takesiteasy
Adventurer
We've been to Barcelona- definitely one of the world's great cities. I'm enjoying your trip reports and photography! Thanks again for posting.
[YEAR 7!] Quit our jobs, sold our home, gone riding...
- Thread starter lightcycle
- Start date
lightcycle
Nomad
Thanks guys, appreciate the encouragement!
lightcycle
Nomad
Updated from http://www.RideDOT.com/rtw/196.html
We are on the move again!
Lugging all of our soft bags on and off the bike is a bit of a pain, but at least in Barcelona, Iva and Tajana didn't have to wait for us since they parked so far away. We ended up leaving at the same time, and headed south on the coastal road. It was a very scenic ride, here's a short video:
Barcelona to Valencia
Although the sun is shining bright, it's still a little chilly. Neda and I are bundled up in all of our layers, meanwhile the Pula Girls are sweltering because of the greenhouse effect inside their car tailing behind us. They tell us that we look very synchronized in front of them, with our staggered positioning. Cool!
Enjoying the twists and turns along the coast
The girls wanted to stop in Tarragona, which is about an hour south of Barcelona. When we arrived, I realized why: there's a Roman amphitheatre right in town! Tajana paid the admission price to go inside, since she is a historian by profession. Neda and I looked over the railing because we were too cheap to pay. Iva said she'd keep us company.
The Tarragona Amphitheatre could house 15,000 people!
After walking around for a while, Tajana yells up to us: "Neda! Iva! Ours is better!"
I'm starting to sense a pattern...
Because we left a bit later, we arrived in Valencia after dark. This is going to be a problem for us because while the girls like to pack in as much sightseeing as they can during the day and arrive at night, Neda and I prefer to ride while the sun is still shining. It's a bit safer for us, and at this time of year, it's also a lot warmer. We were freezing when we arrived!
Valencia oranges outside our apartment
Valencia is known for its sweet oranges, but the orange trees that the city planted as decorations must have been genetically engineered to taste bad. There were a few half-eaten oranges lying on the ground under the trees - a warning to other tourists not to pick them. Neda seems to think there aren't enough nutrients in the soil for them to grow properly on the streets.
They did look juicy enough though...
We are on the move again!
Lugging all of our soft bags on and off the bike is a bit of a pain, but at least in Barcelona, Iva and Tajana didn't have to wait for us since they parked so far away. We ended up leaving at the same time, and headed south on the coastal road. It was a very scenic ride, here's a short video:
Barcelona to Valencia
Although the sun is shining bright, it's still a little chilly. Neda and I are bundled up in all of our layers, meanwhile the Pula Girls are sweltering because of the greenhouse effect inside their car tailing behind us. They tell us that we look very synchronized in front of them, with our staggered positioning. Cool!
Enjoying the twists and turns along the coast
The girls wanted to stop in Tarragona, which is about an hour south of Barcelona. When we arrived, I realized why: there's a Roman amphitheatre right in town! Tajana paid the admission price to go inside, since she is a historian by profession. Neda and I looked over the railing because we were too cheap to pay. Iva said she'd keep us company.
The Tarragona Amphitheatre could house 15,000 people!
After walking around for a while, Tajana yells up to us: "Neda! Iva! Ours is better!"
I'm starting to sense a pattern...
Because we left a bit later, we arrived in Valencia after dark. This is going to be a problem for us because while the girls like to pack in as much sightseeing as they can during the day and arrive at night, Neda and I prefer to ride while the sun is still shining. It's a bit safer for us, and at this time of year, it's also a lot warmer. We were freezing when we arrived!
Valencia oranges outside our apartment
Valencia is known for its sweet oranges, but the orange trees that the city planted as decorations must have been genetically engineered to taste bad. There were a few half-eaten oranges lying on the ground under the trees - a warning to other tourists not to pick them. Neda seems to think there aren't enough nutrients in the soil for them to grow properly on the streets.
They did look juicy enough though...
lightcycle
Nomad
Iva brought decorations from home so every apartment we're staying at can feel Christmas-y!
Neda found us a great apartment in Valencia, it was even cheaper than Barcelona and it was way nicer. We're discovering that Barcelona is a bit of an expensive outlier - that the rest of Spain is actually priced quite fairly. Also this was the off-season, so I think we were getting very good deals.
