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Day 12
So it's been another windy day today, it's helped at times, where as other times it's repeatedly done it's best to push me into the middle of the road!
Left Perpignan before 9am, and made my way out of the city heading south, and towards the mountains that signified the border with Spain. Before embarking on the mountain roads, I made a quick detour via McDonalds... not for food this time, simply the WiFi!
After having caught up on emails and uploaded the previous days blog, I set about tackling the climb to the border. Have to say I was a little daunted by the fact I was now within sight of snow-capped mountains, but luckily for me the road I was using steered well clear, and actually followed a path through the mountains, with some climbs, but nothing too taxing.
The border was actually nothing special, just a bustling tourist town, a queue of traffic and no-one even asked to see my passport. Was straight through, and out the other side before midday!
I must have done a decent amount of climbing on the French side, as I had some fantastic shallow gradients to make my way down the other side of the mountains, and enjoyed a decent amount of 30mph plus descents.
One thing has struck me about Spain, unless I'm getting this very wrong there seems to be quite a few "ladies of the night" looking to make some money hanging out at lay-bys. I'm assuming they're marketing their wares to the other thing in Spain I've noticed, lorries (more specifically the drivers) and lots of them! It's not fun when you're already tackling a cross wind, then countless lorries rocket past you and cause further disturbance in the air around you. I've decided they're all cheap skates, as there's a perfectly good motorway that runs parallel to the toad I'm using, but they obviously can't be bothered to pay to go on it!
Anyways, I reached my hostel in Girona without too much trouble. Realised it's Barcelona v Real Madrid tonight, and whilst asking the hostel receptionist where was best to watch the match bumped into 3 Americans who confess not to being football fans, but figured they would catch the game whilst they're here, so looks like I have some company tonight!
- comments
Alex Chris! Sounds awesome and you know you've gotta support Real Madrid even if it is just so that you can have a look at Ronaldo in his shorts... Ok no maybe that's just me! Hope your knees are holding up? It seems that mentally you are doing great I just hope your body can keep up! Thinking about you every day, your amazing journey and of course it's deserving cause. Stay safe xxx PS don't let the Americans get you drunk, especially if they are coloradoians! Xxx
Dad Well done on reaching Spain in time for a small local football match. A brilliant effort - and it's good to see the sponsorship is still edging towards £3k. Now you've done France and various mountains you know why so many of the French have those little engines on their push bikes. Perhaps a new side line for Spokes. Hope you have a great night with Chris tomorrow in Barcelona. Then just think of the fun you'll have assembling that furniture. See you at the weekend. x
Mike Chris, brilliant, I have just caught up with your Girona e-mail although by now you will have met up with Chris J. A fantastic achievement! Annie and I know just how up and down the roads were (next time try Holland) and to do over 100 miles on that first day was awesome. To do it unaided without us getting in the way to tell you we had found "this marvellous coffee shop round the corner" when you just wanted to keep cycling probably made the last few days better than you might have feared. Again, well done, well done, well done! Look forward to catching up and saying it in person. Mike.