From Comacchio to Boccasette
17 June 2023
After an evening based on spritz, followed by local marinated fish and grilled eel (you’re in Comacchio, what else would you eat?), the morning departure is a bit slower than it should be, but no harm done — there’s really no rush.
The start
From Comacchio I head towards Porto Garibaldi, where I dive into a Carrefour to stock up on food, also needed to compensate for the meager breakfast offered by the B&B where I spent the night. Once supplies are sorted I set off again and I bang through all the beach resorts of the Ferrara coast, not without an unavoidable dose of boredom. But I push on. And things change when I reach the area of Lido di Volano.
The first stretch follows the sea meter by meter, and the route is really beautiful. After a few hundred meters, you arrive in a beautiful pine forest, where you can pedal calmly on a wide, comfortable gravel road. And there I come across a fallow deer busy having breakfast.
I tried to get closer but the poor deer made a break for it! Oh well, I set off again.
I’m pedaling at very low intensity, and this will be the leitmotif of all 90 km I’ll do today. I want to enjoy every meter, without rushing, without anxiety about racing to arrive what, an hour earlier? And why? So I pedal slowly, and I stop continuously, knowing that I’d have made my friend Mik happy, who would have killed me by the thirteenth stop to look at the brick of the roadman’s house or the cormorant doing things. But neither Mik nor the other Roman cycling friends are here with me, so there.
Back to the videogame
End of the pine forest stretch at Lido di Volano, and here come the jumps into the past. After all, yesterday I understood I was here for this. The first one is very funny: I find again the MTB route bounded by gates, a surreal adventure from the first trip. This time, though, everything is different.
For one thing I have Jungle and not Autan, because you can fool me once, not twice. But then I’m really more relaxed, and I pedal it through in a carefree way, including the sandy patches that predictably bog me down, but never mind.
The encounter with myself
I finish the videogame of the Mesola Wood, and I find myself there, where 4 years ago I reached the sea after many km of effort, above all of the mind, as I discover now. The encounter with my self of 4 years ago isn’t easy, but my heart takes care of saying what needs to be said. It’s an important moment, of big and unexpected awarenesses, which I celebrate by continuing to pedal calmly, letting happen what has to happen.
I meet the Po, and this too is an important passage. And here, right here, an enormous opening cracks open onto pieces of my distant past that find meaning only now. No, I’m not going to tell you here — too personal — but oh, what a hit, to understand only now why I’m so strongly drawn to these places, to these canals, to these “bilancioni” (the big square fishing nets typical of this area).
A different pace
I keep pedaling, and despite the new awarenesses, I’m surprised by the serenity with which I proceed, at a slow but steady pace. Quite a different story from 4 years ago, where anxiety and rush dominated everything. I stop often, I happily chat with everyone, and it’s a pleasure to share stories. Among other things, in Goro I happen to explain to a little girl why I mix sparkling and still water in my water bottles (we Romans are spoiled and we like our water “not too sparkling” 😄).
For the rest of the trip there really isn’t much to tell. I pedal meter after meter, around me the landscape never changes, I match my pace with the slowness of the Po branches flowing by, which I cross several times, often on splendid pontoon bridges.
Several km later I arrive at my destination, I push as far as the beach of Boccasette where I treat myself to a couple of spritz at 4 euros (they even tell me it’s “at the upper limit” compared to the local bars), and then I go off to dinner at the excellent Oasi di Val Pisana, where I linger to chat with the owner Katia.
Tomorrow we set off for Venice.