Gwilym's Adventure Blog

Last night I had a lecture (in French) from the well meaning elderly campsite owner about the perils of missing my ferry due to road closures, accidents and punctures (and yes, apart from a few words I understood the conversation fully). So, not wanting to ignore him I left early this morning with a Sat Nav arrival time of around 4pm for a 7pm check in Well, sods law, all went very well, here by 2.30 and just received a text saying the ferry is delayed by 2 hours due to wind. I am now at in the local Mcdonalds on the free Wifi, I wonder how long I can pretend I am still drinking this coffee? Anyway, a misty start to the day and I finally broke though the cloud just in time to ride the Col de Pourtalet (photo 3 is at the pass) at 1794m before dropping down into Spain again and eventually picking up some country roads heading toward Bilbao. At this point, it was time to jump on the Motorway and head for Santander and a long wait.  Other than the ferr...

Interesting experience trying to get food last night. Andorra is known for 2 things, skiing and having more fuel stations per 100m than any other country in Europe. This is mainly because the fuel is so cheap, visitors come in from both Spain and France to fill up so near the border they are just right next to each other. Apparently it is not know for serving food before 8pm. We (the Danish biker and I) tried a number of restaurants at 6:30 to be told, not until 8pm but we eventually found a place that looked somewhat questionable and staffed by a waiter who spoke no English. However, the food that turned up was both very good and very well priced so it turned out well. Out of Andorra and up and over the El Pas d la Casa (2408 m - the highest pass in the Pyrenees and with 3 petrol stations only 50m apart) and then down and back into France for the day. A mix of mountain passes and faster trunk roads let me cover 320km in just under 6 hours before I arrived here a...

Whether the blog title means anything to you may well depend on your age or age of your children. If in doubt, click here for an explanation. This was a last minute addition to my tour for the simple reason that until I started on this trip, I had no idea that Andorra was deemed to be a separate independent country in its own right, I just assumed it was part of Spain but now I know better. The journey today was around 350km and only a mere 5 hours gave me a mix of mountains and flatter lands before climbing up and arriving here in Andorra at around 1000m. Hopefully this will mean a cooler night as it is pretty hot right now. The 4th picture is approaching the only manned border I have seen on my whole route though I didn't have to stop or show my passport.  The fuel is so cheap here as is the food and drink so have already fuelled the bike up and will be doing the same to myself shortly. On the campsite, I met up with a Danish biker who is on week 5 of hi...

Sadly a bug lost his (or her) life on my camera lens today. Sad for him/her) as he/she is dead but sad for me as he/she has messed up my photos. I was cold last night in my flimsy little summer sleeping bag, I was cold when I got out of the tent at 7am and then the bike told me it was only 9 degrees. Coming to the mountains for cooler morning rides was my plan but this was a little too cool. Heated grips and seat used in Spain, in July!! All turned off by 8:30 though as it was already over 20 degrees by then and topped out at 33 degrees around 1pm. The route was over another couple of mountain passes at 1600m and 1659m as I made my way from being inland back towards the coast to set myself up for my final goal of the trip tomorrow. I passed lots of different rock formations today as well as using a section of dead straight road that was 16km long. Perhaps that is all the straight bits from the roads I have ridden over the last few days. Just over 500km done today ...

I stayed up late (for me) last night and saw the Blood Moon at around 11pm with a very bright Mars just below it though my picture does not do it justice. Today was an up and down kind of day. After leaving the campsite at 7:30 it was bend, followed by bend heading up and up into The Sierra Nevada mountains until I went through the Puerto de la Ragua pass at 2000m (where it was a lovely 16 degrees) before descending to some of the flattest land I have ever seen. As I was riding through these plains, I have expected to see a herd of buffalo or a elephants wander by. I recall being told "The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain" but there was no rain falling today and it was up to 33 degrees again by midday. I made it into the campsite here by 2pm so that I could pitch up and hide in the shade for the afternoon. 6 1/2 hrs and only about 360km done today due to the nature of the very windy road I think I will try and be away earlier tomorrow if ...

