Part 2 of 2

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Sept 25 Portiragnes--Somewhere southwest of Agde
A mellow Sunday, a sort of prebirthday party for Manya with our new discovery of the 4 star campground complete with water park, zip line, archery, soccer fields and a load of other possible activities that are obviously much more busy in summer than now, three days before closing for the season.
I always like being in these beach towns that are getting ready to close. There is the evident zest of summer vacations, with brightly colored beachfront businesses advertising beachballs and postcards and dishes featuring fish and moules (mussels), but with half boarded close and stores emptying their shelves in anticpation of the quiet cold winter, there is a sense of melancholy in the air that signals the end of the season of light.
But this is a good place to spend a Sunday, as the shops see this as a day for business, unlike those more inland who still follow the religious rhythm of taking this as a day of rest. And set up now in a bungalow for the night, complete with well equipped kitchen, we are happy to shop for food that we can cook and eat on our schedule, with relatively predictable tastes, and without the ridiculous wait that seem all too common in restaurants here.
Yesterday took the cake for French restaurant service, as we decided to eat lunch out, saving our lunch food for dinner if we got stuck camping in the wild. In classic French fashion, the waitress asked, in perfect English, if we spoke English, and when we confirmed we did, she promptly assigned the French speaking waitress to our table. We ordered off the set menu, a starter, a main course and dessert. The first course, a huge bowl of mussels, came immediately. Once this was done, we sat and waited, until the English speaking waitress asked if we wanted dessert or coffee. I told her we had ordered a second course, and she gave the oops look. About 10 minutes later, we got our second course. Finishing this, we then waited even longer, untl Manya's ice cream dessert finally came, but no sign of ours. We thought we asked our French speaking waitress for the dessert and check, but this seemed to have no visible effect, and we waited about 30 min this time. Finally we got our dessert (from another waitress) and asked for the bill. Again, this seemed a herculean task, and finally I went to the cash register to pay, and watched our waitress laboriously try to add 4 numbers (after I corrected her overcharges). Finally, I just threw the correct change at her and walked away, so we could get back on the road, a mere 2 hours after stopping.
The riding yesterday was more flats close to the sea, with sporadic bike lanes that were a pleasure and a few stretches where there was no room for anything but the main highway and a road as straight, flat, and dull as an arrow (I am wary of dissing arrows as our morning archeryu session here was a blast with a chance to zing these arrows while seeing the challenge of this Olympic sport). Having no patricular destination, it was one of those days that felt like it took longer to get along the map than expected (the 2 hour lunch didnt help), and in the end, we went 80+ km, past an unbelievable number of campgrounds, all closed, until we came upon this lively spot, where we felt lucky to have half an hour before the waterslide closed to play around. To get here, we again cycled along more Tour de France routes, indicated by the paint on the road (Go Disco!), which is more exciting that I would have thought. Not realizing all the accomodation options here(who would have thought a campground would have about 10 more homey options than your own tent?), we went for the tentsite. This is not so cheap at 27 euros, especially since we have no screening and there are some mosquitos here, and if we wanted to rent a freezer (yes, another feature of full service camping), that would cost another 3.50. With the kids lobbying to stay here a day to sample all the earthly delights of the campsite and the adjacent beach, we learned this morning that we could stay in a trailer like bungalow for about 40 euros a night. This is quite a bargain compared to hotels, especially if you factor in the kids playland aspect and the chance to cook for ourselves. We may have discovered this a tad late as judging by the scant occupancy here (maybe a couple hundred Germans, Swiss, and French out of a full occupancy rate of over 2000), not many campgrounds will remain open much after the end of September.
This is a nice contrast to Montpelier, where we enjoyed the day in the city, but after which Koby said he could skip cities for the stress he feels getting in and out of them (lots of one way streets that he won't go the wrong way on, red lights, roundabouts, etc)--although Montpelier had bike routes most of the way in and out. In Montpelier, we took the sleek, royal blue tram across town, using the incredible bargain family pass (5 E all day, with a single ride normally costing 1.50). We walked along the river through the modern Antigone development, where the kids showed remarkable restraint in this great fountain that spurted out of the ground in ever changing patterns, staying dry for almost 10 minutes before throwing caution to the wind and just standing right in the biggest jet and getting soaked. Fortunately, they don't complain about this and so we don't worry too much since this is one of those choices which has pretty natural consequences. Thus wet, we went into the big shopping mall to find pastries (a fine bakery on every level) and a new size 1 soccer ball for Koby, who had knocked the air out of his in some shot against a stone wall. (There were some really tempting deals for tiny kid shinguards, goalie gloves and uniforms and closeout cleats for 15 euros). Then it was off to the state of the art 50 meter Olympic swimming pool (motion sensor showers on the way into the pool, all natural lighting, handicapped accessible, timed entry cards, etc.) and giant not hot jaccuzzis, and big curving waterslide. After checking email and wandering the old city (happening upon an old church with two enormous exterior columns probably 15 ft in diameter), we dined outdoor in the Place Comedie, appreciating the evening light and activity in this fine square before readying ourselves to get back riding on our way towards Spain.

