The grand depart

Day: 1
Route: Dascio - Rescaldina
Distance: 55 miles
Height: c.3000ft ascent (mapping software claims it was 5,500ft, but we don't believe it!)
Time in saddle: 5hrs 45mins
And so it begins. We set off with blue skies and spent ~3.5 hrs cycling along the west shore of Lake Como, in and out of tiny villages, and some larger towns where you could feel the wealth (the give away was even the trees in the street were manicured, never mind those in people's gardens):

A quick mid-morning granita stop quenched our thirst, before continuing down the lake:

To avoid tunnels (narrow, badly lit) we had to keep crossing on-coming traffic to get to small bypasses. On one such occasion Alistair had his left arm out firmly indicating we wanted to turn left when a group of oncoming motorbikers decided they wanted to high five him!

A while later we started to cross again when an Italian cyclist behind us called out to indicate we should climb a slope instead. We dutifully followed and then he spent the next 20 minutes being out tour guide, pointing out where we could get water from etc, until we rejoined the main road. We then waved a grateful goodbye to our new friend who sped off much faster than us by virtue of having no luggage, tyres half the thickness, a good half foot height (therefore leg) advantage, and by the looks of it having been born in Lycra.
10 minutes later however there he was on a road junction flagging us down. Turns out he really didn't want us to end up on the main road so he had stationed himself on a turnoff and waited. Brilliant. Despite our poor italian and his non existent English we also managed to fathom the road that we were now taking was where George Clooney lives (but no, there wasn't any sign of the wedding yet).
We stopped near the southern tip of the lake for a rather decedent lunch (with the requisite Como tourist tax) and the first of what we'll sure will be many espressos:

We were soon heading off up the day's big climb (although only a baby hill today). ~600ft later we started the downhill section through suburban Milan until we reached Rescaldina our overnight stop.

So far so good, weather, bikes, legs - all behaving.