In summary: Things have not been going particularly well although they now appear to be improving.

Day 1: Nightmare tour of the Surrey hills – 80km with 1300m of climbing – torrential rain and howling winds for the last 1/3 of the ride.
Day 2: Sore knees all round – limped to the ferry but should really have had a day off
Day 3: At sea with the vomiting proletariat.
Day 4: Bilbao – torrential rain, sore knees, Guggenheim museum, no obvious viable route from the city, debates about where we should go (or if we should fly home).
Day 5: ** Cheating ** Taxi over the mountains in a southerly direction
Day 6: ½ day cycling in the sun and on a sensible mountain road in the general direction of Seville. (Not sure how we’ll get to Istanbul at present).



The long version:

South to Portsmouth
Our first day was almost enough to make us give up and head back to Wimbledon. The ride started well enough: it was sunny and 10 degrees and so we decided to take the scenic route to Fernhurst – 600m of climbing and 75km in total according to mapmyride.com. As far as I could remember we had one big hill in the whole route and that was it – not entirely true as it turned out. The first 30km were lovely – very narrow, traffic free country roads lined with autumn-coloured trees (weirdly). After 50km and a considerable amount of climbing we were both a feeling pretty unhappy however:

• It was significantly more hilly than it was supposed to be – with regular long and very steep uphill sections.
• Having not cycled for a few months (bad weather/Christmas /Barcelona/far east trip) it was a bit of a shock to the system – sore knees, sore back, sore bum
• Adding 20kg of luggage to a light road bike makes it much harder to climb hills – especially as you need to maintain a certain speed to stay upright.

With 15km to go it was cold, getting dark and the weather had deteriorated to strong winds and heavy rain. We were also completely exhausted but with no other options to hand we had little choice except to continue to the pub that we had booked for the night. Eventually, after a very fast downhill we arrived at the (delightful) Kings Arms in Fernhust – soaking wet, desperately tired and extremely cold. We changed, ate some food and collapsed into bed at 20:30. When I checked the GPS the next day it said we had climbed 1350m over the 80km. That explained a quite lot.

Day 2 should have been an easy day however Reena’s left knee was very sore and so we limped to Portsmouth.

The boat to Bilbao with the proletariat

The Pride of Bilbao is an enormous ferry with a casino, cinemas, swimming pool and numerous restaurants. In my wisdom I had gone a bit wild and booked the most expensive cabin available. This turned out to be a masterstroke given the dreadful weather we experienced over the 36 hour trip.

With the exception of another cycle tourist, the people on the ship appeared to be from one of two categories:

1. Mobile home enthusiasts (typically seen clutching a copy of MMM magazine and debating the pros and cons of rear-lounge vs mid-lounge layouts)
2. Members of the lower orders who had, incredibly, taken the 72 hour round trip solely to buy cheap cigarettes (£3 for a box of 20 in case any of you are interested).

Avoiding the delights of bingo with the masses we went to bed early on the first night only to wake at 4am with the boat lurching violently in heavy seas. This was both incredibly nauseating and a tad dangerous as it wasn’t possible to stand up without crashing into a wall or being hit by something flying around the cabin.

At 09:30 I (bravely) went for a walk to find: the hairdressers were closed (I remain shaggy-haired Steve for a bit longer), two men with tattoos drinking pints of lager and another two men sitting looking out to sea – one of whom was throwing up rather violently into a Tesco’s carrier bag. Other than that the decks were pretty much empty as sensible passengers stayed in their cabins for much of the trip.

After 36 hours of this we arrived in Bilbao.
Bilbao and South
As soon as we had cycled from the ferry and onto dry land the heavens opened – torrential hail/rain. The passport guy said it was a really bad time to be cycling in Northern Spain – we could go south, he said, but it wouldn’t get any better for a long time. Hmm... it wasn’t sounding entirely promising.

After a quick trip to the Guggenheim it was apparent that:

• Bilbao isn’t a hugely interesting city
• The weather was dire and not forecast to improve in the near future (although it had been 17 degrees and sunny last week – typical).
• All routes out of Bilbao involve very steep gradients – not the sort of thing that two unfit cycle tourists with bad knees should be attempting.

So... cycling in almost any direction would hurt Reena’s knee. Going North would get us to Istanbul but the weather would still suck. If we headed South to Seville the weather would be better at least – but wouldn’t get us where we wanted to go.

After much deliberation we decided to cycle to Seville, however with the rain pouring down we (shamefully) arranged a cab to take us south over the mountains to Trespadarmes.
Cycling from Trespadarmes was really excellent – the weather improved (probably coincidentally) and the roads were challenging but not ridiculously steep. We don’t have a plan at the moment as to how (or if) we’ll get to Istanbul but at least we’re a bit happier than we were and are enjoying the cycling. I guess there’s always the North Africa route although I might have to sell Reena and her bike for a camel in Tangiers and go it alone.

That’s all for now. Take care. S&R