A perfect day!

March 8, 2022

Day 18 - Trespaderne to Bilbao

Wow! I thought yesterday was good, but today may have it beaten. A bit less variety in the scenery perhaps, but it was just relentlessly breathtaking. Enormous mountains, green rivers, forested hills, and unbelievable cliffs and peaks and juts and strata.

We weren't on a perfectly graded, perfectly smooth, untrafficked path, but the road wasn't too bad. Not hugely busy and most drivers are pretty good at not passing too close.

And it has a goddamn castle on the other side!?

We stopped in a gas station for lunch and bought a 1kg tortilla con patate and some peach juice, which we shared sitting on our camping chairs on their lawn.

We even passed a mountain so impressive it was a named tourist attraction - Monte de San Miguel.

Did I mention it was downhill the whole way, with an intermittent tailwind? Apparently the first 20-30km were actually slightly uphill, but we didn't even notice! And the second half was DEFINITELY downhill! And very popular with road cyclists. We flew along for miles and miles through a Swiss looking valley, with horned brown cows, lush green fields, cute chalet farms and villages, and the unbelievable rock faces which loomed around every corner. It morphed into a distinctly Basque vibe as it continued - lots of X's and K's on the signs!

Honestly, I would say my favourite descent ever! Unfortunately, there wasn't much of a shoulder and not many places to stop for a picture.

The weather held out as well. The forecast was for rain and snow in both our start and finish locations, but miraculously we only saw a few brief spots of rain. The sun even came out! And the temperatures were definitely on the rise as we progressed north.

LOL j/k of course it wasn't perfect. The last 10km into Bilbao was pretty awful - my komoot route took us up two hills, with signs for 10% and 12% gradients, that I'm sure we could have avoided, to a road that didn't exist. The descent was so steep we had to walk it. Then into Bilbao itself on a busy main road, then a confusing maze of alleys and one way streets before we eventually found our hostel nearly 8 hours after setting off.

Not what you want at the end of a long day...

Today's ride: 80 km (50 miles)
Total: 629 km (391 miles)

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Scott AndersonYou might have already planned how to leave Bilbao, but if if you have time I really recommend biking down the river to the coast (there’s a good bike route on the right bank) and then following the coast east toward Plasencia and Bermeo. Here’s how it looked when we biked the other direction: https://www.cycleblaze.com/journals/girona2014/bilbao/.
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2 years ago

Lorenzo JaryTo Scott AndersonWow, some amazing tours you've done there Scott, and how fit you must be!
We are already a bit nervous about the ride up the coast - not huge elevation but lots of very steep little-ish climbs.
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2 years ago