Kill or Cure Ride

It was a clear sunny day when we left the monastery hotel and Puerto de Santa Maria, heading for Sanlucar de Barrameda further up the coast.

We followed the ocean promenade bike path for a bit and then cut up onto a road and then onto a service road that paralleled the A491. It was pretty good initially, then became less of a road than a track beside fields.

And then, we encountered a big culvert that initially seemed impassable. And there was no way to get up onto the highway above as there was a fence. Jim investigated and determined that he could carry both bikes up beside the culvert and over the top, with all the panniers off of course. The top of the culvert only provided really narrow passage beside the fence and the edge of the culvert, that had to be negotiated very, very carefully as it was muddy and slick and a slip would result in a fall into the culvert below. But it was the only option so that’s what we did. Jim carried the bikes up and over and I very carefully and slowly ferried the panniers one by one. Yikes! You never know what you will face on the bike path! It can feel like a bit of a survival obstacle course sometimes.

After the culvert, there was basically no path for a short distance to the road, so we just pushed the bikes through grass, fortunately not too difficult. We were happy to come to a crossroads with some signage again indicating what seemed to be a direct road along a wine-tasting route - “Ruta entre viñedos El Bercial”, another 16 km to Sanlucar. Always reassuring to see a map with “Usted está aqui” - you are here.

It was a completely flat route. We were, and have been for some time, mostly riding on river plains designated by the blue area on this topographical map, that flow from the mountains on either side. We were approaching the alluvial flood plains and the mouth of the mighty Guadalquivir River than Sanlucar is just slightly south of, and that leads up to Seville.

We eventually came upon a lovely new green “magic carpet” that we followed right into Sanlucar. We are wondering if we could have picked up this cycle path earlier in the day. We might have missed something.

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Though it was flat terrain and we only rode 46 km, it was a very tough day as we had a strong constant northwest headwind 15-27 km, gusting to 51 km, the first of our trip, all the way. It required sustained effort to keep going. We were lucky to be on reasonably good road surfaces most of the way (the culvert diversion notwithstanding) but it was very tiring and we both felt buffeted and exhausted by the time we thankfully reached Sanlucar. I wondered how compromised my stamina would be from the bronchitis, but apart from coughing and spitting (a bit tricky when you are in motion), I survived it ok.

Jim is doing an amazing job of navigating in the absence of any really clearly defined routes or signage using the Trans Andalus, GPX downloaded files, Pocket Earth and Google Maps. Way above my pay grade and patience level. On my own, I would still be lost near Tarifa! This year, he has his phone mounted on his handlebars and can much more easily keep track of the route. And having tons of data anywhere with international SIMs in our phones is invaluable.

We easily found our hotel just off the really beautiful and active main Plaza del Cabilo, with a big fountain in the centre, ringed by restaurants and cafes. It’s always good though not to have your accommodation right on a main square because the noise level from all the outside seating is pretty significant.

Fortunately, our hotel, the aptly named, very elegant Cisnes (Swan) Palace (a Superior Deluxe room with a small kitchen area for an amazing €63) and the lovely town of Sanlucar lived up to and in fact exceeded expectations, and we had two nights there to rest up and recover.

Our day - 46 km, flat, strong headwind.