Anello della Donzella

Perfect tour for touring bikes or gravel that I made with my racing bike. Flat tour but scenically exciting, where you can breathe a salty atmosphere, where fresh water becomes salty. Land of fishermen and jobs, pedal with respect.

According to the plan, the elevation gain was 100. I have no idea what my Garmin is doing 🤷😜

The Sacca degli Scardovari is located in the Po Delta Regional Park (UNESCO heritage) and is a vast body of water that extends for kilometers inland in the municipality of Porto Tolle (province of Rovigo). The sacca has a surface area of about 3,200 hectares, with an average depth of about one and a half meters. In places where the vegetation of reeds and aquatic plants is thick, this large body of water becomes an ideal habitat for many species of birds, while the salinity of the water is variable because the waters of the Po di Gnocca and the Po delle Tolle continually meet the salty waters of the Adriatic Sea. The Sacca degli Scardovari is known for the cultivation of mussels, clams and pink oysters.

I thought better, poorly marked and you run too much on the road and very little on the cycle path.

Today we're supposed to go through the Po Delta. We're not sure how we're going to go about it, or where we'd find good birdwatching spots. First, we have to stop at the supermarket, which is at the very beginning of this very long, stretched-out village. So we drive along the Po de Gnocca until we reach Santa Giulia. The most remarkable thing there is probably the pontoon bridge with a roadway laid out over many small boats. The bridge at Boretto, next to the remains of which we spent the night, must have looked similar. A small bar invites you to stop for a coffee! It's bound to be busy here in the summer, but today it was comfortably sleepy. Then we continued to the tip of the island, from where the Adriatic Sea can be seen. In the Bay of Scadovari, you can see many fishing huts and mussel beds. The paths to the small oases inland are (still?) closed. Presumably, everything is waiting for the season. Although we're out at lunchtime, we see many birds. Flamingos, ibises, herons, plenty of seagulls, and various ducks. And countless others that we unfortunately don't know. We drive through the town of Scadovari, where there are many fishermen's cooperatives and a market hall. This must be a center of fishing and mussel production. But we can't find a restaurant in the town. Everything seems very deserted. Just outside of town, to the south, we come across a small house by the water that turns out to be an excellent restaurant for fish and seafood. We really enjoy the food! A long, white mussel is new to us, and we're served cold with pesto as an antipasto. And the dolci... impossible to resist! We especially like how, towards the end of lunchtime, all the house staff also sit down on the veranda and enjoy their meal together. Over a bridge that is officially considered impassable, we reach the island of Polesini Camerini, where we slowly sail back along the causeway. Suddenly, we see a colony of cormorant nests in the trees. We watch them for a while, as we do later at a body of water with plenty of dead wood. This oasis is a true bird paradise. Turtles also suddenly appear. A peaceful time to observe and marvel. We head back along the Po de Venezia, formerly known as the Po of Kilns. Brick production from the local clay used to be a major activity here. Today, many industrial ruins can be seen, as well as the ruins of former farmsteads and manor houses. Once again satisfied with a good day of travel, we return to our accommodation.