What a day! I left the hotel around 10am and completed a full lap of Gibraltar, it was already getting hot. I used the motorway to get round the Monstropolis (Monstrosity + Metropolis) that is Malaga and then selected "avoid motorways" and followed the smaller roads.  The route above is approx. but I was on the N340 hugging the coast rather than the A7 which this is showing. I have been up and over numerous mountain passes, had bend after bend after bend, hit 36 degrees at one point before returning to the coast for a sea breeze and a much cooler 27 degrees, before heading high again to my planed night here at Trevelez in the heart of the Sierra Nevada. The last 20km to get here was just the icing on the cake with awesome views and great biking roads. The art to motorcycle touring is staying hydrated and synchronising ones bladder with the fuel tank on the bike. Today I award myself 1/10 as following my run this morning I over hydrated and had to have a...

  What a rough night! Too hot to sleep properly and a dog barking constantly. In the early hours, I heard a noise in my porch during the night and there was a cat in there. It soon got sent on its way. After starting the bike up at 7:06am (just to make sure no one would complain about the 7am rule), today was a mile munching day where all roads are game on and so it was a mix of motorway ring roads to avoid large towns and fast trunk roads in between. Goodbye Portugal and back into Spain for another of the goals for this trip. That was to get to the most southerly point on mainland Europe which is the small island at Tarifa. Sadly you are not allowed to drive along the causeway so I had to walk the last 200 metres or so to the fort. I have now been to the North ,South and West points of Europe but East will take some planning as people can't agree where it is. There are a number of options but as people can't decide if Mont Blanc or Elbrus is the highest mo...

Since 1979 The Village People having been telling us to " Go West ". Well I did that today and I ran out of road. A great start to the day that was overcast and never went above 20 degrees allowed me to ride for a full 4 hours stopping just once for fuel before my first major goal of this trip. Cabo da Roca is the most westerly point on mainland Europe. What was really nice was that coffee and cake was only a third of the price of the same at Nordkapp. After my snack there, I used the toll motorway to bypass Lisbon but that didn't go well. When I approached the toll both I saw what I thought was a bike lane and rolled through thinking it was nice they didn't charge bikes.  Well, 50km later I found out it wasn't a bike lane and had to explain to a man in a booth why I had no ticket. 30 euro fine for me. but I did shave off about 50km and 2 hours form the route above Anyway, back on the nice roads and I was heading south. A quick glance at ...

With my sat nav just set in the general direction of Lisbon and motorways turned off I set off from the campsite this morning open minded about where I was going. The start to the day was great, a bit of cloud cover kept the temps under 20 and then up and over some Spanish and then Portuguese mountain passes when I was actually in the cloud, which kept me cool until about 10:30 (or so I thought). I realised pretty quickly that once I had entered Portugal the clocks went back an hour so it was 09:30 and therefore very hot or that time of the morning. The sign in second photo down (you may have to zoom in) was a little confusing but I just kept going. Anyway, the day went on, the bends through the vineyards went on for smiles and smiles (yes I know it is kilometres but the joke won't work then) For the best part of two hours nothing was straight and I actually wanted a short bit of no bends to get into 4th gear and to relax but no, the hairpins kept coming. T...

When I left the campsite this morning, the plan was to use the motorways to skirt Bilbao and Santander and then return to the coast roads and continue along the north coast of Spain. So, how did I end up here then …. Well, change is good. I was riding along and was about to return to the coast after Santander when I remembered how good the "Pots and Pans" road was (Ok, Potes and Panes) so I decided to go to Potes for elevenses. I then thought I would just pop (25km each way) to Fuente De into the heart of the Picos de Europas and then my next idea was to see what the N621 heading south from Potes was like. I tell you, it was awesome and so glad I did it. It was obvious by this point that I was by now a long way from the coast so I set the Sat Nav to head for Portugal and to avoid any major roads. The last photo shows (from Google Earth) how good the N621 is I didn't make it to Portugal but I have found a very nice site that is quiet, has a r...