Easy day back to the coast. Massages!

After that eventful day yesterday, we were looking for an easy day today. We're heading back across the plains to the coast again.

The Brit from our B+B in Calella had recommended a hotel in d'Empuries. And it looked like there was hiking nearby and some ancient Greek and Roman ruins right next to the hotel. So off we went.

Even though it was sunny, April had memories of being in the cold rain yesterday so she dressed up in her long riding tights and long sleeve wool shirt. Then she was hot almost immediately. No skillz.

We again had the mix of paved and dirt. Nothing special to report. We saw some people collecting wild asparagus. It's getting late in the season for it because all the grasses are growing up hence it's hard to spot the asparagus. We've only seen it once while riding.

At the last town before the coast, I had the map, and I managed to sneak us onto a fantastic paved road. There was a dirt bike path that we normally would have followed, but I "accidentally" steered us to the paved road. Not only was the 8K stretch fantastic, it was even more pleasurable because of it's illicit nature. Haha. Life's little pleasures!

We got to the hotel early, like 2:00, and signed up for the romantic package, which meant we got the room, breakfast, dinner and two massages at the hotel spa. We couldn't resist. Ate lunch at the hotel restaurant. Fixed price of $25E each. Sort of a ripoff. But we figure what the hell, it was supposedly a good restaurant, and we were right on the beach terrace. April had a tomato tart, then a grilled monk fish, and a little cake thing for dessert. I had a cod sashimi type of thing, a steak (entrecôte), and then some home made chocolate ice cream for dessert. Also had water and wine.

Service was very slow, quite unlike most of the places we've eaten. I've been loving that the Spanish take your order and get the food out quickly. Not like in Italy where you have to freakin beg for the check at the end of the meal. And the other thing is the Spanish are very friendly yet very matter of fact. They're warmer than the French, and they don't behave like they're the lead actor in some melodrama like the Italians. Haha, what the hell, some generalizations.

After lunch we explored the beach, then hit the spa for the massages. Turns out they were great. In expected euro fashion they gave April the male masseuse, while I had the female. In the mens changing room they gave me a locker, and in there was a pair of sandals, a super short robe, a long terry cloth robe, and what looked like the eye covers for airplanes. Well I wasn't going to put on the short robe as my ass would have been hanging out, and i certainly didn't need the eye covers, so i just donned the long robe and went au natural underneath. And in a slight tweak of expected protocol, in the massage room, my masseuse said hang the robe on the hook then jump on the table, and she stood there waiting. Hmm. I guess they don't make a big deal out of being naked here. So I whipped off the robe and jumped on the table.

Like I said the massage was very good. They used a ton of oil, which I really like because my hair doesn't get pulled that way.

Then afterwards April says to me, "so weren't those underwear things weird?" I say, "what underwear, my locker had eye covers." April starts laughing, that wasn't eye covers, it was a mini underwear thing, which explained the short robe, and the masseuse telling me to hang up my robe while she stood there. Haha!! Live and learn. Couldn't quite understand why I needed those eye covers.

We walked the beach again. Looked at the ruins which were just a bunch of low lying rocks. Nothing significant left. The history is this was first Greek settlement on the Iberian peninsula, around 600 BC. Then the Romans showed up around 200 BC to cut off Hannibal's supply route. The whole show was abandoned about 200 AD, after the Germanic tribes came down and kicked ass.

We chilled a little before dinner. I noticed my white t-shirt had some oil stains on it, I must have spilled some olive oil on it during lunch. Then I notice 30 minutes later, more oil spots. Turns out there was still so much oil on my chest that it was soaking and staining my t-shirt. What a drag, as I only have two.

So we go to dinner expecting this nice fancy meal, and the menu is the same fixed menu from lunch. Huh! I get pissedI tell the waiter we can't eat that same meal again, April gets mad at me, but finally we all settle down and they cook us some different options, chicken and cod. All's well that ends well.

Now for the finale of the Romantic Package!!!! Only in my dreams, as we both fall asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillows.


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Location:Carrer de Pianc,Cadaqués,Spain

The Rain in Spain stays mainly on the Plain....

Eventful day! Capped off by Barcelona failing to advance in the Euro champions league semi-finals. They tied Chelsea, from England, 2-2, disaster for all the Catalonians.

