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Sat Jul 28 2007: Spain in a day |
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Today is the day that we ride over 1,000 kms of superslab.
yipee.
I got to sleep at 9PM last night! Poor Neda was tossing and turning for a couple of hours after I hit the hay. So I woke up 1/2 hour before the 5AM alarm, got everything ready and we were out of the hotel at 6:30AM, still dark outside. And COLD! 16C, which at 130-140 km/h on the highway translates to BRRRRR!
Bright and early. Well, early, at least...
How much can one really write about spending 1,080 kms on a motorcycle on a highway across the country. If you're in North America, not much. But Spain? Holy frack! Even the highways are twisty! Pretty much most of Spain, north to south, is comprised of some mountainous range in every region. You can't zone out like an I40:Indiana to Missouri run! At one point the 2 lane highway made a sharp hairpin up the side of a moutain! Imagine 4 lanes of traffic doubling back on itself!
iPod: turns everything into a music video!
We took the main Autovia leaving the Basque region through Madrid. I made the mistake of only wearing mesh in the morning, so I suffered for the first leg, trying to get as much of my body behind that big windshield of mine, handwarmers cranked up to 11. We had planned to divide the trip up in 200 km segments, as that was around the point our reserve would hit on the bikes doing 140 km/h. Normally we'd average around 300-350 kms/tank, but you burn a lot of gas trying to push those bikes at that speed. It's great being on the road early enough that you can catch a sunrise (hopefully to your left or right, not in front of you...), plus you don't have to share the road with any other vehicles.
Even the highways are twisty!
It was during the first fill-up, I noticed a lot of women with headscarves and also signs in Arabic. Thanks to Javier (a Spanish guy), who mentioned in the guestbook that these are for the immigrants (Moroccans, Algerians, Tunisians, etc.) who work in Northern Europe who have to cross Spain to go back to their home countries for holidays.
Sierra Morena mountains
Through the Sierra Morena mountains in southern Spain
We were doing alright with the 200 km/leg plan for a while, but at the end of the second leg as we approached Madrid, the weather got stonkin' hot. I was now okay, but Neda was really suffering in her full leathers. She tried soaking her shirt and hair with water before leaving, to let the wind and evaporation cool her down but with the arid heat climbing past 35C, it would only last a half hour before she started overheating again. When we got to Madrid, we had to negotiate a series of intertwining highways, getting on and off a series of exits and on/offramps to get to the right Autovia to take us south to Sevilla without going through the city. What I didn't know is that Madrid has an extensive highway system... underneath the city... where the GPS signals that we rely on so heavily don't go... The minute we went underground, I was staring at my last known position, and "GPS Signal Lost. Acquiring Satellites". Good luck. Somehow we actually ended up in the heart of Madrid pointing in the wrong direction. I'd make a terrible homing pigeon...
Highway tunnels under Madrid
Neda told me I was quite expressive on the bike, helmet moving violent back and forth, up and down as I was spraying venom against the inside of my visor, fists pounding on my tankbag...
GS hiding from the sun
Somehow we got out of Madrid, but Neda was not doing well. She had to get out of the leathers pronto. That's Italian for, "Holy crap it's stonkin' hot!". Our 200 km/leg slowly dwindled down to 50 kms. We had to do something, so she went in her jeans and I gave her my mesh jacket. It worked. We were 600 kms into our day-long odyssey and we were good to go. South of Madrid the landscape becomes a lot more golden and brown, especially due to the heat wave that part of the country has been experiencing for the last few weeks. In a couple of spots, we even saw smoke in some areas that suggested small forest fires! At times, I forgot I was riding in Spain, it looked like parts of the South-West US, California and New Mexico.
There seem to be a gas station every 10 kms or so on the Autovia. Had dinner in the saddest of roadside restaurants, old men from the local village singing songs in the corner. The waiter did not find our lack of knowledge of the Spanish language amusing at all. It was an experience...
The last gas stop a guy from Hamburg chatted to us a little bit. It was the first words of English we had heard all day, ironically from a German! We then got off the Autovia onto one of the most beautiful roads I've ever been on. A one-lane country road with twists and elevation changes, little foliage around the road so clean sight lines around each corner. And the scenery! Pictures do it no justice.
The road to Arcos
Arcos de la Frontera
When we pulled into our town, Arcos de la Frontera, we were greeted with an amazing site: a city on the edge of a huge cliff, almost every single building was painted white. I think we're going to stay here an extra day here and we'll walk through the town tomorrow. I can't just sleep 8 hours and climb back on the bikes again tomorrow morning!
Arcos de la Frontera: Queen of the White Towns
No other bed has ever looked so inviting at the end of the day!
Much as we had our struggles today with the heat and mileage, today was one of the best examples of living on a motorcycle. Every morning, you pack up everything you own, toss it on the bike and leave - no trace you were ever there. And your breakfast, lunch and dinner are just line items on a petrol station receipt. When you take your stuff off the bike in the evening, the sounds and smells are different; you're in another city, a different country, maybe even a different time zone. That last one throws you for a loop, because half the time, you gotta wake up an hour earlier the next morning to pack up everything you own, toss it on the bike, and leave... It's so romantic, not being tied down to anything. A true nomadic lifestyle.
It's the time you spend alone in your helmet, especially on the slab, where you try to do the math and figure out what it will take to spend the rest of your life living this way. Because when that new road ahead of you furls up into the tight turns that take your mind away from every other thought, besides how the hell you're going to make it to the next corner: that's nirvana. All that other shit around the road is just window dressing.
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