Benjamin Evans - Author

‘An ornament of the earth ....the sublime of the beautiful.’ Sublime. ‘Impressing the mind with a sense of grandeur or power; inspiring awe, veneration’ Veneration. If I was to describe what this building is designed to make me feel it is this. Veneration To revere. To look up to. To feel inferior. To bow before its glory. I’m not sure I like it. I’m not sure that this makes me want to believe. The thing is, is that I believe in something. The world is not as simple as a block of atomic mass. There is more than this, a different form of energy out there and inside we yearn for it, just like we do for food and water and love, and only when we find it can we be truly happy – in heaven, nirvana, or whatever you want to call it. Yes, we have tried to replace it with reason, or money, or pleasure but these have not provided us with answer, rather leaving us empty and confused, rich in thought but poor in spirit. I am sure it is why s...

I really wasn’t happy there, not at any point. It was a tourist factory, packaged for the simplest of needs, with no sign of real life beyond. Yes, there is no doubt that what is there is some of the most incredible in Western Europe and yes, I would have been a poorer a person for not seeing them, however behind this all there is a toxic pernicious intent. Every where there is someone tying to sell you something. You are welcome only for your credit card. There is nothing else for you. There is nothing else here. I really tried to find it, but aside from a few moments in the empty park I could not see what it meant to be in Rome or be a Roman. It didn't seem to exist. It felt like being in Magulluf or Lanzarote – a package resort for those who want holidays to be trips into the unreal, rather than experiences of difference. Sure, it was a privilege to be among its treasures, don’t get me wrong, but soon I ached for the real and the now. Imagine visiting your girl...

So I do decide to leave Firenze and what happens? I get lost for two hours in Pistoia, my backpack breaks and a trail of bizarre objects drops behind me (sock, stopwatch, highlighter pen) and then finally my gear cable snaps and I am stuck. I knew it. I felt that something was going to go wrong today and it did. My luck ran out. Lucky Man I have long learned not get too concerned with good and bad or right or wrong. This is an adventure – these things happen. When I realise my bag had broken I went back, picked up the stuff that had fallen out (minus the stopwatch which is lost forever) and carried on riding. When I get lost in the town of Pistoia I asked an old man on a bike where to go, nodded as he gestured indecipherably then followed his finger pointing back to the main road. When my cable snapped twenty miles out of Lucca, I rode along in top gear as long as I could, then in the next town I found a bike shop. The two old village locals running the shop not...

Nice relaxing day today in very rural...where are we again? Genova I think. The Italian Riviera. Ride takes me through small pastoral villages – a shop, a man with a dog and a bell tower – set against the most ridiculously beautiful backdrops - floral mountains, gushing rivers crazy roads and hot afternoon sun. It was like cycling in a sophisticate's provincial fantasy. For me this is reality. This is my world. However, this being Italy there was also a two thousand foot climb and a descent into the sea. And this meant a return to some of the most ridiculous roads in the world. Roman Roads If there is one thing you cannot take away from the Italians it is that they build roads better than anyone. Fact. They have been doing it longer than anyone and now they have turned into an art form. Enormous columns of concrete balance entire motorways hundreds of feet in the air while they curve round mountain like godly serpents. Tunnels burrow through score upon score ...

Another day of perfect simplicity. Climbing, descending, pushing and coasting, trying to stay hydrated, trying not to pass out, keeping positive, staying positive, god its a long way, long way...long way...and here we are again, back in town looking for dinner. Its been just another day but another day where I've experienced a world beyond my dreams, more dynamic and fluid than I thought possible, and that has changed me forever. The road from the coast, through the Appennino Settentriole and into Bobbio was the most incredible I have ever ridden. I know I've talked a lot about roads and I thought I'd seen it all – the Stelvio Pass, the Cabrillo Highway, even the Lake Garda tunnel-fest – but this was something else entirely. The climb up to the picture postcard paradise was something I had become used to – villages, green hills, rustic cafés and bell towers, but then I reached a small crossroads by a café in Ferriere and had a choice to make. Take the route w...

The road to Milano is not the most interesting. No more mountains, beaches, rivers or descents. However my mind is full of new experience. What did the father of the family say last night? 'I hope your visit here helps you to make better decisions- so you can do the right things for you and for children and help them to have better lives.' It was a very beautiful thing to say and very Italian, more so when you understand how the country now sees itself in the world. Modern Italy does not pretend to be best. It accepts that there are many things that others - the Germans, the British, even the French - do better than them. They would prefer to stay indoors rather than work in the rain, a Sunday is for eating and drinking rather than exercise or preparing for the week ahead, and sometimes...sometimes people make better wine than them. However, that does not make them inferior. The land of the Romans, the Renaissance and the foundations of European civ...

So that's it – seven hundred miles and we're back. The more things change the more they stay the same. The real world beckons although in some way, compared to the rest of Italy, in Milano it is already here. Office blocks. Trams. Mobiles phones. Gucci. Rush, rush, rush. McDonald’s. Ralph Lauren. Status. Fashion. Success. I have learned so much but soon the city will take me over and I will feel as empty as when I arrived. Empty. Empty. Nothing It doesn’t happen. I sit in the garden by the San Siro and I understand. I understand that I have a 'real world' self and a 'cycling' self and that these are very different things. The former is not real at all but is very good at pretending to be - at work, at home, in the pub - so much so in fact that it has become arrogant and self-righteous. It is not me. It is my self projecting itself on the world. A few months ago it was all that I wanted to be. It had the success, it had th...