We are cycling again! The second half of our Tour started in Nova Gorica from the EPIC center, near the Europa Square, on the border of Slovenia and Italy. It is beautiful cycling weather, thick twenty degrees, blue sky. Yesterday it was raining at this time. We hang the tickets in the trees and Stojan, Sasa and Katja are the first to arrive. About forty people gather while I give some interviews to the local radio of both Slovenia and Italy, arranged by the GO2025 organization. Very nice. After a brief explanation to the co-cyclists about our project, we cycle to Europaplein, two hundred meters away in front of the train station where our exhibition will be on display until July twenty. There we all ride a few laps so Richard can take drone shots, because this “south pole” of our circle must of course be in our film. Together we cycle to Nova Gorica City Hall where Deputy Mayor Marko Tribuson is waiting for us. We give a birthday tree with a Forest Book and with applause we thank Nova Gorica for their hospitality and hope they will continue to join our Circle4Change activities in the coming years. We bike back to the border where the Italian police, who have checked us regularly in recent weeks, now let us through smiling. We ride to Gorizia’s town hall, just beyond the main square, where the mayor warmly hugs me; we met at the Uniscape-landscape festival two weeks ago. He gets another birthday tree and tells me that Gorizia is the greenest city in Italy in proportion to the number of residents, and that may well be true. At this spot in front of the stately town hall, we say goodbye to most of the co-cyclists. Whoever wants to take a birthday tree, and with Marco and three enthusiastic cyclists we really start the second half of our Tour. Via Sagrado to Villesse, twenty-five kilometers from here, where we are expected between one and three. But the route goes differently than expected. Richard had laid out a nice wooded route but the co-cyclists knew a better route. Well fine they didn’t. Lots of cars and sun instead of trees and shade. We quickly regained control. In Sagrado we have a coffee and there we also see Maurizio again, the filming journalist from the regional RAI, he is filming the tree bike on the way to Villesse and wants some drone footage of Richard for tonight’s broadcast. He is waiting for us at Villesse town hall with Arianna, who I have been in touch with. We lay out the large map in the shaded area where the children will soon come for the workshop. The mayor and deputy mayor, both women, walk in and chat. They have already started planting a forest, small, but the beginning is there. The children make a beautiful drawing for us together, everyone gets a birthday tree and they wave us off happily when we leave around four o’clock. With Daan I am now cycling through a kind of Holland, flat with lots of straight roads. What a great contrast to the hilly landscape on the north-eastern side of Nova Gorica-Gorizia. Richard follows by car to keep an eye on the route. And the tree bike is doing super well today, even on the overpasses I don’t have to downshift to “snail mode. When we stop in a town down the road to check the route, the window opens asking what is this strange tree doing here? It turns out to be the town hall of Ruda and of course we get the address. It is around five o’clock when we go shopping in Cervignano del Friuli to cook tonight. And there it turns out that it is still about thirty kilometers to our accommodation in Porcenia. We decide to do that stretch today so we don’t have to bike tomorrow and we have the tree bike with us to take good care of. With this warm weather that requires even more attention. So early in the evening it is great cycling, even though some of the roads are actually not suitable for the tree bike, weird though. While changing a battery we suddenly find ourselves at ‘Lo Stallo’ a nice fruit and vegetable stall. It turns out the man has planted his own forest. These are good initiatives. We continue cycling and at 7:30 we reach Porcenia. Sixty-four kilometers on the counter. Not bad for this first day. The open trailer full of small birthday trees and our red bus welcome us as we enter the yard. Eating a pasta, we conclude that it was a great first day and also very nice that we have time tomorrow to put everything in even better order. We also like moving the bus and trailer forward. This way we keep learning. If all goes well we will be in Venice in three days.