Mad Bike Rides

A lovely, lovely ride today. Up into the hills… John had been worried if he could cope with all the hills…but it was no problem. Up and down all day!…

A very chilled day. Blog…wander…breakfast…..wander…read a lot…. A bit of a shame but almost all the streets are in the midst of civil improvement works. The place is bit of…

Slowly building up the kms with John! But another relatively easy day with little climbing! And overall it was a great day of cycling….with lots of variety….from the lagoon-side cycle…

Amazingly…today was the very first day without needing a warm layer to start the ride!! Thankfully…..we had planned another short day to get John into the swing! After yesterday…neither of…

Ready for action! John was worried. Is he fit enough? Will his bum cope? So I planned a nice easy start to his ride. His first battle with the bike….…

The handover day!! John is arriving today (John Williams, chairman of New Zealand Wineries and colleague and friend for many years)…but not until the evening. So a lazy day, long…

A very chilled…lovely city! Calm squares… …and cool streets…. Famous for the Royal Equestrian School (Andalusian horses…), Flamenco…….and of course…Sherry! So - unusually for me really - I decided to…

A very short hop today! So a relaxed start.  Breakfast in the square…but still wrapped up against the freezing cold wind!! Truly….cold! And then an easy…wind-behind-us ride to Jerez.  The…

We were catching the 8am ferry this morning…and were advised to be at the terminal no less than 90 minutes before departure! So an early start…and were actually at the…

After a night’s reflection…Iain decided that his chain was really not going to last!! So he would find a taxi! So…..a full day on my own today! A wistful farewell….…

A difficult day! And if I said we had breakfast at 7pm…you might imagine I have mis-typed an “a”! But no…..true…a series of events and empty landscapes colluded to deny…

What a delightful surprise!! We were both pleasantly surprised at our lovely ride in to the city yesterday….so I was looking forward to a long walk today. And it is…

The wind direction has changed! What a delight!! Two days ago we exhausted both batteries over 100km. Today we barely used one half of one battery for almost  the same distance!!…

We decided to take an off-road route today to get away from the main road! Usually all but impossible in Morocco…but today the additional distance was manageable! It was a…

Today was a tough, tough day!!  In a word…..wind!! 20/25/30kmh wind all day…on the nose!….with 50kmh gusts…turning a comfortable ride into a slog!! Barely 100km…and all batteries exhausted…..and both bodies…

The line on the map says it all really! A relatively short ride today: two days scheduled to Casablanca…but nowhere to stop mid-distance…so we made into a comfortable three day…

A two day rest here…our nominal destination. But….we are nowhere near halfway yet, with the planned diversion up the length of Portugal still to come! But it feels good to…

After another wonderful breakfast….we set off… …on the road to Marrakech! After yesterday’s grind…today was easy! Slightly downhill all the way. Milestones: I like milestones! a reminder of times gone…

A distance record-breaking day! We had spent a good wee while studying the map last night. El Kelaa was the supposed destination…but it looked like an accommodation desert (to say…

What a joy to be able to cycle out of the garage in the morning…instead of manhandling bikes down stairs etc! Another lovely day of riding. Up and down almost…

We planned a monster day today…..after Mr Google had advised us that we were in for well over 2,000m of climbing. And invariably Google underestimates ascents by around 50%! Yikes! …

A well-earned lazy day today. A very long lazy breakfast, some comms, and then a wander around the Medina. A fantastic place to completely lose oneself…as it is a rabbit-warren…

Another big day!  For all our motel’s faults…they did put on a good breakfast and at the early-for-Morocco hour of 7.30! So we were on the road shortly after 8.…

Our first Moroccan rest day is in Meknes about 200km away. But today….we the made the beer- & accommodation- dependent decision to split the journey 70/130km…and stop near Ouezzane!  So…

This is my third visit to Morocco….with my first back in 1978, when I hitchhiked from uk to Fes (& back!). And during that trip Chefchauen stood out as my…

Mmmmmmm……Diq!  Must be up there with Penis-Cola!! Is it our subconscious choosing suggestive names…or just coincidence? An early start this morning as we bade farewell to Corey when his taxi…

A long four night stop here….so plenty of time to do all those things one needs to do!!  First some more photos: And this is the view from our roof…

Corey’s last day in the saddle!! Alas! He has been a great riding companion…and probably deserves a medal for putting up with his mate’s Dad for three weeks! But we…

Another big ride today….as we cycled West to he famous Caminito del Rey: a vertigo inducing walkway hanging off the cliff face! First though….a classic sign at our first coffee…

A great sleep…and a slow start to the day as we gave ourselves the whole morning to have a quick look at Granada! And yes…I think Granada remains my all-time-favourite…

An awful night’s sleep was not a good start!! Worrying about today’s ride (bigger than yesterday!), with a face burning hot from yesterday’s wind, sore cracked heels, tired legs, cramp  in…

A big day!! And our first battery-stress day!! It was a tough one! A full 70km up hill!!  Not a steep gradient…but…a strong head-wind made it feel a lot steeper…

After an early start… …..today we headed inland.  Through lots of citrus groves. St Clements…as oranges jostled with lemons. And here…they are still picking oranges! The sweet smell pervaded everywhere…but…

A very relaxed day! The sun struggled to emerge until the afternoon….and finally it warmed up nicely!! Fingers crossed that that is the end of the rain!! But no worries…as…

I woke early….to silence! No rain!  But that delight did not last long….as the pitter patter of rain on a tin roof dampened the spirits somewhat! We were later told…

A chaotic day!! We woke to the sound of torrential rain. We delayed…and delayed our departure…but it did not stop! So pragmatism was the order of the day. We decided…

An unexpectedly big day today!! I should probably explain: we are rushing a bit, in order to have a big four night stop at the end of our ride! That…

A big day!!! The first 30km or so was on some of best bike paths you will see. Beautifully surfaced (sealed)…to a standard which would leave all UK/NZ roads to…

We said our farewells to Iain this morning….as he headed back by train to Collioure with the third bike. We did not envy him his day of jumping on and…

A rest day today. Time to get the blog started!! Funnily enough with three of us riding…it seems to have been more difficult to find the time to write! So…

Penis Cola….really? A hard ride today? The Best Friend Thirst Ever Had. Taste the Feeling. You might imagine the banter! Actually…those latter expressions are old advertising slogans for Coca Cola!!…

We woke up to the pitter patter of rain. Lots of it! And we had well over 100kms to ride! It had eased a little by the time we left….but…

A day of three halves today. Firstly…a 40km run into the heart of Barcelona…with most of it a repeat of yesterday’s last leg. Railway line and all. But as we…

Another big day…to test sore bums…and tired muscles. But it was simply a lovely ride. Off-road almost the entire day…following trails, rail trails, tracks and lanes. Crossing fords and meadows.…

….with Pals! An early morning start…and a photo to prove it! Myself, Corey and Iain…..ready to go! And we made it…a double-ton ride as well (our own expression for day…

The key to a “relaxing” journey..is of course the bikes!! Last year…..we had plenty of relatively minor issues…but I had one major issue with the Merida/Shimano bike…and fast-decreasing battery capacity!!…

It is difficult to believe that it was nine months since we pulled into Collioure, to complete our epic ride to Istanbul....and back!! Important to mention the 'back' bit, for…