We leave Loiano following the Mater Dei route, along a first nice stretch of open dirt road between fields that will quickly take us to the parish church of Scanello. From here, on the provincial road, we reach Quinzano and take a left, also overlapping with the Fantini road.

We enter the Monte Bibele area along a nice dirt path with beautiful views of the valley (beware of some sandy stretches where you might “plant” your wheels) until we reach the service center of the archaeological park. From here, if we wanted, we could make a detour to reach the archaeological area, the last stretch of which we will have to do on foot anyway.

From the service center we reach the valley floor of the Zena River, which we take by turning right and which will take us gently and slightly downhill, all the way to Zena. Here we take a left and begin to climb, until we cross the small Gorgognano Street, which we take by turning right.

Shortly after, a detour on the left (on a track) takes us to the Whale of the Zena Valley, an artifact made by students of the Academy of Fine Arts of Bologna, depicting a very ancient 9-meter whale, the remains of which were found in these places.

We take via Gorgognano again, which becomes a dirt road and continues with several ups and downs to keep to the ridge. At the point where the asphalt resumes and the road begins to descend, we turn right and (10 meters) left to keep instead on the ridge trail where we travel a couple of very fun and technical kilometers, between wide views and erosive ridges. The final section descends steeply down a challenging slope (with dry ground pay attention to ruts in the path) that brings us back to the valley floor. Here, as we take a right staying on the Fantini route, we say a final goodbye to the Mater Dei route that heads into the Savena valley and Bologna. Less than a kilometer from the turn and here we are in Botteghino di Zocca, a locality with facilities suitable for stopping and refreshment.

After the “roller coaster” of the last dirt stretch, it will be pleasant to descend a few kilometers on the asphalt of the valley floor, until we reach the visitor center of the Gessi and Calanchi dell’Abbadessa park, which is based in the Fantini’s house.

Another six hundred meters and we resume having fun with the MTB, taking a small asphalt road on the left that shortly after becomes a path and will let us reach the nearby ridge (with a few dozen meters to be done by hand bike to overcome a couple of tears with a very rutted bottom). Reaching the ridge we turn right and then left onto via Madonna dei Boschi. After 400 meters we take a path to the left that, zigzagging between chalk outcrops, leads us first to the Filo quarry (an ancient chalk quarry), and then to the oratory of Madonna dei Boschi to finally come out at the entrance to the Croara chalk park.

Here there are a few options to close the itinerary:

• With a quick 1.5km descent you can reach Rastignano station and return to Bologna by train+bike;
• In Rastignano you can take Via Mater Dei and return to Bologna by bike;
• Further on, following our route, at the height of the “Luigi Donini” prehistory museum you can easily reach the nearby San Lazzaro station and from there, Train+bike, reach both Bologna and Ozzano.

To complete our route, after crossing the Croara Park, rich in interesting geological emergencies, such as the Buca delle Candele, the “Palestrina” quarry or the Spipola cave, we will reach the village of Ponticella and, following the paths along Savena, according to the MTB route of the Fantini routes, we will arrive at the “Luigi Donini” prehistory museum

After the museum (if we do not want to reach the San Lazzaro station as indicated above), thanks to the network of bike paths that connects San Lazzaro to Ozzano, we easily return to Ozzano and to the starting point of the route, closing the loop of the Bolognese Valleys Ciclovia.

General warning: Many of the unpaved sections of this cyclovia are on clay soil, that becomes an extremely sticky and agglomerating mud in case of rain