November 2, 2014
Change in Direction: Sagres to near Aljezur
No singing bird like the previous morning where I'd camped at that ruin farmhouse. These days I'm feeling lazy about getting on the road early. Although the days are drawing in, there are still enough daylight hours to ride a hundred kilometres. Anyway I have a bit of a lay-in until nearly nine. Have a shower and clean shave which will keep me looking and smelling sweet until I reach Lisbon in a few days. Then spend a long time sitting over my morning tea and leave at ten.
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Once I've ridden out the kilometre long spur campsite access, I turn right in the opposite direction to Sagres on the road out to Capo Do Vicencio, the most south western point in Europe. There's a blustery south westerly making going laboriously slow on the couple of kilometres out to where I see a lighthouse on a clifftop. There are many campervans parked in laybys along the way, their occupants having walked the hundred or so metres to the edge of the cliff on the left. The sea air invigorating and view stunning.
Not many go through the gates into the lighthouse when I get there as I think you have to pay to enter. It may be interesting to see the workings inside, but I like most are content to see it from the outside. There's a tubular steel bicycle wheel sculpture with a small "kilometre zero" sign beside. I lean the bike against the concrete block base and take a photo. Someone has left a padlock on the wheel inscribe with names "Chris & Eva" and a picture of a bike ridden by a boy-rider and a girl on the back.
At that moment a group of Asian tourists are coming out the gates of the lighthouse and an attractive young woman is talking loudly at the head of the group. They all grin when I turn to face them and it looks obvious they are talking about me and the bike. The girl is instantly approachable and I say hello and she hot foots it to arms length and asks me in flawless English where I'm from. Where are you from I ask "China" she replies. She giggles and laughs a lot as I tell her my story as her group continue to walk to and get into a black Range Rover and I don't miss my opportunity of a great photo of her posing by my bike. She passes me her iphone. Then she has to get a facial shoot of us together. Luckily I'd just showered and shaved and I didn't put her off with BO and stubble.
I ride back to Sagres in a tailwind. I remember its Sunday, but there is a small supermarket open in town. And later I would see an Intermarche open on the way out of town, so a complete shutdown on Sundays seems not to happen here. I stock up. In the evening I'll be eating boiled potatoes. A change from pasta. Simple and appetising and whatever I don't eat will be fried for breakfast.
I ride further pass lots of open surf shops and I find a coffee shop with wifi, where I spent over an hour on this site. It is approaching two when I set out on the road north. I keep on my fleece top as it is still windy and a sea haze is blocking out the sun most of the time. I see rain off at sea.
There's quite a bit of climbing away from the coast up upon a plain. Then later after descending and passing through a village of white houses, the road follows a narrow valley with steep wooded slopes either side, followed by a climb out to a summit where there is a ruin farmhouse which I check out as a possible campsite. But the backyard wherein I look, although level, is a little tight space-wise and overgrown with big briars. Not good if they come in contact with the tent material. The place would've been great otherwise as there are absolutely no other houses near.
I descend a long way to where there are houses everywhere and camping possibilities few, until I come to a pine plantation, a few hundred metres from a house with a barking dog, but where I pitch the tent is well hidden.
Today's ride: 54 km (34 miles)
Total: 7,694 km (4,778 miles)
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