#73 Monegros and the Sub-Pyrenees

eBiking East across northern Spain, through the flat Monegros semi-desert and then through the lush hills of the Sub-Pyrenees to the rugged Costa Brava coast on the Mediterranean.

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Sunday 13 October 2019.  Huesca • Monzón |108 km|

Too much headwind – and failed navigation.

[A mild day, completely overcast to begin with; sunny later.  18 to 25°C temperature range.  Battling a strong headwind at 20km/h directly from the east all day.  Some quiet single-lane asphalt and well-shouldered caraterra (main road); also some floating gravel surface and a short stretch of almost impassable rutted 4wd double-track and single track.  The route was very haphazard and took in:  Fañanás, Blecua, Pertusa, Laperdiguera,  Barbastro, Castejón del Puente and Monzón]

Well, what a bloody awful day that was!  Everything was going swimmingly until I got to the town of Barbastro at 1.10pm after cycling 65 km from Huesca.  Then it all went kind of pear-shaped.

The countryside is less barren around Barbastro due to intense irrigation; mainly of maize, grapes (the ‘Somotomo’ D.O.C. of Aragón), and temperate fruits.

It is often that the wait-staff in Spain are quite rude and arrogant, but the guy in the first restaurant I tried in Barbastro will live long in my memory as the new champion in that department. We exchanged a few unpleasant words before I left in disgust. Words (from me) like ‘What’s your problem mate, did you wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning or are you always so full of shit’ (¿Qual es tu problema, Tío?  ¿Te despertaste el lado de la cama equivocada, o siempre estas llena de mierda?) . The girl in the next restaurant, where I actually did stop, wasn’t much better. The words this time were ‘If you can’t understand me, just tell me so but stop f-ing-well ignoring me.’  That didn’t work, but the customer-with-attitude thing the Spanish are so adept at, did. Just state what you want – without inflection, and definitely no please or thank-you, and talk over the top of whoever necessary – and voila that’s it.  Your order will arrive eventually, accompanied by a dirty scowl. It’s all about one-upmanship with these people. Pecking-order. And foreigners rate below camareros (wait-staff). The food (a very plain hamburger) was the worst food I’ve eaten in Spain. The thick chunk of meat-ish substance was still blue and un-defrosted in the centre. Serves me right for arguing, eh!

But these tribulations were merely inconvenient. I had stopped for 2h 20m in that restaurant (mainly to see the end-score in the Japan-Scotland rugby match on their WiFi). But no sooner was I was out of town than Ziggy’s GPS guidance had me going up a steep and stony 4wd trail that climbed to the highest point around these parts, and the surface only deteriorated further on the descent.  Several times I reset the destination to ‘trick’ the GPS into a different route calculation, but to no avail – Ziggy was lost!   So I ignored his route completely, since it wasn’t a real road anyway, and just aimed for a tarmac road that I figured must be in the valley somewhere.

Ziggy was content with this new road when we encountered it – that means he ‘snapped’ to follow it and happily resumed tracking to my selected destination of Balageur.  However, after only a few kilometers Ziggy insisted I had to ride down through a vineyard and cross to the other side of the river we were following.  But this river ‘crossing’ turned out to be a dam spillway that I couldn’t go on due to a security fence on the other side of the river.  By then, I was already in a small ravine on a rutted single-track footpath, and I had to skull drag the heavy bike back up out of, to the amusement of three guys fishing a kilometer down-stream whose advice I had ignored about whether the road went through when I passed them going the other way.

I found my way back to a single-lane tarmac road and decided to aim for Lleida instead of my original destination, because by now it seemed fairly certain that Balaguer doesn’t have a regular road going to it from where I was.  But as soon as I was back onto the busy N-123 highway, the front tyre went flat from a thorn picked up in all that off-roading (the hard tarmac drives it in). It was already getting late by now so I decided to just fill the tube with sealant foam and hope it would last as far as Lleida, still 50 km away.  But I didn’t even make it to the next town, which was Monzón, 15 km away, and had to pump it up again twice just to get that far.

