Spain: the further adventures

So what do you do when a family bikepacking adventure is equal parts agony and ecstasy? Why, you write a book about it of course! 

Tentative title: Camino sock wars

There was so many little things, so many details that happened during our trip in Spain while travelling to and along the amazing Camino de Santiago that it doesn’t lend itself to a quick blog post. Over the past 6 months when not just simply living the tedious moments of everyday existence, we have been jotting down all the details of our month in Spain, trying to suitably encapsulate the moments in words before the passing of time discolours the intensity and erodes the definition of our memories. 

The book is at least half a year away, so below is a brief overview of our time in Spain.

History is everywhere in Spain, as we are citizens of the new world, Medieval towns centres were entrancing.

Canals and their accompanying gravel roads provided a quiet link between town centres as we made our way across northern Spain toward the Camino de Santiago.

 

As good as online maps and navigation apps are, always question when a displayed route goes over blue water. This de-couplement of the trailer and stretching of legs occurred because we encountered a drainage channel when "navigating" a "road" through marshland beside a lake.  Please note the dear little valkyrie wearing the purple slipper shoes and the total abandonment of socks. It was un-seasonally cold weather for us Antipodean campers and this added to the severity and frequency of unhappy toddler incidents.

As we neared the Camino a colder front blew down from France. We missed snow by 25km. It may look nice and sunny in this Medieval church courtyard, but there were gales and sleety flurries around us as we headed for Pamplona. We would like to say that it was wonderful to reach Pamplona and to finally be on the Camino Frances, but we could only say that if we ignored the misadventures had finding accommodation, the bout of toddler food poisoning and the continued challenging weather. Oh! of note is how darn accurate those weather apps are in Spain. Rain fell within 5 to 10 minutes of the predicted time!

Much to the delight of other pilgrims on the Camino, we battled the unseasonal cold weather and pottered along the trail, noticing the snow flurries on the ridge line in the distance and seeking shelter behind the mountain peak from the blustery winds.

Some days in the middle of our jaunt where what we expected of Spain in Spring, and we were able to understand why the cold water of these ancient baths were enjoyed. Unfortunately this wasn't to last.

 Another bout of food poisoning for our dear toddler was just starting to end by the time this side road picnic occurred, and we recognised that a difficult decision needed to be made. We were behind our travel schedule and our dear little valkyrie needed rest time.

Our solution was to temporarily split up. The girls were going to bus ahead and I was to blast along 220km in two days to meet them in Astorga. It was mad for us both. I smashed out 160km in the first day trying the cover as much ground before the next wave of forecast rain hit, while "D" wrangled bike, unfamiliar trailer and our sick little one, all while searching for accommodation in new town.

Here by the medieval walls of Leon you can see that the forecast rains did indeed catch up with me. At times that day it was a down right bog-fest, but I soldiered on and met my dear ones in Astorga.

From Astorga we continued onwards in unseasonally cold weather to find crosses on mountain tops...

... Templar castles...

... and required a short day or two, due to frequent rain and I going into caloric deposit.

Yet we soldiered on and discovered mountain top monuments among the milling pilgrim walkers.

Finally, our destination, The Cathedral of Saint James in Santiago was reached in inclement weather.

In hindsight there are things that we could have done differently, yet there are things that we did that worked fantastically on our tykepacking expedition along the Camino. Perhaps the hard learned lessons to successful tykepacking needs to be the next post.

Don't worry Camino de Santiago, we will return... just perhaps not for a few years yet.

Longrange Spainish weather forecast: Toddler storm front increasing inseverity.

Leaving Barcelona

On Sunday morning, after wrangling two mostly loaded bikes and a trailer down five stories of narrow apartment stairs into the entrance vestibule, one at a time, we then wrangled our Antipodean child into warm clothes and downstairs onto the sidewalk. Wrangling the cumbersome bikes was the easier job. No amount of pre departure preparation was going to see Anika happy about putting on warm clothes. The past two days in Barcelona had told us that much, and moving the dear little one to a intended departure schedule only made matters worse. Its safe to say that our temporary Barcelona neighbourhood was happy to see our noisy convoy depart.

