Finale Ligure is possibly as close as you can get to paradise for mountain bikers. Good weather almost year round, hundreds of mountain bike trails leading down to the sea, great coffee, icecream and lots of really good fresh Italian food.

Close to the town the trails are exposed, rocky and technical passing through herb plants, pretty flowers and traditional Italian Villages with a stunning backdrop of the Mediterranean Sea.

You can climb (or take the shuttle!) for 15km to the top of the mountain above the town to see views of the snow covered Alps on one side and Corsica on the other followed by amazing singletrack descents through beach forests, rocky mountain tracks, pine woods and open mountains all the way back down to the sea. We had to drag ourselves home every day and couldn’t wait to get up in the mornings to go again.

After 8 days straight of riding dragging my bouncy bike up 10,000m of climbing and down even more I am pretty destroyed but extremely happy! highly recommended…

Despite the reputation for sunshine we timed it wrong and had torrential rain nearly every day. The locals said they wouldn’t bother riding – it’s muddy, the rocks are really slippy and dangerous, it won’t be fun they advised. Of course we ignored them and found some amazing riding despite the mud and rivers running down the trails. They were right about the greasy rocks though, wet limestone would make road biking on sheet ice seem grippy! The trails are tough but incredible, long climbs followed by physical technical descents full of tight switchbacks, loose stones and rocky drops. Luckily I was on-board my new Specialized Stumpjumper Evo, the most fun bike you can ever imagine, it gets up the hills no bother and skips playfully back down taking anything you throw at it. Time to see what the fuss is about and try some enduro racing I think!

A monster 9 hour train ride later and I arrived back in Zurich to find spring has arrived, temperatures have gone up 10 degrees and the snow has melted – wahoooooo!

Incredibly rocky paths switchback through the olive groves eventually leading down to the sea and beautiful cove at Deia. The rock gardens are serious ones that would be at home on a downhill course, often steep and lasting several hundred meters, they are littered with huge unavoidable boulders and half meter high drop offs. The old men standing around picking olives and gossiping barely batted an eyelid as I went clattering past in a cloud of dust.

It was absolutely amazing riding but I was certainly glad of the full-suspension bike, you can ride so much more aggressively. Throwing the bike into the corners, launching off the drops and straight lining over the rock gardens. Awesome.

Roadies you are missing out!

The mountains rise up steeply from the shores of the lake and are covered in a network of hiking trails but its hard to tell what is actually rideable. There are often sections that are tough to walk so scrambling up with a bike is hard work but risks bring rewards and I found some amazing descents. The terrain higher up is very rocky and covered in Mediterranean type herb bushes whereas lower down there are lots of woodland singletracks ending in pretty villages with amazing coffee.





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Rifugio Menaggio ride – a long nasty road climb, a technical singletrack climb, a bit of hike-a-bike and then an amazing switchbacking rocky descent followed by flowing woodland singletrack all the way back down to the lake. Brill.




This was an amazing ride at B’tto di Nava, a real adventure expedition. A tough hour of climbing nearly went to waste because of terrible Italian signposting and when I found the path I spent a lot of time questioning if it was the right one because it was so crazy looking. Standing at the top on a narrow singletrack with a vertical drop off the edge, you can only see as far as the next switchbacks and then the trail several hundred meters below. The connection between the two involved and insane narrow track with 30 or 40 tight, loose, rocky switchbacks and a few steep drops and steps thrown in for good measure. Risks once again bringing rewards, like Italy!

We arrived to heavy clouds, cool temperatures and muddy trails – quite a novelty after a summer of dust but I felt perfectly at home. The first ride involved a long slog to get above the clouds surrounded by rugged, wild mountains. Unexpectedly we turned straight into a really fun man-made mountain bike trail full of jumps and berms to descent 100s of metres back down to St Moritz where it was time for a bit of boutique shopping.




The next day the weather cleared up just in time for an epic technical freeride day up to the Survetta Pass. This was the kind of ride where you could stop and take a photo every ten meters, filled with views of glaciers, turquoise lakes, empty valleys and high peaks. Steep climbing was rewarded with a technical traverse along the edge of a mountainside with a disconcerting drop of the edge and kilometers of perfect, fast narrow singletrack descents. Eventually we made it to the Survetta pass, a desolate empty valley with a beautiful glacial lake, and from there one of the best technical rocky descents I’ve ever ridden. More of the same the next day followed by a stunning train ride swooping down 1000s of meters back down to Zurich.












With this kind of thing on the doorstep it’s very difficult to justify going to work on a Monday morning…

The trails are insane, probably the biggest variety of terrain I’ve ever ridden. Everything from fast swooping dusty singletrack through the woods, narrow rocky trails traversing along steep mountain sides, a technical descent across a boulder filled moonscape at 2600m, to rooty trails through the forest. At the bottom of each one you’re left looking at stunning views, pumping with adrenaline and excitement thinking that was surely the best of the day and then 5 minutes later the terrain changes entirely and you have a new favorite.












and don’t listen to anyone that says you need a full-sus in the Alps – Ragley loved it!

A few weeks ago I had an early season freeride adventure risking the presence of snow remaining in the Alps. I remember passing the near vertical mountain above Wallenstadt on the train when I was Liechtenstein and wondering how on earth there could be houses up there, so after finding out there was also a mountain bike trail there it had to be investigated!

Walensee - the start

climbing up

first obstacle

steep cliffs

Alpine singletrack!

the top (ish!)

scheisse Schnee!

spring colours

Ragley you are one spoilt bike

Wallenstadt

Wallensee

The arrival of summer makes Zurich a much nicer place to be. There is suddenly life in the streets and people come crawling out of their houses for bbqs and summer parties. Switzerland is a country of extremes, when the sun is out it gets super hot so jumping in the lake or super fast flowing river through the city are essential for cooling off. When it’s not sunny it can drop 15°C in an hour and rain torrentially with sky exploding bursts of thunder and giant hail stones. It’s all quite exciting as long as you’re not out on a bike!

post ride river chilling

hailstones

evening road exploration