Ride Day 35: Into Spain, Toward Bilbao, stopping in Donastia

Circumstances being what they are, we had a short ride from Saint-Jean-du_Luz over the nearby border with Spain and into Donastia. Basque country is very beautiful. And very hilly. But the people are very kind and generous.

We had an easy ride into town and stopped by the first beach that you  arrive at to watch the hundreds of surfers trying their luck on the waves.

The first thing you see in Donastia, beaches and surfers

Riding across the bridge into the old part of the city

 

The harbor in Donastia

A street in old town

 

Donastia is one of my favorite cities. It is big, ish, but the old part of town is very compact and can be walked in an hour or so. It is famous for lots of things, but for me, mostly for pintxos and txakoli wine. There are hundreds of little restaurants, typically called "Bars" where you can grab plates full of pintxos for a very modest price.

After getting into the little pension that we'd rented, we dashed to our favorite pintxos joint, Bar Borda Berri. It was early (for the Spanish, at least) -- only 1900, but we had our fill of absolutely delicious pintxos and enjoyed the txakoli.

Poured taditionally, txakoli is poured through a hole in the cork, from high altitude!

That should be enough for us...

The traditional "high altitude pour"

Yummy pintxos (tomato filled with cheese and topped with pesto; entrecote; cod; and risotto)

A cathedral down the street in the old quarter

 

We are still working out what comes next in terms of our itinerary. We know that we will be in Bilbao on Friday, but the weather is on a definite downturn with loads of rain and camping doesn't sound all that exciting to us at this point. The problem is actually getting into Bilbao. Lorie and I did it a few years ago and it was pretty dismal since the roads are built for fast cars and trucks, not bikes. We're working on it and you will be in the loop as soon as we tie it up!

Text

Since Pamplona is off the table, How about Saint-Jean-du-Luz?

No Pamplona. OK with us! So we head to the coast of the Bay of Biscay today to the coastal harbor town of Saint-Jean-de-Luz. A little bit of climbing, but a short day and no rain and mostly flat or slightly downhill. Nice. Tomorrow we will ride to Donastia (San Sebastian) and feast on pintxos and Txakoli wine. I can’t wait.

 

We are well and truly in Basque country. Everything is written in Basque and the Basque language is some hybrid between Spanish, French, and, well, Basque. It is beautiful. The weather threatened rain but couldn't quite deliver. That was fine with us since everything we have is thoroughly soaked.

It is starting to look very Basque

Beautiful countryside

Flocks of sheep have the right-of-way!

 

This gorge was a unique place to ride. Beautiful

A Basque village

 

 

The harbor at Saint-Jean-du-Luz

There is a large fishing fleet

A gloriously uneventful ride. We had rented an AirBnB so we could dry our tents out, and we got to town early. What a cute town! We rode down to the harbor and it was lunch time. Jon and I had a local beer, Lorie a local wine, and we sat for a few hours and watched the locals in this very quaint and busy spot. A nice way to while away a few hours when you’re bone tired.

 

 

 Only in France!

 

As a catch up, Lorie and I now have ridden over 3,000 km (around 2,000 miles). And we have climbed over 12,000 meters (over 40,000 feet). We are at the threshold of the start of the Tour de France and a few days of rest. But we have to get to Bilbao first. That will be on Friday.

 

Hope that you’re all well. I will keep the blog up as best I can!

Ride Day 32: Continuing to Climb, Arette to Saint-Jean-Pied de Port

Monday morning and after shaking the cobwebs off, we had a family meeting. One of those. I was proposing that we skip Pamplona on Wednesday since the climb, which is actually unnamed, is so severe that it might just be our undoing. Our legs are tired and it is pouring rain. Nobody objected. Not once. So I did some route planning and we did the ride that was already scheduled for today, Saint-Jean-Pied-du-Pont.

