The Long Table

The idea

Most cycling weeks move you to a different hotel every night and hand you to a restaurant at seven. You eat well and you sleep well, and you spend every evening being served by people you will not meet again.

This one does the opposite. Two homes, three nights and two, so you unpack twice in six days instead of six. The kitchen is not behind a service door — it is the middle of the room, and the group ends up in it whether you planned to or not.

The riding is not the part that gives way. Krvavec is the climb Pogačar grew up on, day two is the Maraton Alpe loop, and the ride to Brda is 150 kilometres across the country. You earn the table.

Three nights a chef cooks. Two you go out.

Three evenings, a Slovenian chef arrives at the house in the afternoon with whatever they bought that morning. They cook in the kitchen you have been sitting in since you got off the bike. Nobody takes an order and nobody hands you a menu — you find out what dinner is by watching it happen.

Each one cooks their own reading of this country. Under Krvavec it is alpine — buckwheat, cured meat, river trout, cheese off the mountain. In Brda it is already half Italian, and the wine comes from a hill you rode over that afternoon. One of the three happens over fire in the garden. The other two nights the group eats out, once at the family gostilna below Krvavec and once at a table in the vineyards.

• You get back, you shower, and the chef is already working.
• A beer or a glass of something local while the kitchen fills up.
• One table, everyone at it, no seating plan and no service.
• The wine comes from the valley you rode through, and someone at the table can tell you why.

Who it’s for

Riders comfortable with 90 to 150 kilometres and 1,200 to 2,000 metres in a day, six days running. This is the hardest week I run, and the 150 kilometres to Brda is the reason.

It suits a group that already knows each other — a club run, a set of old friends, a team. Eight people sharing a home for five nights should want to.

My part of the deal

You bring your bike and your legs. I take care of the route, the two homes, the chefs and all the small things that can otherwise make a cycling week complicated.

• Routes I have ridden in every season and in both directions.
• A day that runs without you thinking about it, and no two days that feel the same.
• The chefs found and briefed, the tables booked, and the shopping done before you arrive.
• Your bags and bike boxes moved between the two homes, and a full toolkit throughout.

How flexible the week is

• A shorter option on the two biggest days, and it is a real route rather than a short cut.
• There is no support vehicle, so the group rides together and regroups at the top.
• If the weather closes the Krvavec road, there is a valley alternative.
• The Piran day can be swapped for a shorter Brda loop up to the point we contract the homes.

Where you sleep

Three nights at Eko resort Krištof, under Krvavec — a sauna and a cedar steam barrel to come back to. Two nights in a house in the vineyards of Goriška Brda, with a pool to fall into when you get back. Two homes, five nights, and one long table in each.

Who you’re with

Eight riders, five nights, two homes. You are not meeting at a hotel restaurant at seven; you come back to the same kitchen every evening, and by the second night nobody is waiting to be told where to sit.