Certain things take 9 months to come to fruition and our little baby has finally arrived, following that amount of planning and training! Not US Route 20, not London to Rome return but a full tour of Italy. By some [covid-free] miracle we all managed to meet at Milan Airport. John and I came from Provence in the South of France where I had enjoyed a few days with friends and John had enjoyed teeming rain and a massive hailstorm! The saving grace, for him, was our final dinner at the fabulous Mas des Anges with great friends (and I had my favorite courses there - foie gras followed by filet mignon brochette with a gorgonzola and garlic dip….and a little Cotes du Rhone as the month of September will involve Italian wines only!). The two Richards and Paul flew in from London with more luggage than I could ever have imagined possible, when all you really need is a couple of spandex outfits and a bike! As you can see above, we had absolutely no space to spare and John had to avoid fast corners to prevent Richard S from being crushed by an avalanche of bags. Lovely AirBnb with a wraparound balcony and a roof terrace, which proved to be the perfect location to build our bikes with the stunning backdrop of Lake Como (spoilt in these pictures only by the 4/5 guys in the foreground!). The Richards and Paul are off making sure they put their wheels on correctly, leaving John and myself to attack the rose aperitif….and John doesn’t drink rose, so I guess I am the lucky one! Little fish dinner tonight I think, then off to Biella in the morning via a 66-mile ride (106km) and 3,700ft (1,120m) of climb. And so the “relocated-by-5600-miles” Ride Route 20 is underway…..