 

It had rained all night and it continued to rain in the morning. We put on our rain gear and some warm clothing, though it wasn’t really cold. But it was wet. Since we bailed out on the Pamplona route, today’s big climb was our last real serious alpine ride. We had a nice, flat and wet ride for about an hour, then came the ominous turn to the right. 

 

We bought some cheese and bread at this little market in a tiny village

A rainy day in the Pyrenees

Jon leading the way

The road went straight up and looked like a wall. This also is an unnamed climb in the Basque Pyrenees. We rode on and on and on up a road that was continuously between 11 and 13%. We stopped maybe 3 times and were going so slow that a fast walker could have passed us. And the weather continued to get worse. Fog. Dense fog. And more rain. We could see our breath coming out in puffs.  

We were climbing into the clouds that clung to the mountain sides

 We labored on. At one point the road flattened slightly; to 6%. We felt like we’d won the lottery! Wahoo! But then we started seeing apparitions in the fog. Horses! Dozens of them all over the road. Good thing we were going so freaking slow. They were actually very nice and when I pushed on their haunches they moved away. No big deal, just some crazy folks on a bike.

 

Padon moi, mesdames et messieurs!

It was cold and had we not been climbing we would have been frozen because we were soaked to the skin

 But more poo to decorate the bike!

 

After an eternity, we crested the top and figured out which of the two roads we needed to ride. In this instance I use the word “road” very loosely. The road was paved, kind of, but it was only about 1.5 m wide – about 5 feet. And it was very steep going down. Lorie’s computer said 18% -- I didn’t look at mine because I couldn’t take my hands off the brakes or eyes off the road. Eventually we came to an area where the road traversed a very steep slope. I hope this picture does justice. A 5 foot wide, very rough road with a precipitous drop on one side. It was definitely scary. But we were very careful!

 

The horizontal slash across the hill is our road down

Down we go

 

At one point we scared a flock (covey, herd?) of enormous vultures. I have to figure out what kind of vultures they are, but they were absolutely huge. Much bigger than the biggest bald eagle you’ve ever seen. We were within about 15 feet of them but couldn’t get any photos. Sorry. So very cool to see these guys.

 

We made it down to the valley floor and connected with Jon, who had already picked out a place to eat. We were frozen solid and I was shaking so hard I couldn’t even take off my helmet. But hot coffee and hot soup and lamb chops and fried potatoes and tiramisu came to the rescue and we were put to right in no time. Yum. All for 13 euro.

 

Lamb chops and frites

Tiramisu

Gateau chocolat

 

We rode into our campground at about 1600, got our tents set up, had long hot showers, and had some bread and cheese that we’d bought earlier in the day at the random town that I showed above, at the Monday market. After that, sleep. No problem. The rain had stopped so it looked like a pretty good night. 

 

Home for the night

Vineyards on the steep hills above the campground

A very local wine that is superb

 

Wow. What amazing things have happened in the past few days. The beauty and pain of going over these mountains. And I’ll say it, some pride in accomplishing it (even though we are devilishly slow). Lorie is tough beyond description. Going down steep hills is hard on her but the only time she complains is when I’m going too fast. That’s reasonable and I listen.

I have one more catch-up blog and then I will be up to date. Before I sign off, here's a tip of the hat to good friends Tim and Mollie Gosselin who have just now finished an amazing pilgrimage in Portugal and Spain. Chapeau!

Ride Day 31: Internet Finally! Catching You up with Chalet du Soulor to Arette

I’m not sure where to even start. It has been a long time and so very much has transpired. Most good. :) We are currently in Donastia, Spain (aka San Sebastian). Everything is A-OK and we are thrilled to finally be in Espagna!

And no matter where I start, I am going to be leaving so much out. But here we go.

Let’s start where we left off, with us tired and at the top of the Col du Soulor and tucked into our very alpine chalet. After doing bike maintenance we had a fantastic dinner. Here are a few photos. And we had a bottle of Bourgogne Gamay from 2015 and it was the one of the best wines we have had on this trip. Sleep, then, as we were all really zonked.

