Day 10: Trieste to Maniago

123 km: 800 meters up and 430 down

This is the start of another four day section, and this was the easiest of the four days.

Instead of having to take notes from a whiteboard like previous trips, this trip we get them passed out in their already printed version. Some riders pour over them, highlighting certain bits, others – like me – shove them in their pocket to be taken out if needed if there is confusion about which way to go.

We started at 8am with a convoy, which was meant to be for 4 km but after 1.5 km most of the convoy was out of sight due to having to stop at the lights. As Gergo doesn’t flag or give notes for the convoy to ensure riders don’t go off on the their own, it was just by good luck and guessing that we managed to stay on the right track.

The first 18 km was along along the coast, then we turned inward and took the last view of the Adriatic Sea (the top of the Mediterranean). The next time we see the sea we will be in the Netherlands.

We went through a town called Palmanova, which is an excellent example of a star fort from the Renaissance. This was built by the Venetians in 1593. The whole town is walled, and there are only entrances/exits through the walls.

An aerial view of Palmonova (picture source)

This is also where the Trans Europa ride we did in 2012 intersects with this ride, the Oydessy. In 2012, we came through here on the way to Venice.

Walled town of Palmanova, inside the south gate

Cathedral in Palmanova square

North-west gate out of Palmanova, onwards to Amsterdam

There was a big market in the square with lots of stalls selling food, clothes, cooking ware, and lots of fresh flowers.

Market square inside Palmanova

Through the palace gate to the Villa Manin

Where we stopped for lunch there was a man trimming his hedge who was chatting away to all the riders, and telling to make sure that they stopped in the next town Mortegliano to see the biggest bell tower in Europe.

 

The locals reckon this is the tallest bell tower in Europe, Mortegliano.

One of the TDA staff Ozgur had made homemade lemonade for lunch, which was very thirst quenching. It’s made from lemonade, honey, water and soda water.

 

In the afternoon the breeze from most of morning was replaced by beating sun, it was 35 degrees C and felt hotter.

There were lots of very long straights, broken up with interesting small towns. All the town were deserted and the shops were shut as it was siesta time.

Beautiful riding today through the agricultural flat lands north of Venice.

Whilst going around a roundabout I was bit/stung by bug (through my riding top!). I wasn’t sure what it was, but took an antihistamine just in case it was a bee or a wasp. Luckily I did, as later that night when I had a look I had a big welt.

The last twenty km of the day seemed to go on and on, a bit of an uphill gradient, and into a bit of head wind.

Although we were riding towards the Dolomites, because of the heat haze we did not get a view of them until about 8 km before the end of the ride, where they slowly started to appear through the haze.

Approaching Maniago and the end of the flatlands. Next 3 days climbing up to Passo del Brennero and entering Austria 🇦🇹

We got to the hotel at 5pm and found out dinner would not be until 8pm. To start off with I could not find my bag anywhere. I looked through the bags twice, and was starting to get really worried. I then went through the bags again, bag by bag. I had never noticed until now that my red bag is actually half black. The bottom half is black and it was upside down. Relieved, I went off to the room to get cleaned up.

The hotel room had a nice big bath so I had a relaxing soak and then I intended to have a quick nap, but ended up sleeping for two hours. I was more tired than I would have expected, as not much climbing, but we had had 9 hours in the sun and although there was not much climbing there was no real downhill, so we were constantly peddling all day.

Dinner was tomato pasta, grilled pork and potato, vanilla ice cream, washed down with sparkling water.  I had dinner with Brett, Miriam, Tom and Cathy.

Introducing

Tom and Miriam, retired they live in New York, and have 3 sons and one grandson. No pets. This is their 4th TDA tour. Miriam was a lawyer and then taught law, and Tom was an engineer.

Cathy is from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She lives with her partner Peggy (who doesn’t like bike touring, so is not on the trip). They have no children and have a German short haired pointer. Cathy has done 2 previous TDA rides and is an ED doctor.

Tom and Miriam on the left, Cathy on the right

Tomorrow is going to be a big day, 130 km and 2600 meters climbing and I am feeling a bit daunted. We are going to be climbing through the Dolomites.

The Dolomites are the mountain range located in north-eastern Italy, and form part of the Southern Limestone alps. The Dolomites are also known by the name The Pale Mountains, they take this name from the carbonate rock dolomite. The rock was named for the 18th century French mineralogist Deodat Gratel de Dolomieu (1750 to 1801) who was the first to describe the mineral.

