Milan to Cagliari

Imagine it’s 1926, the year America built its legendary Highway 1 overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The road is stunning and there’s hardly anyone there.

Now take a pair of scissors and cut out a 100 mile long strip just south of Carmel-by-the-Sea. Keep the angry blue-green waves of frothy white surf breaking against the soaring rocky cliffs, but replace the redwoods with evergreen shrubs, cactus and occasional palm and wild olive trees.

There. You’ve just travelled in time. It’s exactly one hundred years later and you’re in Sardinia, the second largest island in the Mediterranean. You’re riding on the island’s north-western coast, highways SP105/SP49, somewhere between Porto Torres and Bosa.

It’s breathtaking. And there’s still hardly anyone here.

But let’s rewind to 24hr earlier.

Out of Milan and into the Mist

We took off from Milan around 10:30am on January 31. Our first destination: the ferry terminal in Genoa.

To pick the route, I used google maps to identify our no-autostrada-no-toll options then fed the resulting screen grab to AI with instructions to filter for winter rideability and scenery. The verdict: the east path through the higher mountains would be the most beautiful by far with snow quite likely. The western route would run through fields and flood plains in the beginning then climb up a low mountain pass before dropping down into Genoa. The city is surrounded by Ligurian Apennines so there’s no way to avoid mountains altogether.

This being a week before the start of the Winter Olympics in Milan/Cortina, we decided not to take any chances and picked the route with the least risk of snow. Choosing local roads would give us time to both explore and get used to the bikes in a more relaxed setting. We had only ridden them for an hour at that point and any unknown mechanical issues would be much easier to troubleshoot without cars flying by at 130km. Total estimated time: about 4hrs.

Once in the saddle, we found both Milan and its surroundings to be flat as far as the eye could see. The city traffic itself came with a decent dose of adrenaline – we’re in Italy after all – but the fields beyond quickly grew mundane. About the only interesting aspect of this part of the trip were the many single lane levy roads encircling some of the low lying villages. The quarter lane we allotted ourselves suited us fine, but the cars traveling in opposing directions were forced to take turns pulling to the side of the road.

The ride didn’t turn eventful until about 3 hours later as as we started making our way up to the mountain pass on SP160. Now in the region of Piemonte, the climb wasn’t obvious at all at first, the weather simply turned increasingly misty and the visibility began to decline in tandem. Then the narrow road began weaving up the hill and we found ourselves driving 20km below the speed limit. It wasn’t raining. It wasn’t even drizzling. Just the dense mist beading on our visors forcing us to use our left hands as wipers every 300m.

About 4hrs into the ride we started seeing small patches of snow along the side of the road. I looked at the temperature gauge. It had dropped from 8C down to 2C. The road had been wet for quite some time already but it now turned slippery. A few minutes earlier I gave up on hand wiping and simply left my visor open. Min soldiered on in hers. What’s ahead? I thought.

With our rate of progress slowing down considerably, a couple cars caught up with us in the turns and we decided to pull over to let them pass. The first car sped on, but the second stopped and the driver rolled down the passenger window. He seemed a little annoyed and started explaining something to us eagerly in Italian. I responded by saying that I didn’t speak Italian, but did it a little too well so he asked if I was Spanish. Polish, I said. He smiled, reconsidered and tried again. This time a bit slower, repeating the key words. I finally understood. He said that we were 4km from the peak and that the weather would change as soon as we went over the crest. There would be sun on the other side, he said. Message finally conveyed, we both smiled and he took off leaving me to relate the good news to Min.

Sure enough, 4km later we reached the peak, crossed from Piemonte to Liguria and the sun came out. Shy and surreal at first, then more and more bold before talking over the sky some 15km north of Genoa.

Genoa and the Ferry

Once over the ridge and with more sun hitting our jackets with every passing minute, the temperature grew warmer quickly. By the time we’d left behind the last of the picturesque little villages on the way down and reached Genoa it had climbed all the way up to 12C/54F.

Arriving in Genoa around 4pm with focaccia on our mind we had plenty of time till our ferry’s departure at 8:30pm. Unfortunately, the terminal entry proved to be a spaghetti of overpasses, detours and ramps.

On first attempt, we arrived within 600m of the imbarcazione (ferry loading area) but with no clear signs for how to proceed to Tirrenia lines. The building was clearly a ferry terminal, but the main entrance had a large Shopping Center sign above it. I approached a lady in uniform guarding what I later learned was the passenger entrance and asked. She was quite helpful and typed in the exact address of the ferry loading area into my phone. I was elated until I got back to Min who was waiting with the bikes and looked down at the map. 4km to get to a place two or three blocks away. Google maps glitch, I thought. It had to be the first ramp we’ll see along the terminal. So we got on the bikes and went on a 20km sunset ride along the shores of Genova. Correct, unintended. The ramp turned out to be an onramp for SS1, a spectacular highway above the sea shore with docks, restaurants, ships and terminals to the south and a sunblasted cityscape rising into the hills to the north. Wish we could have paused along the way to take photos.