We decided to stay another night at our inn, Can Masa, in La Pera, so we can ride today without our gear. The bikes feel so light, which is great cause we're heading up a famous mtn called Els Angels. Lance Armstrong used to ride this road regularly when he trained out of Girona. We were ascending from the east side, shorter and steeper, a 6K climb. The road starts out fine, steep but not insane, we go about 1K and psst, I get another flat! Three flats in two days, this isn't good. As I change it about 20 riders come racing down and they're all pedaling down the hill, serious shit. We get going again and I'm on pins and needles trying to avoid rocks, gravel, etc. The road is marked every kilometer, we break at the 2k mark and the 4k mark for water, but we're doing pretty well. We just take our time, aprils knee is fine, and sure enough make it to the top with no drama. Great view. We can see back to Girona, where we started and east to the sea, where we've been for the past few days. The climb gives us a lot of confidence for tackling the Pyrenees later in our trip.

We head on down, and it so happens that April brakes almost the entire way, and never changes her legs position, so her knee cramps up. Really??

We head over to Monells, another beautiful medieval town, and stop for lunch. April had the Butifarra, which is like a Spanish bratwurst, with white beans, and I had a rabbit souvlaki type of thing with fries. Awesome. The regular food here is very good. We've determined the standard fare is about 80% as good as the expensive food, yet it's about half the price. As we eat rain is threatening but not actually falling. So we continue on in a big loop to check out some more villages.

We head down a dirt road, it becomes a dirt path, then it gets very rough, sort of like a Mtn bike path. I'm leading and trying to keep on pedaling rather than walk the bikes, the trail gets soft with some deep ruts, I try to push thru a deep rut, hit a rock then start to fall to my right. Nothing worse than falling while clipped in. You're madly trying to twist your cleated shoe out of the pedal clip but invariably it stays locked in. So I tumble to my right and fall right into a patch of stinging nettles and this other plant that sticks all over you.

Now this is a special moment. You can tell a lot about your relationship in these types of situations. Concern? Empathy? Love? How about just a little help? Not a chance. Instead April is behind me laughing like there's no tomorrow! She got the biggest freakin kick out of me falling and trying to unclip, then standing up with that stupid sticky vine all over me. That's 30 years of marriage for you.

So we keep going and finally the rain starts. And then it begins to really pour. We take shelter in a covered bus stop. Wait about 20 minutes and then we get frustrated waiting, so we head out as it lightens up a little. Remember we were just day-riding so we didn't have our rain coats or neoprene booties, or warmer gloves etc. Well the rains didn't let up, and we get soaked, and worse we're on a dirt path which is now a muddy path, so the bikes are a mess. It sucks to suck.

The rain stops, the sun sort of comes out, but we're pretty cold, so we take a short cut back to the inn, and April remembers she wants to see the house Salvador Dali bought for his crazy wife named Gala. Damn it. Of course we stop. It's this old castle like structure. Dali was crazy and his wife, Gala was even crazier. She only accepted the house, if Dali agreed to the clause that he could only visit her when she invited him. I hope April doesn't get that idea for me and Bainbridge, haha. Dali liked this situation cause it inflamed his passion for her. The house was really weird. Very sparse. Weird shit in it. Bizarre in many ways. Supposedly Gala used to call up the young local boys for some action even into her later years. And the story also goes that after she died Dali drove her around for a day in their big blue cadillac. I think Dali was a bit of a poser. Very creative but I've never seen any amazing art that he did.

Finally we get back to the inn, still chilled. I clean off the bikes, put on a new back tire, we shower, then we hit the local cafe for dinner and the soccer game. I must have been channeling Nicky O'Connor cause I got a cheeseburger and beer for dinner. Haha. The cafe got packed. Barca went up 2-0, and the locals were going crazy. We left at half time with Barca up 2-1. Seemed like everything was under control, but Chelsea eventually tied the game, and moved on to the finals based on points from earlier games. The Catalonians will be depressed for days.

Back over to the coast tomorrow.


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Location:Camí dels Enamorats,Escala,Spain

The Plains of Spain. 4/23.

Back to riding again. We're in an area called the Baix d'Emporda, the lower Emporda. It's a beautiful flat to rolling area between Girona and the coast. The are all these wonderfully preserved medieval villages scattered about. And there are designated bike routes throughout the whole area. Sometimes the routes are on paved roads, sometimes on dirt roads, sometimes on dirt paths. And there are special bike route signs all along the routes, which even give distances to the next signs, intersections or towns. really awesome.

It's all farmland, and then the towns are usually on some slight hill with a fortified wall and a church in the middle. Really picturesque. And amazingly well preserved with people still living in the old structures. Beautiful stone arches throughout all these towns, and tons of little alley ways and nooks. It's hard to get April out of these towns once we get in.

