October 10, 2019
Zamora loop
We begin the day by running a few errands, and then walk across town to visit Zamora’s famous cathedral. The errands, both completed successfully: to the pharmacy, to pick up lip balm for Rachael’s sore cracked lips (after nine straight days of sun, the exposure is catching up with us); and to a hardware store (which reminds me of our Ace Hardware back home, because it has seemingly everything packed into a small, dense place) to find a replacement for one of our current adaptors that we apparently left stuck in a wall outlet two weeks ago.
Zamora, like every other large town we’ll be visiting in this region, has a significant, important cathedral that can’t be missed. The ones in this immediate region are a series of interrelated Romanesque wonders: Salamanca’s Old Cathedral inspired Zamora’s, which in turn inspired both Toro’s church that we saw yesterday and Salamanca’s new cathedral.
We were there for a few hours, Visiting the adjacent castle and sculpture garden in addition to the cathedral. I just going to throw all of those photos into a separate photo dump post, or else I’ll never get around to today’s loop ride. This is a cycling blog, so the biking activity takes priority!
Our ride begins, once more, by crossing the Douro.
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Today’s ride is a slender loop south to Penausende, a small village roughly 20 miles south of here. The ride was picked more or less at random, by culling through the network of minor provincial roads for a loop that looked about the right distance and difficulty for our interests today.
There’s a bit of climbing involved, but not much. Penausende, the high point of the ride, sits about 800’ above Zamora. There is some minor rolling involved, but it’s a pretty steady uphill pull the whole way: a 20 mile climb with 800 feet of climbing works out to something like a 0.5% grade. Not too taxing, especially since we have about a 10 mph tailwind pushing us up this steep inclined plane.
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Penausende, just past the halfway point in the ride, makes the natural spot to stop for lunch. We’re happy to find a bench in the shade, and eat our standard bread, cheese and meat scraps while watching a timid calico cat circle us at a safe distance in hopes that we’d leave something behind.
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The ride back to Zamora mirrors the one out - primarily downhill, with minor rollers. One important difference though is the wind, which seems to be strengthening as the day progresses and is now blowing directly into our faces.
We make it back to our room about 5, with another fine ride through the Meseta Central behind us. We’ve been experiencing an exceptional string of fair weather to accompany these great rides - nine straight, and counting. More! We want more!
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Video sound track: Mas Es Amar, by Enrique Eglesias
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About sundown, we walk up into town to a restaurant that looks attractive from its reviews on Google Maps. Reviews sometimes lie though, as is the case here. We don’t care much for the rather bland meal, but we really don’t care much for our server, a surprisingly inattentive and nearly rude young woman with a severe appearance. We have so few experiences like this that it’s always a bit of a shock, and leaves a sour aftertaste to an otherwise fine day.
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Ride stats today: 40 miles, 1,500’; for the tour: 533 miles, 24,400’
Today's ride: 40 miles (64 km)
Total: 533 miles (858 km)
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