Arrived today (last third of October 2022) at the hotel in Alicante. Nice spacious room on the first floor. Usually the rooms of this hotel chain are rather tiny. But it’s wheelchair accessible (1st floor) so plenty of space for me and my bicycle. Tried to get a bike box today at three different bike store locations. Two owner owned and one french chain (sporting goods). No luck. Seems they are very unhelpful. Absolutely not comparable with the US or Singapore and many other countries I have been before. I would even pay for the box 20 bucks. Maybe I’m more lucky next Monday in Alicante. There are several stores with high ratings. Whatever that means.
In the meantime couple weeks passed and I’m back in Durbach/Germany. In Alicante I could get a nice (and large) bicycle box at a bicycle shop. They didn’t even charge for the box. Friendly staff and owner.
But let’s start from the beginning of my last blog update:
I thought it’s possible to update my cycling blog every couple days at the campgrounds but the internet connections are rather miserable. No chance to upload any pictures or the like in a decent time.
The first three days after leaving Logroño was pretty windy and chilly. But the wind is not always coming from behind. Honestly, sad but that’s (cycling) life. On the fourth day after Logroño there was virtually no wind. The bloody windmills didn’t spin. What a beautiful and nice view IMHO. The next days the weather was very pleasant. Right temperature for the time of the year. Very nice cycling except the distances to the campgrounds were either to long or to short for one day. And not on every stretch were campgrounds. Sometimes over 200+ KM to the next one so I had to do lots of detours on my trip. Inland the campground density is very sparse. Even along the pilgrims route Camino de Santiago there was one campground already closed for the season. They closed September, 15. Unbelievable but true. The next days and weeks I got closer and closer to my actual intermediate destination, Pico del Veleta in the Sierra Nevada, Andalusia. But before the big climb I took one day off in Granada and visited next day the Alhambra. But what I saw left me speechless. These stupid and nefarious smoking tourists used the fortification wall as an ashtray. Unbelievable. I my eye not the slightest bit better than the destroyers of the Buddhas of Bamiyan.
Next day I left Granada (still shocked) and cycled to the next campground along the way to Pico del Veleta. It wasn’t even 25 KM and just 300-400 meters climb. An easy going day except regarding the weather forecast for the next day. Strong wind with gusty winds (60+ Km/h). Honestly, couple kilometers after I left the campground (still dark and past 7:30 pm) next morning I didn’t believe I gonna make it to the second highest peak on the Iberian Peninsula. BTW the highest paved road in whole Europe. The first 5-6 Km were very steep (17% +) but it wasn’t that bad because I left all my stuff at the campground (except some food, tools and warm clothes). The road to Pico del Veleta is a dead end, unless you can cope with very bad Spanish gravel roads. After the steep stretch it was a smooth climb. Nothing more than 10% and long parts under 7%. Actually a nice climb if there was not that nasty wind. At an elevation of 2500 meters the road is closed (gate) for motorized vehicles, except for locals and maintenance vehicles. The Guardia Cilvil is patrolling the road frequently. But even the stretch from the campground to the closed road there was almost no car traffic. Thanks to late off-season and mid of the week. Despite the headwind , I almost still can’t believe it, it wasn’t that bad. Except on average one or two gears lower than without the wind. But the wind and gusts from the side were really bad. But before to loose the balance and hurt myself I decided to push the bicycle on the stretches with the strong wind. Altogether it was less than 1 Km bike pushing. Sure, the last 2 Km before the top the pavement was in very poor condition, but I knew that and the last 1000 meters I pushed the bicycle because the bitumen almost disappeared. At the top I couldn’t believe I made it. The lowest official altitude is 3394 m.a.s.l. I stayed at the top for about 1 hour taking lots of pictures and enjoying the spectacular scenery of the Sierra Nevada. The ride back to the campground was pretty easy. It was going down for about 2.5 Km. Total climb this day was about 2.8 Km. Impressive under those windy circumstances.
To my final destination it was still aver 450 Km and just one campground along the way. So I stayed two nights at hotels. Just the last night was on a campground. It was already past 9 pm and dark when I arrived there. Huge campground (probably run by Germans or Netherlanders) with big restaurant, pool, playground etc. But the staff/owner were very friendly. the reception was already closed but they opened it for me so I could pay for the night and had not to wait till next morning. So I could leave early.
On the leg from Granada, respectively Pico del Veleta to Alicante I had some very nice back roads. Very remote and almost uninhabited but challenging roads (pavement). Hopefully I come back some day after a wet and rainy autumn and spring. I heartily wish it for the people living there.
The last day of my trip through 6 European countries was a short ride of about just 70 Km and I felt a little bit tired. But in the early afternoon I finally arrived at the booked hotel. The lady at the reception was really very friendly. Despite I booked the hotel over the internet (giant hotel booking site) I got a discount of about 10% of the total bill. Very polite.
BTW: The last 2 KM from the hotel to the airport was along the freeway (No bicycles sign). I used the online map from the de facto map monopolist. Fortunately it was still very, very early in the morning. Next time I stick with my preferred offline smartphone map based on OSM. I used the latter on my 7700 Km journey over 98%. For POI like supermarkets/campgrounds etc. the monopolist is slightly better, because the data is more accurate (online vs. offline).
Below is the cycled route from South Western Germany to Alicante via France, Spain and Portugal.
