| The DEC office I work in is in the south of France, near the border
with Italy. I have done a lot of cycletouring in France, but not
Italy. France is very well covered by 1:200,000 maps, which are
cheap ($1.50 each), more detailed maps are available as well. Send
me mail if you would like to me to send you any maps.
The following is based on experience in France, but most of it applied
to Italy too.
The roads are good, and you don't need a mountain bike on them.
However there are a lot of long-distance paths that would be make
great journeys. You can cross the Alps on the paths for example (the
have frontier police on skis in winter). The south of France is
very hot in July and August, and the traffic is terrible. You can
avoid this by staying inland in the mountains, but the going will
be hard in the heat.
The west and south-west of France are less commercialised and cooler,
but a long way from Italy. But you have three months. The Pyrenees
are quiet, and quite uncommercial, especially on the Spanish side.
As regards what to bring, my personal choice has been to bring a
sleeping bag for flexibility, but plan to stay in small country
hotels, which are quite good value in both France and Italy. They
usually serve evening meals: in any case, even the smallest towns
have restaurants. Hotels are very welcome after 100km in the heat.
However, France is otherwise not cheap, but you can buy fruit etc
easily during the day.
Being female is unlikely to be a problem, as most approaches will
be only verbal. However, having things stolen is a certainty unless
you take precautions. You may not want to carry several pounds of
U-lock around for three months. You will have to keep your bike
in sight at all times in towns, or lock it up in a secure place.
This is not a big problem, as hoteliers and camping sites are used
to cyclists.
Learn as much French as you can before you come (Italians will
understand French better than English, in the country). This may
be superfluous advice to a Trudeau.
John
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