At Airolo station, a bronze relief by Ticino sculptor Vincenzo Vela commemorates the many who died while building the Gotthard Tunnel. Airolo, with its splendid mountain backdrop, is located in the valley of the young river Ticino after which the canton is named. Nowadays more than ever, the Leventina is a bustling transit corridor. Main roads, motorways, railways and tunnels built with much hard work are crammed into a very small area. Something is always being built somewhere. The goats grazing on the steep narrow slopes have long become used to this. With stoic calm, they savour the grasses and herbs of Valle Leventina.

Meanwhile, as you pedal, you'll enjoy making speedy progress on the excellently constructed main roads. As you cycle downhill, you soon reach Ambri – mainly famed for the HC Ambri-Piotta ice hockey club. In winter, shouts of "Forza Ambri" threaten to bring the Pista la Valascia ice stadium tumbling down, and nobody seems to care that the village will have to wait a few months before it sees the sun again. This is why sunseekers like to take one of the world's steepest funiculars to escape to sunnier climes. With a gradient of 87.8%, the Ritom funicular takes you from Piotta up to the stunning mountain lake of Ritom.

The waterfalls near Faido are beautiful. And the chestnut trees are magnificent, the Ticino stone houses are pretty, the sun warms your bones, the people are friendly – we're in Ticino at last! Giornico is a good example: from one of the two Romanesque stone bridges, there are superb views of the quaint, idyllic village with its handsome old stone houses, and of San Nicolao, Ticino's most important Romanesque church. We're heading to the south – and yet we're already surrounded by it! And as you ride on to Biasca, you'll also be surrounded – surrounded by vines, low stonewalls and granite and carbon factories. The famous "Santa Petronilla" waterfall at Biasca can already be seen from afar. If you ride on towards Bellinzona early on a fine morning, the sun casts amazing shadows on the ground because of the many mountains here that resemble sugar loaves. Then, at Claro, an enchanted little church sits atop one of the hills. The icing on the cake, so to speak. Cycle routes nos. 3 and 6 meet at Arbedo-Castione, where the Moesa flows into the Ticino. One last short spurt takes you to meet the "Bellinzonesi", the inhabitants of the UNESCO World Heritage city with its castles.