Geoff Jones

High Cadence ride to Beja

Friday 23 February 2018 – My eldest boys birthday!

Blimey, the Portuguese are so miserable I went down at the allotted hour for breakfast to find no sign of life except a living statue of a man in the hall, not a smile or grimace. Eventually, I worked out the restaurant was across the courtyard so as I went the door opened in silence with me followed by the guy and his 3 equally (e)motionless friends. Wow, was I glad to escape?

With only one gear (the front gear worked once or twice) of I revved the gear I had chosen gave me a top speed of~18kph thus enabling me to do a fair bit of climbing >1,600ft without having to walk. In fact, it’s oddly relaxing not having gears as you just let it roll going down but how FixieMick does it I never know.

On the way near Azinhal there were loads of Storks nesting on the top of electricity poles! How do they do it? Interestingly on the vacated nests lots of smaller birds make the undersides into there own nests!

At the final roundabout in Beja where Google said the bike shop was, I looked around and woe and behold not only a bike shop but a full-blown

Specalized Concept Store manna from heaven. It was closed for lunch but the friendly bike fitter (yes he smiled) told me where the restaurant was around the corner and yes an equally friendly English speaking guy fixed me up a veggie pizza, suddenly the world was a brighter place. I had time to check in the Hotel Santa Barbara around the next corner then took the bike to the store.

So two hours and €25 later the bike was totally fixed 🙂 I spent the afternoon sightseeing in Beja, a very pleasant small town, especially with a great bike store!

The Strava is here

and Flickr

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Cycling & walking from Huelva to Mertola, Portugal

Thursday, February 22nd

Well, the walking part was due to mechanical failure, first time in several years of cycle touring 🙁

I started off from Huelva early, stopping at the ham shop to get a quick cheese sandwich, with the firm intention of getting the rear derailleur sorted out, but the shop didn’t open till 10 am and didn’t look too good anyway, although with hindsight I should have stayed!

water syphon — You can just see on the horizon were the water pops up again!

The first part was crossing the estuary by a lovely bike path, I’m sure the twitchers would have loved it, a quick stop for a second breakfast in Aljarque foolishly taking a ‘shortcut’ over what turned out to be a sand dune – when will I learn 🙁 Later it was interesting pedalling alongside the water channels similar to the Maderian Lavadas especially their gigantic syphons to get across the many valleys

Just after ‎⁨El Granado⁩ my little mechanical failure occurred as I was dropping down on the front derailleur the rear derailleur cable snapped in the brake housing (so that’s why it hadn’t been working so well) causing the chain to leap up and wedge itself in the mechanism and I mean wedged! In the end i resorted to violence by kicking the pedal backwards thus freeing the chain & twisting the changer:-( I sort of twisted it back with my pedal spanner, cut the wire and wrapped it around one of the luggage rack screws suitably tensioned for the middle gear 🙁

Of cause I ended up walking the big hills especially the huge one after crossing the border where I had met the most miserable cafe owner to date. Cheered me up no end, not.

I eventually arrived at the Beira Rio hotel in Mertola to meet more miserable faces 🙁 The lady suggested a bike repair place in Mertola so I shot off there, only to find they now fix rotavators etc 🙁

Looking on Google I could see there was a bike shop in Beja a much bigger city and only 30 miles away so I booked a hotel, for tomorrow, near to the shop and hoped it wasn’t just an agricultural or kiddies bike place.

The days Strava is here:

and Flickr here:

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Biking from Seville to Huelva

Posted on February 21, 2018
3 Comments on Biking from Seville to Huelva

Seville mushroom — Part of worlds biggest wooden structure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropol_Parasol

I decided to move on from Seville after one night, I’m just enjoying the biking in the glorious sun too much to spend time mooching around cities.

It took a long time & distance before I was in open country and quietish roads again. Today I was more careful which roads I rode on so as soon as I could see unmade roads I zoomed down on the iPhone and found a longer more made up road 🙂 I also found an Aldi so I could stock up on cereal bars which the Spanish supermarkets don’t seem to do.

Later a laden up touring guy came bombing past me 🙁 I decided to catch up with him to say Hi, I eventually did just about keep up and then lost him again. However, he stopped for lunch in Niebla so I managed to sit and have a very enjoyable chat with him. His name is Martí from Tordera in Spain, he’s cycling to Lisbon as well on his first long-distance trip, and he’s quick. However, he is going via the coast whereas I will be cutting the corner and going inland so I guess we may see each other there. After lunch, we cycled together, once I decided to go to Huelva too as that was the only place with hotels!

The Costa De La Luz hotel is OK a bit basic with an awkward shower, why have it pointing it across the bath rather than along it? but the city centre is close and surprisingly attractive.

Tomorrow it’s Portugal 🙂

Today’s 100km Strava:-

and the Flickr pics

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Bumping along to Saville from Cordova

A bumper biking day a bit like an Audax with over 91 miles covered a lot of it over incredibly poor roads & tracks with each massive bump making me think that some part of the bike will have been broken but thankfully nothing had.

I left Hotel Italia after a good breakfast wondering why Dutch girls are so incredibly tall & speak such excellent English. The first part of the route was along the river no lovely cycle path here just a gravelly track past an area like a favela and folks sleeping under bridges but eventually, I was humming along a decent road with lots of cyclists on the other side.

But all that came to an end along the minor road/tracks around Guadajoz where the top layer of tarmac has partially peeled away leaving an incredibly rough service 🙂 🙂 better if they just scraped it all off!

The last few days it’s been annoying me that I cant access the two highest cogs (smallest gears) on the rear cassette so I decided en-route to slacken the wire this cured the problem but then of cause I can’t now access the two lowest gears (biggest cogs) since I’ve now gone past the mountains I just left it.

Between Los Rosales & La Monta the route took me alongside the rail track on a dirt road with lots of dogs trying to get me 🙁 most effective treatment seems to be look them in the eye and scream f… off!! rejoining the now very busy A-8005 it made me think which is worse Artics or Dogs 🙁

Amazing to see the vast orange groves ripe for picking all the Olive’s now left behind strange how monoculture works.

I made it to Seville just before dark arriving at the Don Paco hotel in the centre just after 6 pm just in my T-shirt & shorts all the leg/arm warmers removed in the heat & sun, splendid riding weather.

Here is the Strava:

and Flickr, not so many Canon pics today ~~and the wretched Flickr uploader still not accessing the iPhone pics~~!

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