So I decided, after much soul-searching and then after much campground, hostel and hotel searching, in that order, to stay in Monzón.  No campground, naturally, and both hostels were out of business.  According to three separate local couples I asked, all ‘middle-aged’ well-heeled locals, there was only one choice – Hotel Mas.  But they all warned me emphatically that it was muy muy caro (ie. looking at me and my mode of transport, they considered it to be well out of my price range), and that I’d be better off continuing on to Lleida.  Easy for them, they didn’t have to ride there on a bicycle with a deflating tyre.

Well, Hotel Mas in Monzón is all style over substance, but it still deserves its 4 stars, and was quite reasonably-priced too, at €59.  It’s owned by the Mas family.  They even have a logo.  It’s a very simple one; it goes < g;MF > (for Grupo Mas Fabrica, apparently). Probably cost them a million.  Like the Commonwealth Bank one did, and that is marginally still the most stupid one I’ve ever come across, but g;MF is also mighty bloody silly if you ask me.  The mood lighting behind the bar has the logo spelled out in polystyrene letters lit up with LED lights, followed by ‘COOL BAR’.  Except my TV remote batteries were flat, and so the manager(ess) just nicked the batteries for the ‘g’ and, having previously also nicked the batteries for the ‘MF’, it kind of spoilt the whole effect.  Mark my words: this is how things go to pot in the world, and this episode just about sums up the Spanish psyche.

And don’t get me going on about the idiosyncratic elevators. Style over practicality in abundance.   There’re only six floors and I suppose its clever to arrange the numbers in three columns in a reverse ‘S’ (with a ‘0’ and a ‘-1’ thrown in as well, and the 6th, being the penthouse, has to have its own row in the middle at the top).  Trouble is, you can’t actually read any of the numbers – not in the daytime anyway  – because they’re touch-buttons so dimly back-lit in purple behind frosted glass, and in the glass-sided lift in the day-time the sun is stronger, so you just have to guess where it is that you thought you might have seen your number previously, in it’s illogical location.  Not only that – and I know you won’t believe me, but I tested it – you have to randomly select another floor first to go to your actual floor of choice.  I’m sure this is a mistake in programming and not a ‘design’ thing. The manager(ess) confirmed this oddity, and thought it was quite humorous.  And the funny thing is, it does actually go to the other random floor first.  So why not just put in your floor and then punch-in another inconsequential one thereafter, I thought?  Well, I tried that, and it didn’t work.  It’s as though it knows you’re bluffing, and just refuses to move at all until you play the game.  Of course, I could be wrong about this.

And I never did find the original puncture either, which I attempted to do in the bathtub and in the pristine surroundings of my 4-star room, with messy bike bits all over the place.  This is because with foam in the tube the puncture sealed itself as soon as I exposed it to air (but then leaked again when fitted back and fully pumped-up).  I had two brand new tubes –  the first one split as soon as I installed it and I had to use the other one, so I’m down to no spares again.  Ugh, please no more dirt, Zig.

Monday 14 October 2019.  Monzón • Agramunt |93 km|

I fell off!

[A different kind of day, weather-wise – heavily overcast and threatening rain all morning; later, heavy rain and thunderstorms all around.   Strong headwind all morning, up to 25km/h from the East, but died away when the rains came.  The route took in: Taramite, Alfarràs, Algerri, Castelló de Faranya, Balageur, La Sentin de Sió, Les Ventoses and Agramunt]

I didn’t stump up the extra cost for breakfast at the Mas, but suffered an interminably long wait for my coffee and slice of tortilla at a bar downtown instead.  They’ve got this annoying habit of half-serving you, then going off to half-serve some other customer and so on until they run out of customers to half-serve, before reverting to each in turn to complete your order. Maybe they’re afraid you’ll leave if you don’t get prompt attention, but that you’ll stay once you are committed.  It worked for me – I would have left after 10 minutes, but ended up waiting almost ½ an hour, in a tiny café with maybe 10 customers all up.