New Years Eve Dinner in our very swanky apartment
It is soooo nice to be celebrating the holidays with friends! The meals are more elaborate and we help lighten the girls' stash of Croatian alcohol. I tell Iva that we're actually helping because now she will have to carry less on the way back to Pula. She replies no, she is slowly replacing the Croatian booze with Spanish ones to bring back home!
The green "flowers" above are made from artichokes, compliments of Tajana. Delicious!
So you wonder why I am not in a lot of these pictures...
We thought we'd go into town for the New Years Eve countdown, so being responsible adults, we planned to catch a streetcar. In our drunken haze, we didn't notice that we were waiting at the wrong side of the bus stop and that these streetcars were going *away* from the city.
Nice face, Neda. And yes, we brought glasses with us to the bus stop, because we're classy that way...
So by the time we realized we were on the wrong side of the bus stop, we were too late to make it to the city, but at that point we didn't care too much. We took our bottle(s) of wine and champagne and merrily made our way to the beach (did I mention our apartment was right on the beach?). This was a waaaay better idea.
As midnight approached, there was much drunken Croatian singing and dancing on the beach!
With the clocks on our iPhones counting down the last seconds of the year, we popped the cork on the champagne and made a toast to 2015! Wow, 2015. I know people normally say that time speeds up as you grow older, but so much has happened in the last two and half years that it actually seems a lot longer than that!
Time seemed to have rushed by faster when we were back in Toronto. As each carbon-copy-day stacked up on the tray of the Xerox machine, I found that I ended up skimming through every sheet because they were filled with the same details of the same commute, the same job, the same routine, and before I knew it, pages of half-read years piled up behind me.
Time moves normally now. Every day is different for us now and we're eager to greet each new day, devour its pages like a good book.
I may not know how many years I have left in my life, but I'm going to try to put as much life as I can in those years.
lightcycle
Nomad
In the distance, fireworks were going off in different parts of the city. Happy New Year, Valencia!!!
We are going to kick off the first day of 2015 with a ride! I really thought Neda would be hung over, but she pulled it together and managed to get onto the bike okay. We figured with January 1st being a holiday, it would be a great day to cruise around the city with no traffic. The girls went off by themselves to do their own sightseeing and we made plans to rendezvous later on in the day.
There's a familiar sight! I had to get Neda to stop at this roundabout for a quick picture.
We've actually been to Valencia before by motorcycle. On our European tour seven years ago, we passed through the city like a hurricane but one of the few pictures I took was of this statue, because the hotel we stayed at before was right here!
I'm so glad we're keeping a record of all our travels because there's absolutely no way I would remember all these details.
Valencia train station
And guess what? Neda found another Arena in Valencia...
She said we had to ride around it to get a better look
Later that day, we met up with Iva and Tajana and I told them we saw another arena in downtown Valencia. Iva replied, "Yes, we saw it too. Ours is better."
Haha! Right. Of course.
Our rendezvous point with the girls was the City of Arts and Sciences. This is what it looks like as we rode towards it
The City of Arts and Sciences is a huge, sprawling tourist attraction composed of a bunch of buildings that look like they were purpose-built for a Star Trek or Battlestar Galactica movie. When the girls suggested we meet there, I had no idea this even existed. How the heck did we miss this the first time around?
Oh yeah, because we were riding to a different country almost every other day...
Unfortunately the buildings were closed for New Years Day, but that didn't stop us from frolicking around
These buildings house different exhibits, loosely related to science. Most of them remind me of a giant Darth Vader and his Samurai friends buried up to their eyeballs, with only the tops of their helmets poking above the ground.
L'Àgora, pictured behind the bridge, is a covered entertainment and sports complex
Tajana takes a breather from her hectic sight-seeing schedule to check up on e-mails
More sci-fi statues. This one reminds me of the aliens in A.I.
profdlp
Adventurer
That is better than a lot of very good (and prize-winning) literature I have read. If you don't write a book about all of this someday we will all be the poorer for it.