The Dolomites are renown for skiing, mountain climbing, cycling, and BASE jumping.

The first week in July is the Maratona dles Dolomites, where in a single day, road bikers climb all 7 mountain passes.

Day 49/164: Lambayeque to Pacasmayo – 118km

800 meters up, 950 down.

It was nice to wake up and not have to pack up a tent etc. I am looking forward to getting into two rest days. I have not ridden 7 days in a row before and my legs are certainly feeling it.

Every morning before leaving my tent (or room) I spray myself with bug spray. Today it helped for the bits I had sprayed, but I was bitten through my bike shorts and top! Just when I was almost free of bites. Due to this I had a very short breakfast and was on my bike by 6:15am.

I rode in a group of 5 for the first 35 kilometres. It was useful for getting through the crazy traffic. Where cars would not stop for one rider, they did for five. We still had to be constantly watching – a few times a tuk tuk got in the middle of the group. The police escort from yesterday may have had some uses today!

On the road today (Photo from Jo Platt’s Facebook)

On the road today (Photo from Jo Platt’s Facebook)

The city is the dirtiest I have ever seen, rubbish bags, deal animals etc. The trucks and buses would fail a WOF in New Zealand due to fumes. The drivers are aggressive with cyclists and each other. The horns are constantly blaring. Some of the rubbish at the side of the road has been lit, so there is also the fumes of burning plastic and other waste. Overall not pleasant riding.

Once we got out of the city we were in the desert, endless sand as far as the eye can see. Then more dirt towns. At about the halfway point add to this a significant head wind!

Lunch stop today

With about 15 kilometres to go, we went back into the desert, with a strong head wind, little road shoulder and trucks and buses going past blaring their horns and covering you in fumes. The landscape is bleak and dry with very little vegetation. I was developing very low expectations of the rest day accommodation.

We turned left with 5 kilometres to go still, there was sand and old – almost derelict – buildings. We got down a steep road, came round a corner, and there was the most quaint little seaside town, with a promenade along the sea shore, little shops and a nice hotel! And best of news – I have been allocated my own room for three days! The joy! Not only do I have a view of the sea, but the sounds of the waves crashing on the beach can be heard from my room.

We arrive at the Pacific Coast of Peru (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

I unpacked and took the washing to the laundry, and then Jackie and I met for a cold drink on the hotel balcony. Nice outlook looking at the sea, warm and sunny, and only 2pm. A feeling of contentment and relaxation pervades. Then I was introduced to an innocent looking drink called a Pisco Sour. This is made with cane sugar liquor, lemon and egg. It does not taste like it contains the punch it does.  During the evening I had another 3 of these, thankfully I only had to navigate my way upstairs to my room. I was sensible enough to drink a litre of water before bed.

Day 48/164: Pasabar to Chiclayo – 113km

Up 700 meters, down 775 meters.

Not such a good sleep last night – just because a weird bunch of Lycra clad cyclists go to bed at 7pm does not mean the locals do. Quite a lot of talking and laughing, thankfully I had the iPod and ears muffs!

The soccer field has overhead lights, and these were on for a while, and then came back on at 5am.

When one of the riders woke up it was so light they thought they had overslept. Being so close to the equator there is not much time from dark to light in the morning, and light to dark at night. So usually we are getting up in the dark and going to bed in the dark.

As I don’t have my keys to lose every day I instead play “hunt for my overhead light” – if only I would put it in the same place each day! If I forget until it is dark more challenge is added to this by having to crawl around inside the tent going through everything with the light from the cell phone. My aim from now on is to put it in my toilet bag every morning (which I plan to do as soon as I find it).

To add variety today we had a team challenge, we had to get into a team of 4 and guess how long it will take to ride 25 kilometres-ish (maybe slightly more or less) without knowing the road and how much of today’s 700 meters climb is in it. I am in a combined NZ/OZ team called the Anzac biscuits. You can over estimate your time, but if you underestimate you’re out, and it’s based on the time that the last rider in the team crosses the line.  Given that we don’t know the gradient we are cautious and overestimate based on the expected speed of the slowest rider in the team (me).

It is for fun and there is no prize, but some of the teams are deadly serious and are warming up and have stripped everything off their bike. I considered if I should take off my panniers, but I already spend a few minutes each day trying to close my daily bag so that’s not an option anyway.

