Via Francigena

Cycle-touring, Expeditions, Adventures, Major cycle routes NOT LeJoG (see other special board)
Post Reply
JOHNMOARES
Posts: 2
Joined: 27 Jul 2015, 11:32am

Via Francigena

Post by JOHNMOARES »

Do any members have any experience of cycling the Canterbury to Rome Pilgrim Route by touring bike. Any references to route plans, mountain profiles etc would be appreciated.
User avatar
Peter Molog
Posts: 95
Joined: 16 Oct 2013, 11:45am
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Via Francigena

Post by Peter Molog »

Partly. This spring I followed the route of a Dutch abbot, called Emo from the beginning of the 13th century. He went from the North of The Netherlands to Rome. From Pavia to Rome he followed the Via Francigena.
He wrote a very short travelogue of his trip to Rome and back. A dutch historian reconstructed his route and wrote a book about it.
Using this reconstruction I designed a cycle route.

I'm still working on all the results, but at the moment The following is available:

A GPS-file, containing the route with improvements I made (also with some comments for navigation);
Heightprofiles (based on the original design, but will hardly change).

The website I made can be found here (only in Dutch, but GoogleTranslate is your friend). The maps included in the site, are not up-to-date, but that's only for small parts.

Another source for the Italian part is this. An Italian site, which seems to be complete now. I used it this winter, but it was incomplete then.
Peter

Please, excuse my English. I'm Dutch.
thornie1543
Posts: 162
Joined: 12 Feb 2015, 6:30pm
Location: Port talbot.

Re: Via Francigena

Post by thornie1543 »

Have you tried cyclingeurope.org site? Click on eurovelo 5 and then index of posts or route planning,they both mention the route(if you haven't looked there already of course :D )
Galloper
Posts: 217
Joined: 6 Dec 2012, 2:21pm

Re: Via Francigena

Post by Galloper »

Anne Mustoe's excellent book, "A Bike Ride, 12,000 miles around the World" is worth a look, she follows various Roman roads from London to Rome and onwards. This might be of interest and doubtless there will be some correlation with pilgrim routes.
JOHNMOARES
Posts: 2
Joined: 27 Jul 2015, 11:32am

Re: Via Francigena

Post by JOHNMOARES »

many thanks for all the advise. I will follow up on your suggestions.
andymiller
Posts: 1716
Joined: 8 Dec 2007, 10:26am

Re: Via Francigena

Post by andymiller »

I know a bit about the Via Francigena in Italy (and almost nothing at all about the rest).

One thing I should say is that there are different flavours of the Via Francigena that differ in the degree to which they follow the classic Sigeric route (Sigeric the Serious was the Archbishop of Canterbury who left the first travelogue of the route). The eurovelo website claims that the eurovelo 5 is following in the steps of Sigeric - although in fact it really bears very little resemblance to the route taken by Sigeric. However, if that doesn't matter to you then it may be what you're looking for.

In Italy, the Via Francigena is really the cycling equivalent of the Camino di Santiago, in Toscana and Lazio it uses strade bianche (unsurfaced roads). These are perfectly rideable, but fatter tyres are going to be more comfortable. There's also quite a lot more climbing involved. In general I'd say that if you're looking for something like the Camino Santiago, and you're planning to travel light and stay in pilgrim hostels (you'll need a credenziale) then it would be a good experience, but if you're planning on camping and travelling with a full-loaded touring bike I'm not so sure. If you're looking for a convenient off-the-shelf route to Rome then this isn't really it.

There's a lot more information and links to other resources on my website:

http://italy-cycling-guide.info/cyclewa ... urovelo-5/
Post Reply