"Riding in Tuscany" 2012 12 Day Fully Guided Tour  [1,629km - 1,012miles ] [ Riding through - France - Italy ]

Make your way to Hotel Agay, 9 km outside Saint-Raphaël.

We will organise options if you arrive by train to Saint-Raphaël station.

You will meet your guide and the rest of the group that night at the Tour Briefing.

We will pick up our rental motorcycles and start our ride to Italy.

We will follow the Ligurian Sea Coast, down to Portofino Peninsula ending in Sestri Levante.

We visit the Harley-Davidson® dealer in Sestri Levante before starting our ride on mountainous curvy roads across several passes - Colle Del Bracco, Passo Carpinelli, Passo del Radici.

We have lunch in Abetone, surrounded by beeches and spruce woods.

We will spend the night in Lucca, a nice little town famous for its intact Renaissance-era city walls.

We ride to Pisa to visit its Tower and then we enter Tuscany with its green landscapes, hills, cypress trees, castles and old stone houses.

After having lunch, we ride to San Gimignano, famous for its many towers.

A last stop at Piazzale Michelangelo and we arrive in Firenze where we will have a nice dinner in a typical Trattoria.

Our second day in Firenze which is the capital city of Tuscany.

It is also considered as the birthplace of the Renaissance and has been declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

You can visit the city, stopping off at its many attractions such as the piazza del duomo, palazzo vecchio and ponte vecchio. You could also have a walk along the Lungarno river.

We ride across the Chianti wine region, the biggest wine producing area in Tuscany.

After several stops at villages en route, we will arrive in Siena where we will visit the town's attractions including Piazza il Campo and Duomo Battistero.

Get ready for a great day's ride surrounded by green hills, cypress trees and wheat fields, providing a real mix of colours and smells!

We will cross the Crete Senesi and visit the Abbazia Monte Oliveto.

You will be able to buy products made by the Benedictines, such as honey, marmalades and natural medicines.

We ride to Pienza, the symbol of Renaissance Art in Italy.

We are now in the southernmost part of Tuscany!!

We visit Argentario and start our ride today along the coastal pine forest, crossing Follonica, opposite Elba Island.

We have lunch in Massa Maritima before entering the Region of Colline Metallifere (Metal Bearing Hills) named after its metal mines, which are important geothermic energy sources.

We finish the day in Monterigioni.

We leave the medieval walled town of Monteriggioni and travel to Volterra where we'll have lunch.

Then we ride up to Lucca and Camaiore which are surrounded by mountains and marble quarries.

After a visit to the marble quarry we will ride to Marina di Massa on the coast to enjoy the superb garden at our hotel.

Today we leave Marina di Massa, cross Varazze and have lunch in Pontiverra.

This is the Piedmont red wine region which we'll travel through to get to Alba, famous for producing hazelnuts.

It's also here that the chocolate paste, Nutella, is produced!

We end our road trip for today in Barolo, the town which has the same name as the red wine!

We cross the Col de Tende to the stunning Mercantour Regional Park.

We have lunch in Sospel and ride on the very pleasant mountain roads to Nice.

We then have our last dinner on the French Riviera..