Herbie
Rendezvous Conspirator
Seconded. I've been through a raft of travel memoirs, etc. lately and easily half of them have been dreck compared to your writing Gene. Start collating some of those blog posts and send them off to some editors along with a letter of inquiry.
lightcycle
Nomad
Thanks guys. Means a lot to us to know there are others that feel the same way as us!
lightcycle
Nomad
Updated from http://www.RideDOT.com/rtw/197.html
The girls are waiting for us again. It was a tedious process walking to the parking lot, riding our bikes to the front of our apartment then taking a couple of trips in and out of the building to load up all our bags again. Meanwhile, the girls were sitting in their car, watching us with bemusement as we fussed around with all manner of straps, tie-downs, dry bags and tank bags, etc.
It reminded me of when we used to snowboard and we had a few skiers in our group. When we reached the top of the lift, the skiers would stand around impatiently and watch us as we sat down on the snow to fuss around with our bindings before heading down. Invariably, the skiers would tell us that they would just meet us at the bottom or meet us at the chalet for lunch.
So I think that's what's going to happen. We left Valencia together, but because of the different pace and scheduling, we might just meet up at the next apartment and compare stories at the end of the day.
Motorcycles and cars just travel differently.
Taking the path less traveled. AKA getting lost...
The girls wanted to see a place called El Castell de Guadelest, an 11th-century castle built by Muslims as a watchtower for defense. So we turned inland and the coastal scenery was replaced by semi-arid scrublands and the mountains of the Alicante province (La Muntanyas d'Alacant).
Along the way, our GPSs routed us along this broken road that turned gravelly. Neda and I were really enjoying ourselves as the scenery was fantastic and the road was a lot of fun, but I looked back often to make sure the girls were okay in their car. Tajana's little Opel Astra seemed to be handling the uneven terrain okay, and there was no oncoming traffic on the narrow "road" so it all worked out for everyone!
Here's a taste of the scenery before the road crumbled away and I had to use both hands on the bars:
Riding the Alicante Province
Back on the main road, and the Castell de Guadelest appears in the distance
Not much remains of the castle, but we could see the watchtower from the bottom. Once again, we opted to not pay the entrance fee, so Tajana the historian went up for a look while we walked around the town at the bottom.
View of the castle from the bottom of Guadelest
The girls are waiting for us again. It was a tedious process walking to the parking lot, riding our bikes to the front of our apartment then taking a couple of trips in and out of the building to load up all our bags again. Meanwhile, the girls were sitting in their car, watching us with bemusement as we fussed around with all manner of straps, tie-downs, dry bags and tank bags, etc.
It reminded me of when we used to snowboard and we had a few skiers in our group. When we reached the top of the lift, the skiers would stand around impatiently and watch us as we sat down on the snow to fuss around with our bindings before heading down. Invariably, the skiers would tell us that they would just meet us at the bottom or meet us at the chalet for lunch.
So I think that's what's going to happen. We left Valencia together, but because of the different pace and scheduling, we might just meet up at the next apartment and compare stories at the end of the day.
Motorcycles and cars just travel differently.
Taking the path less traveled. AKA getting lost...
The girls wanted to see a place called El Castell de Guadelest, an 11th-century castle built by Muslims as a watchtower for defense. So we turned inland and the coastal scenery was replaced by semi-arid scrublands and the mountains of the Alicante province (La Muntanyas d'Alacant).
Along the way, our GPSs routed us along this broken road that turned gravelly. Neda and I were really enjoying ourselves as the scenery was fantastic and the road was a lot of fun, but I looked back often to make sure the girls were okay in their car. Tajana's little Opel Astra seemed to be handling the uneven terrain okay, and there was no oncoming traffic on the narrow "road" so it all worked out for everyone!
Here's a taste of the scenery before the road crumbled away and I had to use both hands on the bars:
Riding the Alicante Province
Back on the main road, and the Castell de Guadelest appears in the distance
Not much remains of the castle, but we could see the watchtower from the bottom. Once again, we opted to not pay the entrance fee, so Tajana the historian went up for a look while we walked around the town at the bottom.
View of the castle from the bottom of Guadelest
lightcycle
Nomad
I'm sporting my new palm tree hat. Picture by Iva
Amazing semi-drylands of Alicante
Girl-talk at the fountain in Guadelest
From Guadelest, the skiers parted company from the snowboarders. Iva and Tajana wanted to see Cartagena, but if we were to accompany them, that would mean arriving at our next apartment after dark, so Neda and I opted to head straight to our next stop. The roads around Guadelest are very entertaining and the two of us had a lot of fun until we hit the coast and then it was straight onto Roldan.