There was less gradient than we expected so we come in under our time. Going up the hill to the end I was feeling the pressure, was huffing and puffing and pushing as fast as I could. My team could hear me behind them, thankfully no one in my team was yelling at me to hurry up.

One of the teams had a rider who is also not great on hills who thought he was going to throw up, and in another team one of the riders was screaming and yelling at his team. Anyone would have thought there was serious prize money at stake.

The ANZAC biscuits: L-R: Brett and Jackie from Australia, Peter and me from New Zealand

With this behind me, I set off for the rest of the ride. There were some ruins along the way, pyramids in Tucane built out of sandstone, that I stopped to have a look at. I need to google some info about them as everything I have seen written was in Spanish.

Me in front of the pyramids

The pre Incan pyramids (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

Detail of the Pre Incan pyramid (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

The road is not good to ride on, the shoulder has numerous pot holes but the road has trucks, buses and Tuk Tuks everywhere. Even when you are on the shoulder they blare their horns at you. They are much more aggressive than Colombia and  Ecuador, with us and with each other. They are also less kind to animals, and there is a distressing amount of animal carnage at the roadside. Also distressing are the vultures feasting. I can just imagine vultures as the birds in the horror movie (called I think Birds). There is also rubbish everywhere again.

Because of the team challenge and the rest of the day not being a race day, most of the riders are riding in groups. The group I was with got stopped and questioned by the Policia – an interesting conversation when they did not speak English and none of us spoke Spanish. We showed them on our notes where we were going, they took photos of us and – we thought – drove off happily.

However about 5 kilometres up the road along came 3 Policia on motorcycles with their sirens going and one headed over to us. Once again a challenging conversation, and he did not seem very happy with us. We got an escort for the remaining 16 kilometres to camp. It was a bit scary as he seemed really grumpy and he had a gun. It was useful though in controlling the traffic, and he stopped the traffic at two intersections so we could go across. However we were very relieved when we got to camp to see Cristiano. We left Cristiano to deal with him and went thankfully inside the camp.

Cristiano said after being asked for his documentation and having his photo taken, the cop said he had been told to ensure we got safely to camp – by it turns out the cops in the car who had stopped us.

The place we are staying has rooms at a reasonable price so a lot of the riders got one. Nice to have a room to myself, and not have to pack up the tent in the morning, and be able to get dressed standing. As it turns out also thankfully to stop being savaged by bugs. I put two types of spray on for dinner and still got bitten. In the morning I got bitten through my bike shorts and riding top as well.

This place is meant to have wifi but like the place in Las Lomas I could not get onto it. So rather than get frustrated I decided to turn the iPad off. Hopefully the hotel for the rest day will have good wifi.

I am looking forward to the rest day. Even though the days have been shorter and not much climbing, I have never ridden 7 days in a row before, and the legs are getting weary.

Dinner was goat curry, couscous, coleslaw.

On the road today (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

Day 26/164: San Augustine to Mocoa – 161km

2,061km down: 11,580km to go. 2,250 meters up and 3,450 meters down.

We had a bit of a slow start leaving the hotel as the breakfast was at the hotel, and the staff are not used to feeding a large number of people, especially all in one go. A number of people left early – probably about a third of the riders – without breakfast. There was some bread and spread put there by the TDA staff and people made sandwiches.  I decided to ride in the truck to lunch then ride the 80 kilometres and 1,000 meters remaining climb.

Today’s route profile (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

The day was drizzly and over cast when we left, and rained on and off all day. It was not quite heavy enough to put on a jacket, and when the sun came out again you soon dried out. Rolling hills but some good descents, but like previously you don’t want to go too fast as there are a lot of pot holes in the roads. This area must get a lot of rain as there are a lot of landslides, water pouring down from the hills, and the rivers are full and fast flowing.

Road detour due to massive landslide (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

I stopped at about 35 kilometres to get some lunch as it was too early when I left where the lunch truck was parked. I went into a road side cafe and one of the truckies was eating soup which looked quite nice. I asked how much and said I would like some. 6,000 pesos seemed reasonable, so out came the soup followed by a huge plate of beans, rice and chicken! Inadvertently I was having the day special again.

I got to camp about 2:30, it was a nice feeling to get here and know that I still have plenty of energy
and could have gone further without any trouble. The camp is basic, you have the choice of paying extra for a room in a dormitory (my idea of hell) or tenting. There is one shower with no door, facing two toilets, also without doors! One way of getting to know your fellow riders really well.