So we start riding with an uphill to Begur. We were going to visit a little cove from Begur but it would have been very steep getting down there, and hell getting back. So we skipped it. On the big downhill out of Begur I got a flat. Changed it quickly then away we went. Got on the dirt roads with all the bike signs. April loves these side roads. We're stopping for pictures all the time. we stop in an amazing village called Pals. Then we hit some beautiful paved roads. There are wild poppies everywhere. And yellow mustard seed plants. Makes for very pretty riding. We stop for lunch in another stunning village, Peratellada. Great lunch.

I notice a shortcut on the map, and it seems to be paved, so I make a nice compelling argument for going that way, April agrees, then no sooner do we go 20 yards and I get another flat. WTF! Back tire again, different spot. April gives me a mini lecture about avoiding glass, then seems to find sort of a serendipitous satisfaction about MY flat on MY route. For my part I'm sensing I must be carrying too much weight. Gear, not body weight.

We meander along, hit a few more villages, argue about where to stay for the night. April read a nice tripadvisor review of a small inn in La Pera by a biking couple from Minnesota, so she's locked in to this place. I was pushing for an inn our previous innkeeper had recommended. So the vote was a tie and of course I lost. Dan and I tried to explain this formula to Chris Dubois at the wedding. Not sure he quite understood. He'll learn, we all do.

I call ahead, explain to the woman in garbled French/Spanglish that we want a room and will be there in 30 minutes. She seems to agree. We get there at 5:45, exactly 30 minutes later, and no one is answering the door. This town is really deserted. It's like something out of a Sergio Leoni spaghetti west. We wait 15-20 minutes. Nothing. I call two more times, no answer. Of course I'm feeling sort of smug cause this was April's choice. Haha.

Finally she shows, let's us in, she speaks no English, but we work it out, the room is great, we're the only ones here, the shower is great, and we have to hurry to the only cafe in town which closes at 7:00. We're not in Barcalona anymore. Well the cafe is great and everything turns out wonderfully. April is fully redeemed. We even have pretty fast wifi. In fact we like it so much we decide we'll stay a second night and day ride up some hills tomorrow.

We hit the sack incredibly satisfied. Sleeping soundly when Paul Flessner decides to drunk-Skype us at 1:30 AM our time!!!??? What the hell.

Tomorrow, Els Angels!


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Hiking along the coast, Calella de Palafrugel to Tamariu, 4/22.

We took the day off from riding, and planned a hiking day. We got this idea from an old Brit we met at a B+B in England during our coast to coast hike. He and his wife had bike toured in France about 50 years ago and told us they always rode one day, then took a rest day to enjoy town they were in on the second day. As you might imagine, April loved this idea.

Pretty good breakfast at the Brit-run B+B, but not as good as the full English breakfast you get in England. Then we started hiking north along the coast; big test for my new super light hiking shoes. Before we left I was obsessing about the weight we had to carry, so I wanted the lightest pair of shoes I could find that would still suffice for day hiking. I found some 4.3 oz trail runners from new balance, bought them, tried them out in the Olympics and they were great until we hit some light snow. Then my feet got soaked. Turns out there were gaps between the bottom treads, that let water into the insole. Breathability I guess. Anyway this was a non-starter. So then I began looking for a second pair much to the consternation, or perhaps the better word is aggravation, of my loving wife. Bought the second pair, they're about 7 oz. Better sole. Like Katie O'Connor said: rich people's problems.

Anyway away we go, up the headlands to a light house. Awesome views. Then a steep descent to a tiny cove, up the cliff again, there were 20 switchbacks on this section, then a gradual descent into Tamariu. Gorgeous coastline. Sure enough, a two hour hike one way. The new shoes kicked ass. They're so light it's like having moccasins on. And you have to hike slightly differently, you can't bang your heel down. In fact you can feel even a leaf underfoot. This is the whole barefoot running thing. I like it, I'm like twinkle-toes prancing around on the trail. Think of a nimble deer, or a cat; you get the picture. Haha.

We have a nice lunch in Tamariu, and then head back. It always seems shorter going back. We passed lots of hikers. Made it back In two hours again. Feet were fine. April is using one pair of shoes for both riding and day hiking so she has a sturdier hiking shoe. She's not clipped in on her bike, she uses the old foot cage system. I was debating it but couldn't pass up getting more gear.

Chilled in our room for awhile, then walked down to town for dinner. To our surprise, almost everything was closed up. It still is very early in the season, so many places close Sunday night, especially if the weather isn't great. This area is where the barcelonians come for the weekend in nice early season weather. But we found a beach front restaurant, it was much more expensive than our tapas from last night. But we had a great chocolate fondant for dessert.