The way out of Monzón, a sizeable town of 18,000,  was very interesting and quite lovely.  There I was buenas días-ing to all the old black-stockinged ladies as I was ramping through the densely-packed poor neighbourhoods (they’re called barrios here too, like in Latin America), with their steep winding narrow streets up the hillside under the town’s main historical attraction, the Castle of the Knights Templar, that dominates the heights.

I’d only gone 15km out of Monzón when Ziggy again tested my patience by sneakily routing me onto a dirt track through irrigated orchards.

This track crossed a low ridgeline via a short but very steep hill.  I didn’t quite make it to the top – the bike reared up and fell over about 2m from the crest.  No damage done to self or equipment, but I had to unload everything and scramble it all up to the top in 4 stages.

At least I was going in a straight line though, unlike yesterday, and soon rejoined the main road heading east, the A-140, that I should have been on all the way from the hotel this morning.  Ah well, never mind – I got to see some charming neighbourhoods (and also some vicious chained-up guard dogs too, poor things).

After 50km, I knew I was finally into Catalunya when I passed through the village of Algerri.

So far, there wasn’t too much in the way of hills, but the 25km/h headwind meant I had to use TURBO mode to even make headway on the flat and I was fast draining the batteries.  So at 1.10 pm, after only 63 km travelled and with only 25% charge remaining, I stopped in the sizeable town of Balageur to recharge while having lunch.

I lunched in Bar Taberri, opposite the Roman Bridge in the centre of town, where the young waiter was pleasant but his awful crabby owner-lady – who never spoke a word to me the whole time – told him to put three, one-euro supplement charges onto my bill.  This was for sitting-around for so long, I suppose (I was in there for over 2 hours).  The waiter at first tried to tell me it was a supplement for having the sepia (cuttlefish – and it was nice too!), but I pointed out that, no, sepia is included in the menú del día price, so he just shrugged and said the jefa (that’s the boss-lady) told him to do it.   That’s unprecedented!  But I argued no further, not wanting to cause a scene.

On the plus side, it had started raining as soon as I arrived and rained heavily the whole time I was in that bar, and stopped just as I was leaving.  First rain in 2 weeks in Spain, since the Picos de Europa just outside Santander, in fact.  It did turn out to be a false rain stop though, because it soon started again and continued for the next 2 hours right up until I stopped cycling for the day.

I’d hoped to get as far as Calaf, but there were still angry storm clouds and thunder gathering all around me, so rather than run the risk of being struck by lightning I decided to call it a day early, and at 5pm hove to at an unremarkable truckers hotel called Blanc i Negre (in the Catalán language), in the unremarkable town of Agramunt. The people there were friendly, the bike and I were safe; and it was excellent value at €34 for accommodation plus €11 for my stupendous roast lamb dinner. I took note that buenas días is now bon día; its rather important to get off on the right foot with it, as they’re fairly anti-Spanish around these parts.

Tuesday 15 October 2019.  Agramunt • Vic |145 km|

Into the mountains now, and a long downhill run.

[Although it rained most of the night, the weather cleared by morning, and – joy of joys –  the wind had shifted around to the west and was now directly behind me (even though it did gradually die away to around 10 km/h).  The route took in:  Sant Ramon, Cervera, Calaf, Manresa, Calders, Moiá and Vic]

I inadvertently got onto the autovía (expressway) for 10 km after I headed off early in the morning (8.30) from Blanc i Negre.  That was bliss – a beautiful wide shoulder and not much traffic, but it is not allowed, and so I took the first exit I came to, and continued on the same old N-141 that more-or-less follows the expressway all the way to the Mediterranean coast, only it goes up and down a lot more.  I was keen to put in some distance today, to make up for the early stop yesterday; hence that early start.  In fact, I waited a bit for it to get more light, and even then nervously used my flashing rear light to improve the prospects of my being seen on the road.