Wet and muddy ground at camp (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

We are back down to under 1,000 meters so bugs galore again. I bought some different bug spray in San Agustin so hopefully it is more effective, as I am only just getting over the last feeding frenzy in Anapoima.

Tomorrow we are on gravel again, sealed until 15 kilometres then 70 kilometres is meant to be hard packed dirt/gravel. Hopefully it does not pour tonight!

Dinner tonight was beef stir fry.

On the road outside the hotel this morning (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

Three pups watch us cycle by (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

All downhill to begin with (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

Day 20/164: Anapoima to Prado – 146km

1,502 km down: 12,139 to go (1,200 metres up, 1,600 metres down today)

When I was putting my tent down I did not realise that but not only were there a couple of large ant mounds near the tent (which I had seen and kept away from) but there was also some netting above the tent and there were ants all over it. I must have brushed up against it, as I got ants all inside my riding shirt. The biting sort! Ouch! I quickly changed my shirt.

I set off feeling reasonably good, and aiming to ride the whole day. There were some rolling hills to begin. I stopped at 16 kilometres for a freshly squeezed orange juice. They squeeze it while you wait – 2000 pesos (approximately a dollar) for a glass.

Juice stop (Photo credit: Sue’s blog)

At 16.9 kilometres I missed a turn – I’m not sure if there was a truck parked across the road or whether I just wasn’t paying attention. After 7 kilometres I realised I had gone the wrong way and back tracked, adding 14 kilometres.  I learned from my last trip not to try and work out (aka guess) how you could meet up with the right road again, as this led to the time I got really lost on my last trip but thankfully was saved by Bobby and her bright red sports car, who delivered me safely to camp.

The next bit was rolling hills on a back road through a village and farmland. Quite a lot of the road was gravel and bumpy and rocky.  Due to having made the wrong turn, I had the sweep behind me as I was now the last rider (two other riders also missed this turn but they are faster than me). We then came out to a main highway, after about 5 kilometres I had to go over an abandoned bridge, and then connect with another highway. It was really hot, with a headwind, and was hard going. By this stage I had done about 90 kilometres – but only 76 of the planned ride.

Luckily lunch was at 78 kilometres, a very welcome sight. Two of the other riders were stopping at lunch and taking the lunch truck back to camp. I considered stopping also as it was so hot! But I decided that I really wanted to ride the whole ride so I had something thing to eat and carried on. I had 67 kilometres to go – not including the 14 extra due to getting lost.

It was so hot it, was beating down and not a lot of shade. I saw the first couple of flags ok but then, would you believe it, I missed a turn again!!!! I have discovered my speedo is slightly out, as it is set it for the size of tyres I have but not the width/ thickness, so this is throwing the measurements out just enough to cause an issue – especially for with someone already challenged with directions.

I asked a couple of locals and they assured me I was going the correct way to Neiva – they were right, just not the way I should have been going. The road went on and on, and the heat just kept glaring down on me. It dawned on me that I was probably lost again especially as there was meant to be more downhill than uphill and I was mostly going up.

Over one of the many rivers (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

I went to a service station to buy water, and it is the first petrol station I have come across that only sells petrol. I decided to ring Christaino to see which direction I should go, as I was not sure where I had gone wrong .I could not believe it but my phone was nearly flat! It had been showing full charge that morning.

I rang Christiano but he could not hear me but said to text him., which I did but got no response . I was sitting there thinking “What next?” and thinking how I would love to see Bobby and her little red sports car, when I remembered that my son Daniel had kindly downloaded all the maps where I was going onto my phone and my iPad.

I had enough phone battery to get the map app up and it showed me where I was (thanks Dan xx). It also showed me that I was on my way to Saidane, which I was pretty sure from my notes was a town I needed to go through, but as my writing is not very legible even to me I was not 100% sure. Note to self: have better handwriting! Off I went and yay it was the right town and joy such joy there were flags!   🙂 🙂 🙂

I stopped, had some more water, and set off again. At this stage I had done 148 kilometres and still had 30 kilometres to go but at least I was on the right road.

And then there were road works! Thick, wet, dirt roads, hard to ride on, especially with tired legs. There was a water truck laying down more water. I was behind it so I was getting covered in mud as well. The water truck driver jumped off his truck, gave me water without any prompting from me, smiled, and drove off again. They have water here in plastic packets as well as in bottles, this was a plastic packet.

