The Route

Approximatly 3 500 miles through 13 countries and over 2 mountain ranges, 1 of them twice. I aim to raise £3 500 for cancer research. Thats £1 for every mile I plan on covering. Please support me by following the link to my just giving web site.

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Goob Bye Portugal, Hello Spain

Ok people, sorry it has been so long but I have been doing lots of cycling through some pretty remote areas where they do not seem to know what the internet is. Any way last time I wrote I said that I was going to start the ride on Satureday, but as always plans change (I got impatiant and wanted to get on with it). I actually started on Friday and so far I have cycled 541.6km (336.5 miles) in 5 days of cycling. Or to put it another way I have cleared my, Keira´s, my Bro´s and Susie´s donations as well as 11.5 pounds of Chris Bayliss´s.

Below is the details of the week gone past.

Thursday: The evening started very respectable as you can see below, but once that beer touches your lips it tastes so good.

I ended up drinking loads more beer back at the hostel with some people there and we then went out and hit the town. We ended up in some dodgy nightclubs/bars on the water front. Needless to say I was very hung over for the next day.

Friday: I thought I would start the ride on Friday since I just wanted to go out and get on with it, this day was quite a challenge considering the previous night. So I went to Cabo Do Roca (most westerly point) and cycled back to Lisbon. The first bit is really nice and you get to see some really good beaches.
However as you get closer to Lisbon it becomes more of a nightmare. I have poor spacial awareness when I am hung over, so all those fast cars passing me on my left hand side freaked me out a little. Any way got back into Lisbon safely and decided to try and find a camp site on the other side of the river. Again these roads or any roads within 20km of Lisbon are not suitable for cycling. Trying to get to this camp site I ended cycling along a motorway. I was not enjoying this so I had to hop the barrier (quite difficult with a fully loaded touring bike) and try and find another road. To cut a long story short I found the camp site just as it was turning dark. So a good end to a stressful day.

Saturday: The map I have got for this area is pretty crap, it does not show half the roads on there. The map is designed for motorists. So it neglects the smaller less travelled roads which are the ones I like to cycle on. So for the first part of the day I had no Idea where I was. I just keep heading north east. In the end I found the road I was looking for and quite liked it to begin with. But it is dead straight for over 30km so it got a little soul destroying in the end. Could not find any where to stay so I had to opt for a wild camp. Thought I found a secluded spot out of the way so I picthed my tent. Went to light my stove when it was dark and it must of made me quite visable because lots of dogs started barking. I tried to turn it off but anyone who has used a MSR multifuel stove knows it takes a good minute or two to burn the fuel left in the pipe when you turn it off. All this time the dogs were still barking and I heard something in the bushes behind me. I thouht I was going to be attacked by a large savage hound that had ran over, but it must of been something else because when I stood up it russeled off deeper into the bushes. The barking stopped when the stove went out and I went to bed on an empty stomarch.

Sunday: I got up and packed my stuff before sunrise so I was not discovered and set off cycling at 7am

I new that I had a big day ahead of me. I was aiming for Portalegre over 120km away. This was the first days cycling I really enjoyed. Lots of nice countryside.Again I do not seem to be having muck luck with dogs. As I was going along the road (above) I passed a farmer with 2 of them. They then started barking and running after me. I suddenly had to push it because they were catching up. I must of been doing at least 28km/hr and they stayed on my tail (forgive the pun) for 500m or more before they gave up, I was knackered after the pursuit. Anyway got to my destination at 6pm after covering 120km to then find out that the camp site was at the top of the moutain. So I then had to go up the road which climbs 400m in about 3km, I´ll admit it, I was very tired so I pushed it most of the way. When I got to the top I found the site but it was closed. Not a happy chap, I could of almost cried. Looking at the map I just thought I would carry on till I found some where to wild camp again. Found this nice spot in some trees, but it was a bloody cold night it being on a mountain.

Monday: The good thing about where I camped the night before is that it was very close to the boarder. Again I had an early start as to avoid being discovered, on the bike by 6:45am. I crossed the boarder into Spain at 9am that morning. Very uneventfull, no customes, no boarder guards. All there was were some rusty old hinges which I assume were for the old gates.

This was quite a relaxed day as cycling goes, only 80km. I despiratly needed to find some where, where I could have a shower. This being Monday and the last time I had one was on Friday, 72 hours and 350km earier. Again no camp sites are open so I booked my self into a hostel. But Hostel over here is a word for cheap hotel. So for €22 I had a room to my self with a double bed and private bathroom. It was worth it just for the shower. The water going down the drain looked like it would not of been out of place as flood water of the Amazon (no picture of that)
Tuesday: Woke up nice and relaxed, fresh and clean and headed out to Plasencia, a very nice ride yesterday. It remined me of Dartmoor because it is very remote (actually it made Dartmoor look like a bustling city), but more importantly; some of it was a Granite landscape.

Boy did I have a big smile on my face due to that. About 20km short of my destination I started to get worried because the road I had intended to go along has been revamped into a major dual carriageway (boy do I love these up to date michelin maps). Not the nicest of ends to what had been a good days cycle up to that point. 20km of a busy road into a head wind and huge lorries flying by on my left buffeting me all over the shop. When I finially got into the town it appeared quite nice so I thought I will stay for two night to sort out washing and this web site. I went to the Tourism Office and asked for a youth hostel. The guy gave me an address of a place he recomends and a map so off I went. Very wierd place at first, could not work out what it was. I thought it was some sort of drop in centre. Truth be told that is not far off. I found out this morning that it a homeless shelter ran by the catholic church. So here I am not able to speak a work of spanish in this shelter, quite a wierd expirience. There was a large communial meal last night and breakfast this morning. I thought that this place is not for me so I left early this morning to book into a Hostel (cheap hotel to you and I). When I asked how much it was for the night (as in the place I had just stayed in), they said it was free of charge. I said I would really like to pay since I am able to or make a donation, but the bloke then said that it was a service ran by the church. He suggested if I wanted to do that I could leave a donation at the church, so that is what I am going to do.

Thats about all so far, I´ll keep you posted when I can. I think what I´ll do is to try and push on through the rest of Spain as quickly as possible. I do not know why but I have never really felt a vibe whith Spain. I want to get across the Pyrenees and relax in the south of France. I should imagine that the camp sites on the coast will be open when I get there. Any way people I wish you all well, sorry for any spelling mistakes but it has taken me the best part of 2 hours or more to get this post sorted. Everything is in spanish so it simply a hit and miss situation every time I click on a drop down menu, so I have no idea about a spell check.

Cheers