After a relentless wet winter in the UK, we escaped to Sarteano for a week-long immersion in the mythical sterrati. These unpaved white roads have captured the world’s imagination through races like L’Eroica and Strade Bianche, but their roots reach back far beyond modern cycling, dating back to the Iron Age. Beaten flat over centuries, these tracks once connected Etruscan hilltop settlements and then Renaissance strongholds, keeping local communities safely elevated above the malarial marshes of the valleys below.
The April Atmosphere
Cycling in April is a gamble that pays off. We enjoyed clear, warm days that were blissfully free of summer traffic, though we did have to hole up during one afternoon downpour. The reward for dodging the occasional rain cloud was having the enchanting medieval towns almost entirely to ourselves.
A Ride for Every Mood
The terrain around Sarteano offers a brilliant "choose your own adventure" style of riding:
- The Flat Sprint: A 60km loop around Lake Trasimeno. With less than 200m of ascent, it’s a fast, traffic-free blast on a well-developed gravel cycleway.
- The Ridge Grinders: Punchy "up-and-down" routes along the ridges. The intensity of these climbs rivaled some of the toughest mountain passes in the UK Lake District.
- The Big Peak: A legendary 20km, 900m haul up the slopes of Monte Amiata, an extinct volcano that dominates the horizon.
The Technical & The Beautiful
The gravel here is mostly well-compacted and maintained as local byways. Descending can be just as grueling as the climbing. You’ll find yourself navigating short, steep drops into sharp turns that keep your brakes (and your nerves) working hard. But you must lift your eye to the landscape too.
To the west lies the UNESCO-protected Val d'Orcia. It is a landscape shaped in the Renaissance to resemble an idealized painting: golden gravel roads lined with pencil-thin cypress trees leading to ancient villas. As you climb, the scenery shifts in tiers: vines on the lower slopes, olive groves in the middle, and broad-leafed woodlands above 2,000ft to shelter you from the ridgeline winds.
The Italian Reward
Of course, you are never truly "off the beaten track". Whether you are deep into a sterrato entering a hilltop hamlet or climbing up the cobbles of an ancient town, an espresso or a plate of fresh pasta is always within reach. There is no better feeling than refueling with Parmesan and pici under the shadow of a castle in Montepulciano or Sarteano after a long day in the saddle.
Woody
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