At Sant Ramon, I went into my first minimart in Spain on this trip.  None of the previous villages I passed through had anything that resembled one, so I guess I am now leaving the more traditional areas behind.  The motive for going in was to assuage my iced coffee craving, but they only had Alpro-brand almond soy coffee that was pretty damn unpalatable.

The first 50km was all steady climbing from 300m elevation to 900m, but then it was pure bliss: a 20-km downhill run with trailing breeze all the way into Manresa, at 200m elevation.

Manresa is a big town – a city, really, of 80,000.  Not very attractive though, what little I saw of it.

I’d lose my head if it wasn’t screwed on – in fact I did manage to lose my helmet.  Don’t ask me how. When I was preparing to get away from Taberri bar/ restaurant in Balageur it was either sitting, unattached, on top of my rear panier load or I’d placed it on one of the outside barrel tables when I was putting the battery chargers away.  I think.  Anyway, 10 km further on, after the convoluted path through the suburbs to get out of town, I suddenly noticed it missing off my head (I wear a visored cap, too, that feels like a helmet, is my only excuse).  Rather than backtrack looking for it (I had no way of following my exact path back – though, to be fair, it was most likely still on that barrel), I continued on, feeling very naked of head.

So my mission in Manresa was to find a bike shop and buy a new helmet.  This I did easily enough, after asking a couple of local traffic policemen who directed me to Fasol Bikes. €69.  Kerchink! (including 2 new spare tubes at €5 each).  And at least the bike shop guy was friendly and inquisitive about me and my journey and ebike touring generally.

I still had to charge up somewhere though, and there were plenty of likely places to choose from in this bustling city.  Cafeteria Atenes got my vote.  They seemed a bit put out about me being there even so, since I defied seating instructions for a start, to sit near the door and keep an eye on Ziggy outside.  I can just about hack Spanish daytime TV for 2 hours, but in Catalan its a bit harder.  I got dudded on the coffee/desert equation once again (even though I had coffee instead of dessert, I still had to pay the €1.50 supplement – ‘oh, that’s because you wanted café con leche, not ordinary coffee which is the one on the menu!’).  So, where’s my dessert then? Meh.  Still, for €12.40 it was very tasty and quite substantial, if not up to the standard of all points north and west hitherto.  And I got my dessert too.  Flan.  Least likely to have been spat upon.

Again, after I left Manresa it was another long gradual climb for 35 km to another pass, this one at 1,100m, before a glorious free-wheeling run of 15 km down into the city of Vic, located on the Plain of Vic at 480m elevation.

Vic is…well, its quite big, (50,000), historically important (or at least interesting), but rather decrepit too, coming in.  I had big trouble finding anywhere to stay.  The 2-star railway hotel sold its last room because I deferred to the Belgian cyclist couple who got there at the same time as me.  Dumb-ass!  The next 3 I tried were full.  But then I tried a boutique inner city business hotel with the improbable name of ‘UP Room’ (pretty stupid name, huh?) and Josep there did have a room, a double, for €98, no breaky included.  I took it.  They had a free side-board of tapas and pastries no one had bothered with during the day (still in pristine condition), as a complementary afternoon tea kind of thing for the busy business folk, so I scoffed the lot, thus avoiding the cost of a dinner, and had enough left over for breakfast too. Nyuk.  Nyuk.

Actually, Vic has a lot of history, which is nice.  I got totally lost venturing out at night on foot in the maze of winding alleyways that’s kind of like a mini Barri Gotic á la Barcelona but without the crowds… or the panache, or the je ne sais quoi.  But hey, they do have a Roman temple!  Meaning, meh, geographically interesting to wander through, but basically dead as a doornail.  And I was hot to trot too!

Wednesday 16 October 2019.  Vic • LLança |139 km|

Getting better; more mountains.  Magic!

[Through the mountains of the sub-pyrenes in ideal conditions: 13 to 23°C, almost no wind, good road surface and lots to see.  The route took in:  Esquirol, Sant Esteve d’en Bas, Les Preses, Olot, Sant Joan Les Fonts, Castellfollit de la Roca,  Sant Jaume de Llierca, Argelageur, La Garrotxa, Besalú, Navata, Figueres and Llança.  You couldn’t make those names up, could ya]

This day was an even better day’s cycling than yesterday’s.  First, uphill out of Vic and along the ridgeline for 40 km, then 90 km of almost constant dropping down from 1,100m to sea level.

