I present here a variation of the Ciclabile del Mincio [the bike route along the Mincio], in fact this was the first way that I had tried ( in red on the map on the right); it starts from the FS train station at Verona Porta Nuova.
Exit from the station, cross the piazzale and take the street on the left until you reach the railroad tracks; a narrow street parallels the tracks all the way to S. Massimo; here you pass under the tracks and continue towards Lugagnano and Sona; at the roundabout in the village of Sona, turn left for a short duration onto the busy road [SP 26] to pass under the tracks again and immediately after take the quiet road on the right; continue until you reach and take the overpass over the Autostrada and then continue to Oliosi and finally to Salionze.
At Salionze, at the bottom of a steep descent, you come upon a busy street; it is better just to cross this street and to continue for a few meters on the sidewalk to the left and then work your way down a series of steps, always heading to the left, which come down to an unpaved small road that takes us, in a few hundred meters, onto the Mincio towpath; here the towpath road is still open to motor traffic and on Sundays full of fishermen.
Take this road to the left and after a few hundred meters one is finally on the dedicated bike path; shortly after, it joins the bike path that comes down from Peschiera; this section of bike path is the most spectacular, and on Sundays the most busy with cyclists; the bike path passes below the (*)Scaligeri fortifications at Monzambano and the Scaligeri castle at Valeggio; shortly after one arrives at Borghetto sul Mincio, a village characterized by its many watermills and the ruins of the Visconti Bridge (no longer in use), and now a bustling tourist resort with many inns and restaurants.
After Borghetto the landscape becomes flatter and the bicycle traffic minor; continue down to Pozzolo where the bike path now continues along a canal off the Mincio, rather than the main river; this section was paved in 2006. The bike path continues along the irrigation canals of the Mantua countryside to end near Mantua. Towards the end, at the end of Strada Soave, you will come to a level road crossing [at Via Brescia]; but immediately before the crossing, take the bike path to the right and a little bit later, following the bike path signs, you will end up on a bike and pedestrian boardwalk that crosses Lago Superiore [Upper Lake] just north of Mantua; finally, take the underpass below the train tracks to the left and from there continue right on the bike lane to the train station in Mantua. [See Paolo's map to better understand this part of the route. RB]
Here there are trains to Milano, Verona, Modena, Monselice.