After loosing good 45 min on the first attempt, we proceeded with a second. New strategy: let google lead us around in circles. There was so much construction and detours, let’s see if AI does any better than common sense. It did. 27 turns and a couple loops later we ended up exactly where we needed to be. Right in front of 11 early bird cars waiting to get on the ferry.

About 3 years ago, we drove down the Baja peninsula and took a car ferry from La Paz to Mazatlan, Mexico. With that experience as reference, we expected the loading procedure to be a bit messy. It wasn’t at all. Once at the correct entrance – there were at least 4 other ferries leaving that evening – we went through (3) checkpoints. We showed our passports and electronic tickets at each. At the last one they printed out our boarding tickets and the cabin voucher. They also gave us entry stickers for the motorcycles. As the final step, another attendant directed us to park our bikes davanti alle macchine, in front of the cars.

Never mind foccacia, this called for a beer.

Genoa took us by surprise. A year earlier we drove from Nice to Imperia only 100km southwest from here and came away underwhelmed. This time we wished we had planned an extra day or two to explore the city. Alas, our vehicles were now stuck in a line up and walking around overpasses in enduro boots wasn’t particularly appealing.

The actual loading took place at 6:30pm, two hours prior to sailing. They let us drive ahead of the cars and directed us to the top dock. Here, the motorcycles undergo a special treatment. Unlike cars, which park in lines one behind another, bikes line up against the outside walls with the side stand facing the wall itself. Each rider is expected to grab the dedicated thick red rope hanging from the wall and tie the bike down so as to prevent it from falling on its side as the boat rocks from side to side as it sails. We used our Mosko cinch straps in addition to the ropes as a precaution. Ours turned out to be the only bikes on the boat. January.

I asked one of the attendants on the parking deck about luggage safety. He said they secured the doors the minute the boat was ready sail, but could not give us a 100% guarantee that our luggage would be there the next morning. We took that as a cue to drag all our gear up to the cabin.

Sailing. 2 AM

The ferry left on time. When creaking closet doors woke me up around 2am we where just beginning to sail west of Corsica, about half way on a 11-12 hr journey.

Porto Torres to Bosa

We sailed into Porto Torres a few minutes after 8am and our bikes were on Sardinian soil about half an our later. The town was nearly deserted on Sunday morning so we grabbed a coffee and a cornetto each and were soon on our way.

Our first destination was Bosa, about 1.5hrs south along the western coast of the island. I read somewhere that it was one of the most beautiful places in Sardinia. Figured it’d do 🙂

Other attractions awaited along the way. The first of these was the small city of Alghero. We ended up driving through with only a few photo stops, but it certainly seemed like a place worth a weekend trip. Possibly a two week vacation in the warmer months.

We were truly unprepared for what we found after Alghero. In a good way. As I wrote in the intro, the ride along this part of the coast had us smiling from ear to ear. It felt like gaining access to a private national park. Big regret I didn’t have the Insta360 rolling. Also a big motivation for NOT making this mistake in the future. And no, the three photos we snapped here do not do the region justice.

When we finally rolled into Bosa, it was already noon. All the stops along the way took an extra hour. In retrospect, they should have taken at least five. If we get the chance to go back we’ll just ride back and forth between Bosa and Alghero for a couple days 🙂

Bosa itself turned out to be a small, but charming town. A perfect pit stop for another cappuccino, a small snack and the first fresh tank of gas since Milan.

The coffee tasted twice as good with Toto Cutugno’s L’Italiano blasting out of a speaker sitting in front of the cafe entrance.

A Quick Dash to Cagliari

As we continued our trek south from Bosa, we were immediately rewarded with a view of the entire bay.

And a few minutes later Min took one of the most iconic photos of the adventure.

It now being 1pm and with the route leading us away from the Mediterranean, we decided to hit the gas to make sure we reached Cagliari at a decent time of day. We’re planning on using the city as our base for remote work and exploration all of February so it was an easy compromise. Places within a couple hours’ ride can be easily explored on shorter trips and in much more detail.

We reached our destination on Via Sant’Efusio in the Stampace Quarter of Cagliari about 4pm, some 30 hours after leaving Milan.

It seemed like we’ve covered a lot more ground than just two gas tanks each. Either way, time to put the horses in their stalls for the night.