Stage 4 - From Campiglia to Lajatico
25 May 2026 - 60.1 km / 1160 m ascent
There’s a very nice phrase cyclists say: “I am the engine,” because we are the ones who, by pedaling, move the bike. Today I thought about extending it: “I am the engine / The smile is my engine.”
The start
The first cool pedal strokes of today brought us into a beautiful wood right outside Campiglia dei Foci. We’re still in the Siena province, and a change of scenery from the (also splendid) white gravel roads is welcome. For some reason this wood reminds me of the beloved Nemi wood, in my home area around Rome. It’s cool, and that’s a good thing because during the day we’ll be facing hell.
Along the route we find a sign with information about Campo Piro e More, a private bivouac where you can freely pitch your tent and find refreshment, dedicated mostly to travelers on the Via Francigena, all on a donation basis. The phrase on the sign resonates with me a lot.
Towards San Gimignano
After leaving the wood we go back to pedaling on the splendid white gravel roads typical of this area. It’s already starting to get hot, but we climb calmly and with rhythm. Today too I really feel good — my friends point out that I’m at a completely different pace compared to the first days, above all with less anxiety and more confidence. I’m happy to have found it, and I am very happy to have been helped to find it. After a long uphill route on the gravel, through places where for years I had dreamed of going with my bike, we land in San Gimignano, which I had never seen and which strikes me the way it strikes anyone.
How beautiful it is! Everything in this part of Tuscany is wonderful, and it’s easy to understand why it’s such a popular destination, especially for foreigners.
After a coffee and a bit of rest, we set off pedaling again: ever hotter and ever more climbs.
Gambassi Terme
After a long, endless climb we reach the village of Gambassi Terme, where we knew we had to buy something for lunch because in the kilometers that followed we would find only heat and dust. We stop at a small grocery shop where the owner, Massimo, particularly enjoys chatting. My two travel companions hurry through quickly; I give him some line, and it’s a pleasant conversation. He tells me about his walking journeys from Florence to Auschwitz and from Rome to Jerusalem, he talks about the shop, which by now he runs alone after the passing of his parents. We talk about Tuscan provinces — he tells me Gambassi passed to Florence in the Middle Ages, but was the theater of long political negotiations. He also tells me that the nice part of his work is talking with people. “Once I’ve sold them the bread, if there’s no chat it ends there.”
I leave the shop smiling, and Vincenzo catches with a photo all that sunshine I’ve been carrying inside in these last days.
A climb to the finish
We eat a bit (without overdoing it because the road is long and uphill) and we set off again. But it’s really very hot. And we climb. We climb for kilometers and kilometers, without respite. We make several stops, we compare notes with the other travel companions, Germans, French, English, Czechs… today I had paused to talk with a Dutchman who is doing the Trail with a thirty-year-old bike that with bags and tent weighs 20 kg! It’s really pleasant to share with so many different people an experience this exhausting yet also this luminous. After lots of climbing and lots of effort, which today too I managed beyond my rosiest expectations, we reach the agriturismo with an incredible view over all the Siena and Pisa valleys. But for a whole series of reasons, I close today’s story with the photo of two horses who, today, were looking — one next to the other — for refuge from the heat.
The smile is my engine.