ROCK2UK continued......

BOURNEMOUTH BEACH - 7 DAYS AGO

 The above picture shows Bournemouth beach only a week ago....amazing weather for early October. It couldn't last of course and the following day the temperature started to plummet back down to what is considered normal for this time of year.

Mind you....this good weather was nowhere near the kind of heat that we encountered on the Spanish section of our ROCK2UK trip. Once we had made the decision to get as much of Spain covered before Dave had to return home we had a new target to aim for.
We found the roads in Spain fantastic for cycling.....in the main very smooth and very little traffic as can be seen in some of the photos below.
From a distance all the villages appeared to be very similar and some of the views between various mountain ranges appeared vast with the road ahead disappearing into the horizon.....not the kind of views that we are used to in the UK.

WIND TURBINES AND SPANISH LANDSCAPE

We saw lots of wind turbines and also felt the wind that was certainly powerful enough to turn them at some speed. As you can see  in this image the landscape could become a bit boring after a while and the wind turbines did at least create a bit of interest.

WHITE PAINTED TOWNS AND VILLAGES

LONG STRAIGHT ROADS

 We saw lots of white painted villages and towns however from a distance they tended to all look alike. We also came across a good number of olive and orange groves.
In the photo above you can see one of the long straight roads that crossed the plains between mountain ranges.

ANOTHER LONG STRAIGHT ROAD

 Cycling in 40c on these roads needs a fair bit of determination.....mile after mile it all looks the same and you start to question how far you have actually travelled. When you have struggled all day in what seems like an open oven, you then have the wonderful luxury of a Spanish campsite as can be seen in the next photo......

SPANISH CAMPSITE PITCH

 As can be seen in the picture the pitch is more like a wild pitch than a campsite.....after a day of struggling in the heat this is the sort of pitch that we were greeted with.....the ground on this one was so hard that I couldn't get my tent pegs into the ground so in the end I just gave up and didn't bother with the tent.

WHO NEEDS A TENT?

After deciding not to bother with the tent this was my bed for the night....on the face of it not too bad. The only drawback was being bitten by huge ants that decided to crawl all over me during the night...and believe me those things really knew how to bite.

ANOTHER WHITE VILLAGE

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JUST ANOTHER VIEW

SOLAR PANELS

As well as the wind turbines we saw vast areas of solar panels....hundreds and hundreds of the things. These seem a good idea in Spain because they certainly have plenty of sun to power the things.
TO BE CONTINUED..........