 The Medieval bridge in Martorell

As per usual, all was fine once you start moving on a bike, Anika settled, the day was warmed by the glowing sunshine and the metropolis slowly disappeared behind us as we purposely rumbled along roads, gravel paths, and Camino pathways toward our first stop of Cervera. We saw medieval bridges, functional antique carousels and were even almost rammed by a crazed wild boar as it charged out of a field and across the road (its amazing what a bit of frantic yelling will do). All these new distractions could not erase the 100km that we had to traverse while dragging our unfamiliarly loaded bikes gradually up hill into a mild headwind. It was a big first day for us all, we were all unhappy, even the aged thrashings of the 'oh so Aussie' Hoodoo Guru's from the Bluetooth speaker were not enough to distract us from our collective funk. Thankfully the medieval ridge line silhouette of Cervera rose ahead of us. Today raised an important concern; were we going to be able to do what we planned to do each day? We certainly were not going to be able to do another 100km tomorrow. Tomorrow was going to have to be cut in half.

 Day 1

Barcelona to Cervera

Distance: 104km

Riding Time: 8hrs45min 

Average speed: 11.9km/hr

 Cervera

Medieval Anzac Magic

Cervera is an amazing medieval town. Of course there is many other such towns in Spain, but this was the first that we experienced, and so the most memorable. Air B&B was the avenue for sourcing our accommodation, as campsites were understandably non existent in a fortified, ridge top, medieval town. We stayed in a house on the ancient main street which had been converted into three ultramodern accommodation apartments. It was cosy, well appointed and incredibly well priced. As we only had 54km to travel this day, we got up had the next sock battle of our trip and then pottered around Cervera finding tasty baked goods and foodstuffs for the days journey. Presently the sun rose at 7am and set at 9.30pm, we had lots of time to travel our 54km.

"Anzac" poppys

Fittingly today was Anzac day and we came across fields of red poppies. They lined the roads growing wild. {For those from elsewhere: Anzac day is the Australian war memorial holiday and the red poppy is the official memorial flower.} Anika delighted in asking for a poppy till we pulled over and gave her a botanical sample that lasted perhaps for the next hour, then she asked for another.

Google's map app on my phone was the navigator for the day. Most times it works very well when you select directions for bicycle, but somehow it doesn't fully recognise stairs. Yes, after riding country roads, dirt roads and beside canals, we came the the dam wall, and the stairs that we had to ascend to the top of the dam wall so that we could get to our campground on the other side.
Thankfully it wasn't many stairs, about 35 in all, and decoupling the trailer and wrangling the fully loaded bikes was all that was needed.

 The Stairs!

Our Camp was in Sant Llorec de Montgai at Camping La Noguera. An impressively large caravan and campground that must absolutely heave in summer when everyone migrates to escape the oppressive heat on the plains. It wasn't Summer, it was Spring that was running late, so the caravan park was a literal ghost town. We were soon to discover why.

Day2

Cervera to Sant Llorec de Montgai

Distance: 54km

Riding Time: 3hrs47min 

Average speed: 14.4km/hr

Camp beneath the Oak trees

Camino Tykepacking

How is it that I come to be in a plane descending on Spring time Barcelona with my dear wee daughter and wife after enduring 23hours of travel? Well, really it's my dear wife's fault. 

"D" upon my return from the CBNZB said: "You're not going without me next time." Which of course ment that I was not going to be going on an overseas bikepacking trip without the dear little Valkyre. But where in the world is suitable for Tykepacking? I'm certain there are lots of options on planet Earth for riding self supported with your child, but we decided to ride the Camino de Santiago in Spain. Being a historic pilgrimage trail for centuries the Camino has frequent supply points in regular frequent towns, cities and localities, perfect for toddler distraction, feeding and toileting. 

The French way of Camino starts in the town of St. Jean Pied de Port near the French/Spanish boarder in the Pyrenees mountains. Excess baggage fees on local European flights were a headache for taking our bikes, so we decided that riding from our international arrival city was the go. 

So here we are today, the 24th of April, after invading our little Barcelona apartment for two days with at times a cranky toddler and Bikepacking kit, about to depart for a 6 day ride to Roncesvalles. Roncesvalles is the first Spanish town on the Camino. We have planned 21days to get from extensive Barcelona to Santiago, let's see what adventures unfold on the way!