Making the most of every day.

People always tell you, make the most of every day, especially on vacation. Well, I'm here to tell you that's not always possible.
When you go on vacation for three weeks and stay in apartments, some days are destined to be quite a bit less magical, more routine, more like.... real life! Some days you're tired and need to sleep in, some days it rains, some days you have to do your laundry, some days you need to go the grocery store, some days you need to take a nap, and everyday there are dishes to wash and garbage to take out. It's not all prancing around the countryside and rambling around ancient city streets. That's just how it goes. Today was one of those days and I think it was quite in keeping with the vibe here on a Sunday afternoon in Parma.
I slept-in today until about 10. Yesterday was a long day. I realized that once I started to pedal- but more on that later. I went to the grocery store, then gradually got myself together to get out for a ride. About 20km into the ride, the sunny skies of Parma turned very dark. Over the hills that I planned to ride into, big black clouds acted as a dramatic backdrop with the sun already shining from the northwest of the sky. Then it started to rain. Not heavily, but just enough that I started thinking about bailing on the ride and hopping on the train back to Parma. Luckily I had not yet reached the hills so I was able to get under cover and to the train station. Of course, here in Parma the sun is still shining. So, today was a bust.
That's ok though. My legs were really feeling dead and I was planning on taking a shorter route today. I'll try again tomorrow. I have to do my laundry anyway and I'll be cooking dinner from the apartment tonight so I'll do that and have a nice quiet night. Parma is really dead on Sunday so I feel like I'm right along with everyone. Every shop is closed, I think even the supermarkets close early, and there are so few people out on the streets you can ride your bike down the middle of the main roads and no one in a car comes along for several minutes. It's actually kind of strange.
The one thing I realized is that I might want to take the train out towards where I was today then ride from there. This way I can get in better quality riding, rather than wasting 50km of a 100km ride on flat, crowded roads completely devoid of anything resembling scenery. Of course due to the failure of the Garmin Connect app, I can't make any new routes and load them to the Garmin with my iPad so I'll have to plan ahead, take screen shots on my phone and use my memory to freestyle around Emilia-Romagna. We'll see. I'm thinking my days this week might be spent in Firenze, Cinque Terre and maybe Milano, shopping and site-seeing because riding around here is really boring. It's like riding in the plains or something. Not many back roads and lots of industrial agriculture and manufacturing too. Maybe in a big peloton riding these flat roads would be fast and awesome, but alone, they're just dreadful. I miss the mountains, that's for sure.
PS: I've decided tomorrow I'm just going to ride all the way to the sea. It's 130km, or 80 miles with 6000ft of climbing. Long gradual climbs on wide provincial roads. For the first time since being in Parma, I'm really looking forward to this ride. It will take me through Emilia-Romagna, Toscana, and Liguria, over the Apennine Mountains. It's gonna be tough but I'm hoping for a big plate of trofie al pesto when I get there! Then the train back.