Trying to find our next apartment, through the wastelands between urbanizacions
Iva booked our next apartment in a town called Roldan. It is what's called an "urbanizacion" in Spain, which is sort of like a gated community out in the middle of nowhere. These urbanizaciones are mainly created by ex-pats who want to live in a warm climate, but don't want to live in an expensive city or an expensive beach or mingle with the locals
. So they create a community of houses and condominiums in the middle of nowhere, maybe also build a golf course, swimming pools and supermarkets nearby as well.The result is a super-cheap place to stay with all the amenities for vacationers and snowbirds. Since this was low season (too cold for golfing), a lot of the apartments here are put up for rent for short-term stays. Our place in a golfing community was super-luxurious and cheap to boot! I wished we could have stayed more than one night, but this was just a pit-stop.
We got lost and entered the wrong urbanizacion. But you get the idea... very ritzy...
lightcycle
Nomad
From Roldan, skiers and snowboarders departed the next morning separately and headed into the hills of Andalucia! It was quite co-incidental that the next place the girls wanted to see was also where we visited on our last tour of Europe. Looking back on our path, we are actually doing our trip in reverse!
Twisty roads in the rolling hills of Andalucia. That's me, riding somewhere in the middle of the picture!
I think I have almost the exact same picture from the same area from our last trip!
Pausing for a relaxing break by the fireplace *whew*
We have stopped in a small town called Alpujarra de la Sierra, which is just a few kms from Berchules, where we stayed seven years ago. I took a look at our path in the last few days and I'm astounded at our pace. You know when you're walking in the airport and then you step on one of those moving sidewalks and then suddenly you're walking twice as fast? Well traveling with The Pula Girls is nothing like that. Instead, it's like riding around and then suddenly being towed by a rocketship compared to how we usually travel.
And the funny thing is that the girls are doing twice as much as we were, cramming in all sorts of sightseeing in between stops. They are literally running circles around us!
Walking around the very tiny town of Alpujarra de la Sierra
Looking out over our apartment. Andalucia is beautiful!
Shaking the olive tree. There's a net underneath that catches the olives as they fall from the tree.
Yes, I am deathly allergic to cats
Cats are bastardos. When you call out to them, they'll never come to you. But the minute you ignore them or go out of your way to avoid them, they make a beeline straight for you.
Twisty roads in the rolling hills of Andalucia. That's me, riding somewhere in the middle of the picture!
I think I have almost the exact same picture from the same area from our last trip!
Pausing for a relaxing break by the fireplace *whew*
We have stopped in a small town called Alpujarra de la Sierra, which is just a few kms from Berchules, where we stayed seven years ago. I took a look at our path in the last few days and I'm astounded at our pace. You know when you're walking in the airport and then you step on one of those moving sidewalks and then suddenly you're walking twice as fast? Well traveling with The Pula Girls is nothing like that. Instead, it's like riding around and then suddenly being towed by a rocketship compared to how we usually travel.
And the funny thing is that the girls are doing twice as much as we were, cramming in all sorts of sightseeing in between stops. They are literally running circles around us!
Walking around the very tiny town of Alpujarra de la Sierra
Looking out over our apartment. Andalucia is beautiful!
Shaking the olive tree. There's a net underneath that catches the olives as they fall from the tree.
Yes, I am deathly allergic to cats
Cats are bastardos. When you call out to them, they'll never come to you. But the minute you ignore them or go out of your way to avoid them, they make a beeline straight for you.
lightcycle
Nomad
Updated from http://www.RideDOT.com/rtw/198.html
I know now why we travel so slowly.
Every place we've stopped in Europe, we have been able to score free parking. But the drawbacks to keeping your bike out on the street is that you have to unstrap all the soft bags and bring them inside. Then rinse and repeat in reverse the next morning when you leave. So we are basically packing and unpacking twice a day. Something we rarely did in Latin America because we always rode the bike right into the hotel lobby... It's a Major Hassle. General Pain-In-The-***! Like Corporal Punishment! (HIMYM)
Strap on, strap off. The Strapper.
The Pula Girls are waiting for us again. Since we only have a short ways to go for our first stop of the day, we leave Alpujarra de la Sierra together and start heading westwards on the very twisty Andalucian mountain roads. Iva has an idea to take a video of us riding away, so I combined some of her footage with mine to make a short video:
Ewan and Charley better start looking for new jobs...