The road was going on and on and I was starting to worry that it would get dark before I got to camp. I decided I would make the call at the next town, and if I needed to I would catch a taxi to camp. 152 kilometres on the clock at this stage and then suddenly in front of me I see Christano and his partner Anna driving towards me in the ute 🙂 🙂 🙂

Christiano had decided to come and find me and see if I was ok. The text I sent had not got through to his phone either. Turns out from where I had missed the flag I had done a bigger loop to Saidane than the way that was planned. I was very very pleased to see Christiano and Anna.

Back at camp I noticed there were a few mosquitos so plied bug spray liberally after my very cold shower. It did not help, I am covered in bites – most people are even those who don’t usually get bitten. It didn’t help that I had one in my tent for part of the night who waited until I went to sleep before feasting. I heard it at 2am and located it.  Now I am trying really hard not to itch, and taking antihistamine.

The view from Sue’s tent at the camp site (Photo credit: SUe’s blog)

I plugged my phone into the charge bank when I got to camp, and then discovered a couple of hours later that the charge bank was totally flat. Either it is dead or more likely I forgot to check it was plugged in properly when I charged it in Bogota.

I got the phone charged just enough to text my daughter Kelly like I do every day when I get to camp. I must have accidentally pressed a button to ring her, as a few minutes later my phone told me I had a missed call. I tried to ring back (thinking she had rung me, and worried that there was something wrong) but the phone decided there was no service. I went up into the camp ground into the main building and charged the phone for 45 min. I text Kelly that I had service and she could ring me back, and then realised that it was me accidentally pressing ring to her, so she didn’t need to ring. I made sure I had enough battery to last the next day.

Dinner was pork stew, beans and plantain. Plantain is in the banana family, and depending on how you cook it, it is either all right or horrid. Boiled and mashed is nasty, but these were partly baked and ok.
I am not going to be a convert though.

One of the riders missed the turn for the camp and clocked up 200 kilometres today!

Day 12/164: La Pintada to Manizoles – 132k

948 km down: 12,693 km to go (climbing 2,800 meters)

When I took down my tent in the morning, I found my wallet, which had somehow managed to get underneath it. Even though I had had it after I put my tent up, it must have slipped out of my pocket when I bent down.

I set off at the usual time of about 6:30am. It was nice and cool to start with. The road was pretty good for the first 80 kilometres, there were some ups but quite a lot of steady downhill.

There were lots of local stalls selling fruit and drinks plus small shops. Every kilometre or so on the route there are a few plastic chairs, a cooler with drinks and a collection of sweet bars.

The vegetation is amazing, so green and flourishing. There are banana trees growing and enormous bamboo trees.

Columbian Scenery (Photo and caption credit: Sue’s blog)

Interesting trees (Photo and caption credit from Sue’s blog)

After about 50 kilometres I was feeling a bit uncomfortable on the saddle, and no matter how I moved I could not get comfortable. I decided to stop at lunch as I did not want to cause any problems that would see me off riding. Jody, one of the medics, said a number of the riders were also having problems due to the wet and hot riding conditions. I have been ‘double shorting’ since about day two, may have to go to three pairs.insec

As I was not going to ride any more that day, I started to wash some dishes to help out, but there was a very sharp knife up the wrong way and I sliced my finger. As I was standing there applying pressure to stop the bleeding, a bee randomly came up and stung me! Then when I went to take the panniers off my bike I noticed I had a flat tyre! The back tyre of course!

So I went to camp in the lunch truck. I was really pleased that I had.  I had climbed 900 meters prior to lunch and I would not have been able to climb the remaining 1,900 metres. When I got to camp yay! A hot shower! What a novelty. Some cold showers are colder than others I am discovering.

One of the riders Phil (from Christchurch in New Zealand) has been having problems with his bike and can’t use the bottom two gears! Crickey I would not do any riding at all if I could not use the bottom two gears! Phil is still really fast and despite his gearing problem was the first rider to camp today. There are about five of the men who compete against each other to be first.

Phil was sitting by the gate and while we were chatting he told me he was waiting for a taxi to take him down to the town, where hopefully he could get parts for his bike. I asked him if he could get a cat eye for me if there was one there and I would pay half of his taxi.  When he arrived back he had a cat eye for me but sadly no parts for him.