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Fantastic riding on the coast, 4/21

Had a great sleep, finally adjusting to the time zone, it's still nice and cool especially at night. Standard breakfast then we headed out north on the coast. We wanted to get an early start before the traffic started. The map indicated a crazy twisted road from Tossa to Sant Feliu de Guixols, maybe 3-4x longer than the distance as the crow flies. We started out climbing right away, but the grade was reasonable. This was going to be a big test for April's knee, she got a cortisone shot in her knee right before we left.

The road was beautiful. Great surface, amazing views up and down the coast. Incredibly blue water. Gorgeous coves. This area reminds us of the Amalfi coast, but it's less developed here. Turns out there weren't a lot of cars, the road is too slow for them. In fact we saw more bikers than cars! How great is that? And we were able to move along at a good clip; our aerobics and legs are fine. Emma and Chris might have some problems keeping up with us when they get here! Hahaha. Anyway this was a fantastic stretch, as nice as anything we've ever ridden.

Then we hit some more developed areas and towns. But we have this 1:50000 scale map that shows designated bike roads/paths, and this guided us thru the towns pretty well. Then we hit the board walk before Palamos and the Bike Gods were throwing fairy dust on us. First we had an awesome lunch on the board walk, grilled lamb and frites, salad with tuna, then the wind was behind us as we cycled north along the wide boardwalk. Great people watching, passed a mini fair, there was a spinning class on the boardwalk, and the path went all away around the peninsula and we got to avoid the traffic in the main town. So sweet!

After Palamos April wanted to head down to some secluded undeveloped beach, and we sort of got lost finding the dirt paths down it. And these two young punks started following us on their bikes. So we find ourselves deeper and deeper in the woods on these sketchy paths. Classic April adventure. But finally we came upon some bike signs, and wound out way down to this beach, had to walk the bikes in a few spots. We lost the punks. The beach was fine, but nothing we hadn't seen before. And we managed to find a shortcut out back to the main paths.

The riding here was great too cause there are no cars on these back roads. We meandered our way over to Palafrugell then headed down to the coast to Calella de Palafrugell, the beach town.

As we pulled into Calella, we realized we didn't know the name of the place we had reserved. We had done some research in Tossa, and April reserved us two nights at the B+B run by some Brit expats. But we hadn't written the name down, just knew it from the web. Wanksters. We just knew there was a hill with a 10% grade right past the house. So we're riding into town, we pass a house with some name on it, I ask if that's the house, sure enough we see the 10% grade sign, so voila we happened right upon it. better to be lucky than good. Then being Brits the woman offered us hot tea and cookies. April was so thrilled, she loves the Brit stuff. She was close to asking for overly crunchy white bread toast with orange marmalade but managed to restrain herself. Haha.

We got a tower room, which was a round room in a tower kind of structure. April had a nice hot shower and used all the hot water. No skills. I pouted a little cause this place had like 25 five-star reviews on tripadvisor and I had no freakin hot water. We walked the five minutes down the 10% hill down to the beach to a recommended tapas joint. Great cheap little place. We bought 8 different tapas, wine, dessert, and the bill came to about $35E. Not bad.

One important note, Real Madrid was playing Barcelona for some championship game on tv, and everyone but us was super focused on the game. I happened to be seated away from the tv, it was behind me, and everyone else in the place was facing me and the tv. We left before it was done, I think they thought we were crazy for leaving.

Talked to Dan and Jayne on their mobile Skype and Dan recommended this iPad app. Nice work Danny boy.

And tomorrow we're taking the day off from riding and planning on a two hour hike along the coast to the tiny village of Timariu.


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First day riding, 4/20

Finally on the road! Got up kind of early and April wanted to get a few miles in before breakfast. We often do this as it builds up our appetite, especially here where we eat so late we're sometimes even full when we wake up. So we found the greenway south out of Girona. The greenway is a dirt path, sometimes a converted railway bed; April loves them and I'm mixed. No traffic, but they really slow you down. Our bikes and tires are designed to handle dirt, yet they're still very good road tires.

We stop about 10k out of town, find a bar that has coffee and breakfast, I manage to ask for an omelette with ham and cheese. Nice.

Then we continue on the greenway which is very well marked here. Little bike signs which also have mileage on them. Great system. We get into the farmland, and can see the road in the distance and the road cyclists moving pretty fast, while we're meandering along. Sigh, April loves this stuff.

