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Published: January 6th 2024
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A few days before my boat was due to sail from Santander, I set off to cover the 100km from Tarifa to Cadiz. It was a relatively easy route. No major steep climbs and the main road had a good hard shoulder. It did take me a while to find the road adjacent to the motorway, but once on it, I pretty much had it to myself.
The next difficult section was trying to pick up the cycle path to Cadiz out of Chiclana de la Fronteria to avoid the motorway. The cycle path I followed from the town centre led me right to the start of the motorway. I eventually found a place to cross the railway and get onto the cycle path to Cadiz. The sign posting was non-existant. However once on the path, I loved it. Alongside a huge wetland, it was a bird paradise. Flamingos, spoonbills, various waders and some raptors.
I was making steady, if slow progress as I kept stopping. There were a few badly signed sections where I had to search around to find where the path went. In a couple of places I had to push the bike over very soft
sand before getting back onto the boardwalk.
With the finish, Cadiz, literally within sight, my" last cycling day misfortune" struck again. It seems to be a regular occurence now. First of all the cable to my rear derailleur snapped with only 10km to go. I had a spare cable, but decided to press on with the one useable gear as it was late afternoon, I was close to Cadiz and it was a flat route.
The boardwalk was fine for cycling on, and even with one gear, the going was easy. I was so busy looking around me that I noticed too late that the boardwalk stopped suddenly where a track to the beach crossed it. There was about a 10-20cm drop to the soft sand. There was no way I could stop in time. Within a split second I knew that my wheels would sink into the sand and I would be off the bike. To avoid tipping off the boardwalk and have the front wheel bury itself in the sand and risk falling against the edge of the boardwalk, I tried to lift the front wheel up as it reached the last board. I hoped to
land with both wheels at the same time and possibly come to a semi-controlled stop.
The front wheel did hold up a bit and both wheels hit the sand together. I fell of sideways to my right and landed in the soft sand. My first thought was I hoped no-one saw that. The road was close by. No traffic passing. Then as I started to stand up and lift my bike, I felt a lot of pain in my left ankle. Having a quick look I could see that I had a small, but slightly deep cut across my shin. I didn't know what part of the bike I had hit, the pedal, the frame? Feeling around my ankle I was pretty sure I hadn't broken it, so after a couple of minutes to steady myself I continued into Cadiz without any difficulty.
I found the hostel easy enough. It was only after checking in and starting to relax a little that my ankle really started to hurt and I found it difficult to put any weight on it. Checking it again I saw that the inside side of my ankle had swollen up quite badly. I limped
The blue streak.
I wasn't quite fast enough to get a good shot of the kingfisher. around the kitchen cooking up a meal for myself and decided I would take it easy (no pubs!) and see what it was like next day.
The swelling had subsided a lot by morning, but there was a lot of purple bruising right down to my heel.I couldn't work out how I could have done so much damage. My ankle must have hit the bike a lot harder than I realised. Fortunately, I was able to walk easily and without a limp to the bus station to book a ticket to Bilbao, departing later that afternoon. One side of my ankle was fine, the other very sore to touch. I think I had a painful, but lucky escape. A useful reminder of how easily a trip can go a bit wrong.
I spent a few hours exploring the centre of Cadiz (it's very pretty) before heading to the station and getting the bike bus-ready for the overnight journey to Bilbao. The narrow streets of the old town were busy with families enjoying the fine weather and the Christmas atmosphere. The shops were decorated, there was a Christmas market in Plaza San Antonio and an ice rink in another
Flamingos.
I really liked this marisma because the birds were so close to the cycle path and relatively tolerant of me on the bike. plaza.
I gave myself plenty of time to get to the bus station and prepare the bike for the journey.
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