It started to get late and a number of riders had not arrived yet, one of the trucks had gone back looking for them. Dinner is usually at 6pm but it was after 7 by the time we got to eat. The truck came back with a few of the riders but there were still four missing! By this time it was dark, then one arrived with no lights, another one with lights, and then at nearly 8pm the final two arrived. A number of riders are wanting to achieve every part of the ride, which is known as “Every f*cking inch” (EFI). The riders become obsessed with maintaining this, so they don’t want to be picked up.

I fixed my tyre with help from another rider. It turned out the two inner tubes I had in my panniers are the wrong size! As my rims are the same size I did not realize that because my tyres are bigger I also needed to have bigger inner tubes! Luckily I managed to borrow one.

At the camp was a St Bernard, a small black dog that had the body of a Labrador and the legs of a corgie, plus there was a small grey wiry haired dog – about the size of Australian sheep dog (Blue heeler) – this dog was very affectionate and seemed to be really craving attention.

Once again it started to rain during the night.

Day 67: Canizar de Olivar to Molina de Aragon – 120k

5,339km down: 886km to go  (Up 1,424 metres, and down 1,130)

I had a good start to the day as I got a reasonable sleep last night. The local rooster must have slept in because he did not start until after we got up. I have rationalized my panniers down to one which Brett has very kindly offered to carry for me. Every bit will help get through the next three days.

I rang home to get the update regarding how Lizzy and Xavier are getting on. They are both going well, and Lizzy was taking Xavier for his first walk, along the beach near our home. Not that Xavier knew – he was fast asleep! After having a chat to Lizzy, I spoke to Kelly and got some fantastic news.  Kelly is 12 weeks pregnant, she had the scan today and all looks good. So I will be a Gran again at the end of March. It put a big smile on my face. I also shed a few tears, and had to explain to my fellow riders that they were happy tears, as they weren’t sure what was happening on the other end of the phone, they just heard me shriek and then start crying!

So off we went, and of course we first of all had to climb up the 2k we had gone down to camp the night before. Then it was 2k up a 5% gradient – ouch on tired, unwarmed up legs. However this was followed by an 11k downhill 🙂

Heading up a hill early in the day

We had rollers for awhile then a 4k up but then a 6k down. Brett said they are honest hills – they give back more than they take. The bugs going up the 4k hill were a pain, trying to get in my eyes, it was very odd seeing them walking across my sunglasses. Plus there were a few I had to spit out, and one I nearly swallowed, yum.

After 20k I had a quick stop and my legs were wobbly and tired, I did not see how they would make the day. Thankfully they loosened up. Overall it was a great ride until lunch. There are lots of small towns perched on the hillside, often they don’t have a shop but they all have a church. We passed a town called Caminreal, it had heaps of Piggeries, there was building after building of them however it looks like the  pigs never get to go outside 😦

As I said, it was a great ride until lunch, and we set off with 55k to go feeling really positive and looking forward to an early day. You know that saying don’t count your chickens until they’re hatched?! Well the afternoon was mostly up; at one point there was a hill that was 15k, with a hideous head wind. The afternoon went on and on.

The ride goes on and on

Thankfully we are staying in a hotel tonight so no putting up tents and listening to noisy campers. It’s a really nice hotel we are staying at, the Parador de Santa Rita, established in 1826. I have a hotel room to myself with three beds and a bath 🙂 But it does have a low ceiling  that I have to look out for, so far I have only banged my head three times.

We had dinner at the restaurant, it was really nice: salad, meat and pasta. I think they were surprised by how much we ate given that we are not enormous people.

Tomorrow we are riding 109k, the same uphill distance as today, and the weather forecast is for the wind to be at least as bad as today.

The Shepard and his dog were walking along with the sheep, they probably cover quite a distance each day. Not much food for the sheep though.

Day 60: Colera to Sant Feliu de Gulixols – 90k

4,791km down: 1,434km to go 

Not a great night sleep again, the camp site restaurant pumped up about 9pm and was still noisy until about midnight, at which point a camp site dog took over keeping people awake by barking every few minutes. I have not been using my ear phones as they seem to set off my inner ear imbalance (though that could of course just be coincidental), so it’s a dilemma – risk setting off and suffering from inner ear imbalance, or suffering from lack of sleep. The worst thing is finally going to sleep then waking up and checking the time and finding it is only 12:30am! And then 1:30am, 3am, 5am etc.

On a positive note the bugs that have plagued us up until now have just about all disappeared. It is too hot and dry, so at least when you get up during the night you are not set upon. Also the average temperature has dropped. Yesterday was pleasant all day, today was great in the morning but it was hot after lunch.