Finally at llagostera we have to get on the paved road. It feels so fast and easy. From here we head south and east over some hills to the coast. We get moving along at a good clip then hit the hills. This section is ~16K, we're not sure if its mostly up, up and down, whatever. I have to shift down to my smaller sprocket up front for the first time, and my front derallieur won't shift onto the smaller sprocket. WTF? We stop, I adjust the screws, it still won't shift down. I adjust my crank, maybe I tightened it down too much? No it's fine. Finally I determine the derallieur must have been bent a little during transport. This sucks. But I sort of bend it back and then it works.

So back up the hill, wasn't too bad, the weight makes a huge difference but we keep it in low gear. Lots of cyclists passing in the other direction. It's great to see all the riders. Clearly a big biking culture. So it turns out we crest the hill at about 6-8K and then it's rolling and even more downhill to the coast. Freakin awesome! We were thrilled cruising down the down hill. Passed some German bike tourists climbing up, they got the shitty end of the stick!

Finally we pull in to Tossa de Mar, our beach town for the night. April has us in a tiny inn right on water at the end of the beach. It's fantastic, we get a little room that looks right out on the beach. Great showers. We're early enough for lunch, they eat late here, maybe 2:00. We get on the Internet, check out yelp and tripadvisor and find a good place for lunch. Sure enough the lunch place was awesome, we had this buratta cheese appetizer that was amazing. Then we had a pizza and a dried tomato pesto pasta dish. All superb. Nice wine. Perfect lead in to a nap. From our lunch spot we can down the gorgeous beach we can see hotel at the end and this really cool castle right on a point and hill next to out hotel. The sun is shining, light breeze, I say hopefully, "let's hit the beach and chill, maybe a quick nap?" April says, "well I think we should explore the castle." Damn it! I knew it. In fact I'm wondering if I'm ever gonna get to relax on the beach.

So we get to walk across the beach, then slog up all those steps up to the old fort/castle. Yes it's cool. The view up and down the coast is amazing. There are a number of these medieval forts all along the Costa Brava. Lots of fighting all along here over the past 2-3000 years. The Greeks, the Romans, the Moors, the French vs the Catalans, Hannibal, etc.

We finally get back to the hotel like at 5:00. Out for dinner close by, nothing special, except for some drunk Russians, who were arguing with the waiter about soccer stars. Pele vs Messi vs Zidane.

One more thing, it turns out we're slightly ahead of the tourist season, in fact a number places are closed weekdays. But it's great for us, enough places are open, and there are very few tourists and cars. You can see that it will be a zoo here in the summer. But right now it's fantastic. And it will allow us to wander in to a town and always find a place to stay and no places are full. Pretty sweet.

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La Ramblas

Ok it's nighttime again, quiet, can't tell what time it is and I'm laying in bed trying to feel a tingling on top of my ear. Try as I may I can't feel anything. When I did the vipassana class I could feel all sorts of tingling up there. Now I'm laying in bed wide awake, meditation isn't working, so I haul my sorry ass to the bathroom, avoid the bidet, and turn on the light to check the time. It's freakin 4:30 again, "shit!", which causes April to wake up. I get a little scolding then she turns over and falls back asleep instantly. That woman can sleep!!! I get up and and finish "Wild", a book about a woman hiking solo on the PCT. She was a bit of a newbie, but she toughed it out. Makes me wish I was on a long distance trek, but I can't really say that to April or she'd kill me. Hahaha.

I had to meet Colin at 8:30, from worldreader.org, a non-profit Peter/Paul/rob sponsored, that is bringing ereaders to kids in Africa. I was going to be busy until 2:30 with world reader and April was going to walk around barc. We both had a great day, WR is super exciting and really ramping up. April visited a Gaudi house, Casa Batlo, she really liked it, all sorts of crazy organic curves, built around 1904, as part of the modernista movement. These modernist guys were really creative, and sort of crazy. They're responsible for all the crazy buildings, shapes, colors etc in barc.

April and I meet up for lunch, have a great meal at a tapas and montaditos place. The montaditos are little open faced sandwiches. Then we walked down the Ramblas, the main people watching drag. It was kind of weird cause the shops weren't great yet it was still packed and mostly people were just strolling up and down the street. Almost like a caricature of an interesting place. But the market was awesome, the meat, fish and veg shops were kickass. The meat shops had all sorts of innards, skulls, hooves, etc. Couldn't even tell what half the shit was.

After la Ramblas we veered over to the gothic medieval religious area. Standard church stuff, totally over done, probably responsible for thousands of deaths. They're big into Jesus stuff here.

Then we hit the apt for a short nap, finalized all the bike prep, packed, went to dinner around the block then hit the sack. Off to Girona the next day.



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