On Thursday 24^th September 2009 myself (dave) and three of my windsor biker mates are going to do a sponsored ride to Italy. We will leave Windsor at 3am to catch our early ferry from Dover to Calais.Once in France we will head east above Paris then turn south heading for LyonWhich will be our overnight stop. This part of the journey will be approximately 600 miles and will take about 12 hours. This includes stopping for fuel every 120 miles, our bikes are sports bikes and only have small fuel tanks.                                                      Friday morning we will leave Lyon and head east into the Alps. After sampling some of the best roads in Europe we continue east into Italy and onto bologna, another 400 miles covered. We will stay in Bologna for 3 nights.    
After a good rest on Saturday morning we have been invited to visit the prestigious Ducati (Italian motorcycle) museum. After which we will take it easy in Bologna.
Sunday morning we will head 25 miles east again to Imola where we will watch the world superbike race. After finding hopefully the best spaghetti Bolognese ever  an earlyish night awaits ready for the journey home. 
If time allows we hope to pay homage to the infamous stelvio pass in the Italian alps, rated one of the best driving roads in the world you can see why below. The route home will be the same 1000 miles split over two days.
The charity we are raising money for is The Thames Valley and Chiltern Air Ambulance Trust. The air ambulance is based at R.A.F Benson in Oxfordshire and serves Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire. They are funded solely by your generous donations. It costs £1.7 million every year to keep the guys in the air saving OUR lives, each mission costs on average around £1,600.

 Please donate as much as you can reasonably afford. The air ambulance could one day save your life. If you are a uk taxpayer your donation will be gift aided. Giving the thames valley and chiltern air ambulance trust. An extra 25% on top of your donation. Many thanks