Vado a Andare Trovare Italia Solo

For those of you who don't speak Italian, I'm heading to Italy alone next month. For those who do speak Italian, apologies for the inevitable grammar mistake(s) in my blog title.

Before I get to the trip details, I wanted to give an endorsement to the Pimsleur language series that I'm using to learn Italian. It's a three level audio series with 30 daily 30 minute lessons in each level. After only five weeks (I just stared level II), the progress I've made is incredible. Pimsleur certainly doesn't have the marketing muscle or cache of Rosetta Stone but I can't imagine Rosetta Stone being better. However, Pimsleur is actually a bit more expensive (unless you live near a library that has it for free like I do).

On to the trip. I've decide to tour Italy by bike alone next month (June 4th-23rd). I've already purchased the plane ticket so I committed at this point. The original route I was contemplating largely resembled the first Italy tour I did two years ago. However, after doing some research on the individual rides I decided some of the rides were too difficult/remote to do alone. If something were to happen to my bike while climbing a remote mountain pass I could be seriously screwed. Thus I'm going to stay out of the mountains and spend most of my time in the relatively flat Emilia Romagna region.

I'll post details on the route once I have it finalized.