I rang home this morning to check on how my daughter and grandson were. Lizzy was asleep but Shellbe said all was going well. I also had a text from Lizzy overnight saying Xavier was eating and sleeping well. I got some great pictures this morning of Xavier with his mum and dad, another reason to be really pleased that I bought the iPad  – especially as during the rest days I will be able to skype!!! 🙂

Leaving the campsite this morning the first 10k had some climbing then it was flat or a slight incline until lunch. I was riding with John, Brett and Michele. As we came into lunch which we nearly missed the truck as we were watching the traffic and looking at a sculpture, and the lunch truck was on the other side! We were alerted by Ester yelling out, but John was too far in front to hear. Luckily we had a bunch of Spanish riders behind us who heard us yelling at him and when they passed him they said “Companions lost amigo” which alerted him that all was not right and he turned back to look for us. The Spanish riders are a lot more friendly than the Italians, if the Italians had have said anything they would have shouted “Smarten yourself up” as they glided past in their glistening and matching outfits.

Just after lunch we missed a turn and rode to the top of a hill we didn’t have to (all good training for the Taupo bike ride). We rode back and found the place we were meant to turn, we were pretty sure there was no flag but this does not always mean anything, as they often get removed. The next town was 15k away. We went up a fairly substantial hill and then down a steep and long decline, so I was very pleased to see a flag at the next town to know we were on the right track.

It was a fantastic bit of riding – even with the uphill – through the forest, and we only saw one car the entire time. Then it was a bit like when we came out of the tunnel into the small village on our way to Genoa – all of a sudden we were in a built up busy, busy shopping area, with people and cars everywhere. I was pleased to get to the campsite. Brett was even more pleased as he had felt unwell yesterday afternoon and had vomiting overnight. He had ridden today but felt not great, and was feeling nauseous again at the end. Hopefully he will be better tomorrow.

We are camping again tonight, and we have the return of the toilet seat yay! Plus toilet paper yay! And there is a shower that has good pressure and does not have to be held on with one hand while you shower with the other, yay! Still no soap but the rest is a big improvement! On the negative side we are still camping on hard dirt and my tent pegs now resemble sculptures with many different twisted and interesting shapes. Geergo was so fascinated by them that he took a photo of them all lined up together. I will definitely need to buy some more during the rest days in Barcelona. We get there tomorrow and then have two rest days.

Three of our riders are leaving us in Barcelona
Phil – Danya’s dad who joined us in Montpellier
David – who joined us in Vilnius
John – who has been with us all the way.

It will be sad to see them go. We are going to send John a tape of a barking dog, Italians partying, traffic noises and people expelling wind so when he misses us he can put up the tent in his back yard and play it through his ear plugs. Of course first he will have to have dinner in a metal bowl smelling slightly of bleach and drunk a glass of wine out of a plastic tumbler (also smelling slightly of bleach). We will have some sort of farewell dinner tomorrow in Barcelona.

Day 54: Aups to Salon-de-Provence – 111k

4,331km down: 1,894km to go

I woke up during the night to heavy rain, so I jumped up and pulled in the washing. I slept the best I have so far in a tent, I only woke about four times.

It was still raining this morning – it is always so pleasant taking down a tent in the rain! We had breakfast and then set off, wearing our rain jackets. It had been dry for ages so we also had to be careful of slippery roads. The first part of the ride we went through some really old towns, sitting perched on the top of the hillsides, on narrow streets, with shutters etc.

One thing I have noticed all the way from St Petersburgh is how important the pharmacy is in a town. In every town it is the one place that is really easy to find, usually it has a lit up sign making it easy to find. Maybe they sell a bigger range of stuff than our pharmacies at home.

Roads we followed today: D9, D30, D23, D3, D561, D15, D561, D561b, D15, D543A-D, D15C, D917, D15m, D15h, D17, D16. We climbed up 758 metres, and went down 1,158.

The rain stopped about an hour after we left camp, and before that was really only drizzling. Although it looked like rain a few times during the day, it held off. One side effect of the rain is the snails and bugs were out in force. We saw a man at the side of the road with a half filled bag of snails – either he was going to have a snail race or he was planning to eat them – yuk! They were just like the snails we get at home.

