Guest Book
Seville - Barcelona
If you have a motorcycle and you depart Seville in the general direction of lets say, north to Malaga, and you have a map and a GPS showing you the shortest path. Forget about it. First, you go through modern wind mills that are there to confuse Don Quixote. 120 km later, ignore the road signs and turn left (north). Drive about 50 km. Don't worry, you are not extending the ride. But if you drive a four wheeler, turn around right now and go back. If you're riding on two wheels - and love it? I promise you that the next 76 km you will never forget. I have nearly no pictures from that road because you just can't capture the sights and feelings. Bit I will try to explain. The road begins with a small bridge over a lake/river at a bottom of a canyon that you can't cross because it is being renovated. You however, have no choice. Immediately after it you begin to climb from zero altitude to 845 meters above sea level. There are amazing curves, some of them 270 degrees, from one to another anywhere between 50 to 500 meters, beautiful views, ups, downs, a road that is sometimes so narrow that there is no way in the world that two vehicles can drive on it at the same time so you must stop and enter slowly ensuring that there are no oncoming vehicles. But not if you are on a motorbike (as long you keep your side of the road!!!). You then enter the path. You speed, changing seating position according to the angle and direction of the curve and it never ends. And never ends. Sometimes you suddenly face an old castle just on the mountain peak ahead of you and then an entrance to an old village where the houses kiss the road from one side and there are cliffs on the other. And fields, and vineyards and other amazing scenes. After you find yourself alone there, you stop and laugh because that's how it feels, and if you are a 'dummy' like me, you think to yourself "how will I explain it later in writing?". OK, we start registering for next year's trip.
The olive trees from yesterday.
Reaching Malaga. I am dead tired. Malaga is a big city. Near the police station there is a park. Gidion is watching the bikes and I lay on the grass and fall a sleep for 20 minutes. It's all because of the internet last night. When I wake up, I fix an electrical problem on Gidion's bike. This morning, in Seville, we found a mechanic that fixed it (the lights stopped working) but the problem re-occurred. An hour later my fix didn't work either. after a short tour in the city we start heading in the general direction of Barcelona, about 260 km. The general direction turns out to be more and more specific and continues to the center of the city. On each corner there is a toll road. 17 Euros, 1.4 Euros and by the time we reach Barcelona the Spanish have 30 Euros more of your money. If you ride slower then 140 km/h you in serious danger. The cars that pass you, do so at scary speeds. Once it used to be the BMWs, the Porches and their relatives. Today, every small Citroen is flying past at speeds of 160-200 km/h and more.
Barcelona
Beautiful city with a lot of history and a lot of modern flavor from the recent Olympic games. But a lot of visitors as well that have arrived for a conference on..... building construction. And all the hotels in the city are full! It took me until 11:00pm to find a hotel, and eventually, with my broken Spanish we find something in the middle of the city after they allow us to park the bikes in the hotel lobby (!!!). Picture to come. Looking for a restaurant and for a Laundromat, I can't find either. But do find out that we are in the middle of a strip-club area which includes the "associated" characters as well. I ask someone if there is a cash machine nearby and he shows me but adds "are you sure that is what you want to do HERE in the middle of the night?". Sounds encouraging. At night, going to bed to the sounds of drunks and prostitutes yelling from the street, in a bed that was designed for very short Asian people accustomed to sleeping on rocks. Any wonder I wake up pissed?
Tomorrow we are leaving for France for two days. After that - Milan, Turin, Verona, Pizza, Florence, Barry and Greece.