Today was a significant day, politically, for Catalunya.  Their leaders had just been sentenced to lengthy prison terms for sedition for going ahead with an illegal independence referendum a couple of years ago, and there was a real whiff of foment in the air.

When I was passing through Olot, the main road was blocked off with witches hats.  I considered just going straight through, but then I spotted the traffic police parked nearby and I thought I’d better have a word to them first.  They’d blocked off a whole section of the expressway in solidarity with a motley bunch of about 10 high school students draped in Catalán flags who were doing a protest walk along it.  I asked if I  could go on through, and the pleasant but bossy cop said no, it’s too dangerous.  I said yes, I know bicycles can’t normally go on the freeway, but since you’ve got it blocked off anyway it must be safe for me, no?  He positively beamed at this brilliant insight and told me to go right on ahead in that case, but to just make sure I got off again at the first exit a few kilometers down the road (and zoomed up in his car later, just to make sure I did).

The kids were already running out of steam less than 1 km into their walk, and I had a few minutes of tearing down the middle of a 4-lane expressway all to myself.

I had to stop to recharge at the 89 km mark at the town of Besalú, at a nice little truck stop restaurant next to a service station.  There was a lovely outdoor seating area under shade umbrellas with power outlets right to hand.  The bar manager was really friendly and didn’t at all mind me loitering around for 2 hours, and the menú del día was excellent (authentic dishes of gazpacho, and chicken with garlic and capsicum, with a beer, flan and coffee, all for only €7!).

There were 5 local guys at the table next to mine, all with matching ebikes and colour-coordinated pink lycra outfits, just back from their morning club ride, I suppose.  But they weren’t interested in talking to me at all, and even at one stage all stood around my bike and had a pointed conversation about all its attributes without even once referring, or deferring, to me.  Rude buggers!  They were speaking Catalán – as was everyone else there – but surely it wouldn’t have hurt to have a conversation with me in Spanish.  Oh well.

My first glimpses of the sea lived up to expectations.  The Costa Brava, where the Sub-Pyrenees mountains plunge dramatically into the sea along a hundred kilometres of coastline from Blanes in the south to the French border in the north (and then on a further 30km to Argelès-sur-Mer in France), is certainly very scenic.  Secluded coves with pristine beaches and clear blue waters are separated by jagged peaks. Terraced fishing villages and tourist towns vie for space along the wider beaches.

I tried several campgrounds, but they were all closed already for the season. This left me with the fairly expensive option of an hotel and I stopped at the first interesting one I came across that was on a beach.  This was Hotel Grifeu at Plata Grifeu, just north of Llança.  I got in a quick evening swim, but the water sure was mighty cold.

I could complain about the Hotel Grifeu dinner.  OK then, I will. The owner, a crabby old woman who insisted on being the maître d to impress the guests (there was only a group of 2 elderly couples besides me) got rather short with me when I queried the set-price menu.  She was telling me (shrieking at me) that the set menu cost €28 for one person, when it seemed to me the menu clearly stated that price was for two.  So I said I’ll just have a tapa at the bar then, and she waved me off like she was disposing of a swatted gnat.  Even that tapa cost €9.50, for a paltry number of massacred deep-fried calamari rings that you’d get at the local fish and chip shop.  And I could see the calamari boats fishing just off the shore too, to rub it in.  Throw in 2 beers and a JD and coke and my humble meal cost €26 – might as well have had the set menu anyway.

So, my last night in Spain ended on a slightly sour note, but there was no denying the magic of the place I was in.  And I was happy.

-ends-

#73  Huesca to Llança |495 km|

2019.  Cycling in Spain |1,671 km|

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Europe 2019 so far: |10,650 km|

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Total, this bike: 15,793 km