I do rock climbing, mountain climbing, ice climbing, but this year I started another type of climbing: road climbing, that is, going up a mountain pass with a bicycle. And that's how I spent my summer ‘08 holidays: along the Sun Route.

The Sun route is cycling track maintained by the European Cyclists’ Federation that connects the two extremes of Europe: North Cape, the northernmost point, with Malta, the southernmost one. The overall length of this Route is 7409 km.

Our summer vacations this year were a 5 days riding trip in the North Italian part of the route, from Brenner Pass to Peschiera del Garda, for an overall length around 315 km.

We didn’t follow the main route which is all downhill, but we decided to spice it up a bit, so, instead of going along the Isarco river, we went for the city of Merano, thus climbing the highest pass of the whole Sun Route, Passo di Monte Giovo 2094m, with a steep climb that started from the center of Vipiteno (at an elevation of 950m): 1100m in 15km, in around 2h of climb (profile of the climb). My wife and me on the summit of the pass.

The followed four days of relax (long days but no more climbs): it was great fun, especially biking on bicycle lines surrounded by vineyards.

I brought my iPhone with me during the tour, and had the time to post some pictures on Flickr (my wife posted other pictures after the trip) and update my twitter status (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13).