The girls and their Carrera bikes

09:00 –  Italian bakers can’t stop themselves implanting every roll and croissant with a big dollop of jam, and a certain type of English cyclo-tourist can’t stop himself wedging slices of cheese and salami into this unfortunate mix. ‘Not today, dad,’ pleads Lilja. But by the time she does so, and I realise that today there’s no  need to take 49,000 calories onboard at breakfast, it’s too late – force of habit sees a locust-like devastation of the buffet.   

10:00 –  We roll out into the hottest morning yet in Lycra-free civvies, for a modest 30km circular tour of the Costa Smerelda. Modest? Look at us go. Last week suggesting a family ride of that duration would – and indeed did – have seen me called up before a kangaroo court on charges of gross inhumanity.

11:00 – This isn’t so much the final stage as the post-victory open-top bus tour, undertaken at very gentle speed and with a couple of team members nursing slight hangovers.  Porto Cervo marina is a definitive billionaire’s playground, the quayside lined with Abramovich-grade superyachts. Cycling past them on our dusty, trusty steeds is frankly hilarious. A party of sour-faced oligarchesses looks down at us with extravagant disdain from a rear deck. We decide it’s envy, as they’re clearly enjoying their holiday a lot less than us. Guiding Jonny’s support vehicle out of the crowded car park I manage to very slightly delay and thus enormously distress a medallion-chested old prune in a Mercedes convertible. ‘I’m so sorry,’ I say, just a little sarcastically. The seams of his face-lift strain to bursting point. ‘You are not sorry! You are stupid!’ I’ve never felt happier with my decision not to acquire immense wealth.  

Green, Active, Healthy family cycling holidays

12:15 – Round the coast to Baja Sardinia, a more approachable resort with a proper beach and even the odd price ticket on display in the boutique windows. The sea fulfils the promise of the Emerald Coast’s title – if there’s clearer, bluer water anywhere else in Europe, I’ve never seen it. Gelati and Cokes by the sand to see us through the undulating loop back to the hotel, through a neat scenic summary of our trans-Sardinian adventure. Shiny dark green shrubs in dry ochre, hills studded and crowned with Temple of Doom rock stacks, a gigantic blue sky. A sweaty family sing-song takes us up to the final brow, then it’s a whooping, legs-out descent for the very last of 233  kilometres.

A journey that sometimes seemed too long, but now, with the bikes laid down in the orange dust for the last time, seems much, much too short. A wild and magnificent island, and a wild and magnificent adventure.

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