 

Lemony rice with champignons

Cantaloupe with jambon

 

Some type of mixed fruit over creme fraiche

Roasted trout with lemon and zucchini

A fantastic wine to wash it down

The following morning dawned sunny and chilly. The chalet provided a hearty breakfast and pots of coffee for us and five Spanish guys who were on a cycling vacation. And we were off. Today’s torture was the infamous Col d’Aubisque and the less well known but equally devilish Col du Marie Blanque.

 

Here is a photo of the road that we rode along to get to the base of the Col d’Aubisque. The road is a bit scary but it is so beautiful that we were wonderstruck. Then we got to the climb itself and the torture started. Very steep and lots of hairpin turns but we made it to the top and admired the Tour de France statues.

 

The horizontal line is the road

There are several tunnels

 

We made it

At the summit of the Col d'Aubisque

 

Looking down the other side

 

 The descent was crazy: steep (up to 15%) and twisty with innumerable hairpins. I was really glad that I had installed new brake shoes yesterday!

 

Once we made it to the valley below we grabbed some food for lunch and took off on our ride to the base of the Col du Marie Blanque. This climb is often used in the Tour, and it will in fact be on the race just a few days from now. We ate lunch at the bottom and then started climbing. It was very hot and the first few kms were between 10 and 11 %. After 6 km there was a food cart and we stopped for a cold lemonade. That helped (mostly the brief rest). We had another 10 km to ride and, happily, the road flattened out for 2 km just above our rest stop. But the rest of the climb was a test, for sure.

 

Ice cold lemonade hit the spot!

Beautiful horses. Lots of them. (It is France....)

 

We needed a rest at the top of the Col du Marie Blanque

We made it.

Happy cyclists.

 

The descent off the Col du Marie Blanque is very steep. But there was a huge herd of cows being moved up to higher pastures and we had to wait for them to pass. They paid us little mind, although I did have to shove one or two of them away from me so that they didn’t step on our toes. They eventually passed and we rode down very carefully because there was so much cow poo and pee all over the road. My bike and legs were covered with the detritus. Nice!

 

Moo and poo!

 

 

It was Sunday afternoon at about 1500 and nothing is open after that hour. We had a camping spot lined up, but needed food. We rode into the tiny town of Arette and immediately discovered that they were in the midst of their annual town Fete – a festival where everyone eats and plays and drinks all night. We must have looked both way, way out of place and famished because this wonderful young woman, Leonie, walked out to meet us and asked if we wanted to join them. Well, yeah, that would be great. So we paid our 20 euro and she brought beer first, then some kind of pork with salad, then potatoes and pork chops, and 2 bottles of wine, then cheese and cherry preserves, then dessert. All the while music was blaring, kids were having a blast, and our next door revelers were consuming way too much wine (we actually perpetuated the same offense, but to a lesser degree). We were done in, but Leonie brought out the local digestive – some red colored booze that tasted kind of like Campari with some fruit in it. Yikes! It was so fun. This is the kind of thing that we stumble across and are just awestruck by the kindness of people and their good nature.

 

Leonie. An angel, for sure. She made sure that we were well fed and had fun (and a lot of beer, wine and digestives!)

Apple galette

Pork and potatoes (tons of it were available)

 Lots of happy Fete-revelers!

 

We rode, carefully, into the campground and got our tent (I had called ahead to get a “glamping” tent because it is a lot easier on her arm – that was a surprise to her and she was pretty chuffed about it). Right next door were four French guys who had been riding for a few days. Two of them wanted to take the tandem for a ride, so off they went. It was a riot of fun. 

 

The campground gang. We had a blast (Lorie, the only woman, took the photo)

 

We all had a good laugh at these guys trying to ride our bike. I think

that they had even more fun!

 

 It was late and we were zonked and so we went to bed. The fireworks from the closing of the fete started at midnight. Dang. Then, the rain started and it was heavy all night. Gonna be a wet ride tomorrow! But that’s OK, we don’t mind too much.