We were coming up a 6k hill – which is not without difficulty by itself – and I was getting blasted by sandflies, they were going up my nose, into my mouth etc, it was very unpleasant. It must have been the result of the first wet weather for ages. Thankfully once we got to the top of the hill they were much less of a problem. When I am riding I work on a reward system “When you get to the top of the 6k hill you can coffee” etc, so we stopped at the top of the hill for coffee, when we walked in I took my helmet off and shook my head, it was raining sandflies everywhere!

Coming down a small windy street with traffic on the way to the campsite

We got into camp about 1:30pm and put the tent up, it was damp and grubby after last night. Having no toilet paper or soap is becoming business as usual but this camp has taken showering to a whole new level – the water in the shower only works whilst you are pressing it! Next time you are bored try having a shower with one hand out of action, pressed against a wall, it’s not straight forward. I also had forgotten that I had no shampoo until it was time to shower, so it was soap again!

One of the riders Jan turns 30 tomorrow, so we had a wee celebration tonight. In Cannes, Brett and I had gone to the equivalent of the $2 dollar shop and got lots of silly presents and a card. The tour guys organized a cake and wine paid for by Danya, luckily they also organized dinner in the camp restaurant because it poured down about 5pm.

We had also planned some skits. Jan has a really good sense of humour (as does Danya) but Jan had never heard of the Monty Python Cheese Shop sketch, so Brett and Geergo and I did it (Geergo was the musician). It went down well.

Hopefully it will be a fine day tomorrow, at least we have another rest stop once we get to Montpelier tomorrow, so we will be able to dry out the tents if they are wet, and dry our clothes. Tomorrow we are climbing about 800 metres. Ha it’s funny, but after days of climbing over 1,110 this now seems a light day, a bit like how 100k is now a small day.

Day 46: Bondeno to Casalmaggiore – 140k

3,661km down: 2,564km to go

This morning our bags were by the van by 6am, breakfast was at 6:15am and we were on the road by 6:30am. All in a bid to try and beat the heat. It was another day of mostly flat riding, but also very hot. We were at lunch by 10:45, determined to be at camp before 2 pm.

The sun was a really fiery red colour when we left this morning (photo from here)

The morning started off quite nice and cool but soon started warming up. We were again riding along a levy but thankfully it was not as hot as the day before. I was riding with Brett again, luckily Brett is really good at following the directions, and he has a really good map. We were idling along the levy – it was like water torture. There were glorious blue swimming-pools on one side, and the river on the other. No one was swimming in the river though so we were not willing to risk it, and also there was no easy access down to it. I did think about throwing myself into one of the swimming pools. I wondered what would happen: “Hey mum there’s a lady in our pool”. Just as I was getting tempted to risk it I got distracted by another bee stinging me (this one took 3 days to stop hurting). The bees or wasps – am not sure which – love me, as soon as I arrive at lunch so do the bees.

After lunch we were riding along the main road. We stopped once for a drink but got back onto the bike without stopping too long. I was starting to wilt as we came to the 120k mark, and I had just said to Brett “Wouldn’t it be great if this was a day they had got the distance wrong by 10k in our favour again?” (like they did at the camp the night before Venice). Just then Brett saw a flag and they had got the distance wrong by 20k 🙂

Our accommodation was a weird set up, we are staying at a sports club which has a bar, swimming pool, tennis court etc. We set up our tents where we were told to, but a couple of hours later we had to dismantle them and set up further down the field away from the members (apparently a couple of them had complained about us being there, not sure what about but it could have been the washing lines with bike pants, bras etc, that upset them).

The water torture continued as you could only use the pool if you had a bathing cap (which of course we didn’t), and then to reinforce our torture, there was a hose spraying the lawn in front of us. This also attracted the mosquitoes in droves. When you came out of your tent in the middle of the night they descended on you as a pack. We all left there sporting numerous bites regardless of putting on bug spray.

With leaving earlier we are getting up in the dark, which is usually ok as I have my head light. However, it has been merrily turning itself on in my bag since St Petersburg, and of course it chose this morning to be flat. The spare batteries are in my permanent bag, which at the moment is off scouting for tomorrow, so I will have no light tomorrow either. It makes getting ready a bit difficult as the phone light is useless.

On a positive note we had dinner in the restaurant at the camp tonight, we had 18 pizzas between 13 people, and the beer was cold. However the Wifi did not work so sending this was delayed. I also got a nasty fright when I went to the toilet – it was a squat toilet, basically a hole in ground with foot spaces on either side. Yuck.

Squat toilet. Yuck.