Iva is now the official RideDOT.com videographer. We are going to petition her to change her name to Claudio. Every ride needs a Claudio.
Around the curve, the white village of Trevélez appears ahead of us
We meet up with the girls in Trevélez, which is known for it's air-cured Iberian hams, specifically the Jamon Serrano. The buildings are white-washed like all the Pueblos Blancos (White Towns) in Andalucia. They say that alkaline properties of the white limewash are anti-bacterial and is also a natural insecticide, but also the buildings are all the same colour for "social cohesiveness". The paint is a relatively recent development. No record of Pueblos Blancos can be found before 1920.
So in other words, "make it appealing for the gringo tourists and their cameras"...
I know now why we travel so slowly.
Every place we've stopped in Europe, we have been able to score free parking. But the drawbacks to keeping your bike out on the street is that you have to unstrap all the soft bags and bring them inside. Then rinse and repeat in reverse the next morning when you leave. So we are basically packing and unpacking twice a day. Something we rarely did in Latin America because we always rode the bike right into the hotel lobby... It's a Major Hassle. General Pain-In-The-***! Like Corporal Punishment! (HIMYM)
Strap on, strap off. The Strapper.
The Pula Girls are waiting for us again. Since we only have a short ways to go for our first stop of the day, we leave Alpujarra de la Sierra together and start heading westwards on the very twisty Andalucian mountain roads. Iva has an idea to take a video of us riding away, so I combined some of her footage with mine to make a short video:
Ewan and Charley better start looking for new jobs...
Iva is now the official RideDOT.com videographer. We are going to petition her to change her name to Claudio. Every ride needs a Claudio.
Around the curve, the white village of Trevélez appears ahead of us
We meet up with the girls in Trevélez, which is known for it's air-cured Iberian hams, specifically the Jamon Serrano. The buildings are white-washed like all the Pueblos Blancos (White Towns) in Andalucia. They say that alkaline properties of the white limewash are anti-bacterial and is also a natural insecticide, but also the buildings are all the same colour for "social cohesiveness". The paint is a relatively recent development. No record of Pueblos Blancos can be found before 1920.
So in other words, "make it appealing for the gringo tourists and their cameras"...
lightcycle
Nomad
Gonna find us some yummy ham now!
Instead, I found an I am un chien Andalusia
We did find a store selling the Jamon Serrano and perused the various sizes and shapes on offer. We wanted to buy a chunk that we could slice off for sandwiches while we were on the road. The owner came out and offered us some samples. They were delicious! Very salty, I like that. I know the Istrians also are well-known for their dried ham, called pršut, so I tried not to be too enthusiastic about the Jamon Serrano, lest I fall into the Pula Amphitheatre trap again...
"It's okay, but I prefer the ham in Pula"
"Don't be ridiculous, this is great!" They picked up a kilo of Iberico.
Oh.
The owner of the store took us for a tour of his curing facility
Although the pork is not indigenous to the area, the clean, dry mountain air in Andalucia is favorable for curing the meats, and the Jamon Serrano here has been very popular since the 18th century. The Pula Girls remark on the slightly different curing process here. In Istria, the jam is cured with salt and pepper and a few spices, whereas in Trevélez, they only use salt.
mmmm... salt.
The Pula Girls having a laugh
We ate lunch at a little outdoor diner in Trevélez, a tipico Andalucian dishe called plato alpujarreño with chorizo, eggs, potatoes and blood sausages. The sun was shining and we were all smiles and laughter. That's when it struck me that we've been traveling with Iva and Tajana for over a week now and it hasn't rained one single day. I think this is the longest stretch of good weather we've had since returning to Guatemala in September 2013 (not counting escaping to the Galapagos for a week).
I'm not superstitious normally, but I was starting to see the Pula Girls as a good luck charm. Like some kind of totem against rain.
Enough of this dog and pony show, let's go!
About this picture: While the girls finished off their meal, I had some leftover blood sausage that didn't taste very good, so I packed it up and walked around trying to find a dog to feed. This little guy was hanging out with the horse behind him like they were buddies. He sniffed at the blood sausage and refused to eat it. Ok, so it's not just me, then...
A bit later, the horse's owner came out and the dog greeted him. They were all from the same family!