have a vacation by error.
Seven Serpents