Sept 26 Narbonne, France
Today is Manya's 11th birthday, which we celebrated today with french toast for breakfast, (lightweight) presents on the beach, a pain au chocolat before riding, ice cream after, and a bevy of activities yesterday, the highlight of which was renting a 4 wheel 3 seat bike with steering wheel that the kids pedaled around town to rest from cycling. The riding today was less winsome, with headwinds all day and a quirky set of roads with no signs (quite unusual here) that caused more than a few stops, questions, backtracking, and frustration. Since Avignon, we have used local maps (scale 150,000:1) that mostly help a ton in finding carless routes. Today, these were less useful at first, but once we found our path, it is nice to be able to see every little turn and bend to confirm we had it right. While the winds were unhelpful, the Green Man continued to do his job clearing the skies and probably assuring we will leave France without a single minute of rain. Although rain was predicted for today, it started partly cloudy and is now again crystal clear blue. But, between the late post birthday party start and the wind, we had enough after 50 km, and Narbonne is a logical rest spot before a longer day along a canal bike path and then along the beach to Perpignan, the last major town before Spain.
Apparently we passed the 1000 km mark just outside of Montpelier, and the one month on the road yesterday. We certainly can't complain about how things have gone. Most importantly, everyone is healthy, and in fact, there are few times in life I feel more healthy than when bike touring where I get lots of exercise every day, can eat a ton, and sleep a tired sleep of recovery for the next day. The cycling has been almost always super, and outside of Koby saying he is bored periodically (he would much rather be jumping off curbs or up ramps with his mountain bike), everyone has enjoyed our time in the saddle. The advantage of a long trip is you can see things as trends, so it is gratifying to see the kids slowly being more adventuresome eaters, more willing to go shopping alone, more open to learning some words in a foreign language, more into forming patterns for the flow of the day, relating to each other, finding ways to play together. This is all positive as I think traveling in Asia will be much more taxing than here, if only because I can't be depended on for any kind of language help like I can, sort of, in Europe. And while Australia and New Zealand will be much easier traveling, it will be after 7 months away from home, and this will pose its own challenges.

Sept 28 Perpignan
Our last day in France, probably. We arrived here after a rapid day of cycling, leaving early (9:30) to avoid the wind a little. As it turned out, we had the wind at our backs later in the day and we covered a jaunty 50 km by 1:00. We started out on the canal bike path for 20 km. Somehow, we thought this would be paved, but it quickly became evident this would have been a costly and ill served expenditure of public funds as not many people used this long and old route and the gravel parts were plenty smooth. The old paved sections were much rougher, resulting in our first flat tire, amazingly infrequent considering how much glass we see on the roads. Supposedly it is popular for tourists to ply this canal on boats, but riding along its edge gave the same feel, I think, and we certainly go faster than the canal boats we easily passed along the way.
We then ended up along the coast again--more unexcitiing flat terrain but again bordered by countless campgrounds and then these huge vacation villages. It is hard to see the real allure of the Mediterranean, as it seems the same everywhere with flat beaches and not much in the way of waves or sealife, but I guess if it is hot and this is what you have convenient, it works. Judging from the accomodation options, it must be just a complete zoo in summer. There are campgrounds that hold thousands, and these are lined up for a mile in some areas. So there must be tens of thousands, if not more, on the beach, filling up stores, waiting in lines...It is good to be here in a quieter time.
One nice feature about the touristy areas is there are often bike lanes completely seperate from the car road. Interestingly, they often have no easy way on or off, and sometimes this great path will just end in gravel with a big guard rail seperating us from any useful pavement. We can lift our bikes over the rail, as we did a couple times today, but this is certainly not Switzerand in terms of their engineering prowess.
Perpignan is a bit too large of a city to really enjoy (in contrast to Narbonne where we could walk across the whole old town in about 10 minutes and where we finally had a great meal--in a pizza restaurant where service was kind and quick, and the food truly enjoyable and even somewhat interesting (an appetizer mille feuille of layers of roasted eggplant, sun dried tomatoes, and slivers of ham)). Our views of towns are colored quite a bit by the ride in. In larger cities, we usually come in through less appealing or industrial neighborhoods, often near rush hour, so by the time we reach the historic center, we are less enamored with the locale than it usually deserves. This city, which is immensely confusing with its maze of streets and double signage (both in French and Catalan), was redeemed by finally finding another of those outdoor dining locales they are so fond of here. I guess the weather helps encourage outside dining, which is so pleasant, and these lovely squares in towns serve as great backdrops for eating and drinking. But it still seems surprising Americans havent picked up on this opportunity to expand their seating with outdoor seating, although maybe the prevalence of the car culture and traffic makes this less appealing almost everywhere.
We are amazed at how much of France we have seen and how many different areas. From the high Alps to Mediterranean to the home of the Popes to Roman ruins to the Camargue to a whole variety of farming and vineyards and wineries, there is amazing variety in an area of 600 or so miles. Maybe there is comparable variety in the US, from Vermont to New York City to DC to Virginia, but I am not sure. At least partly here, the weather seems much more microclimate oriented, with small systems at times that seperate one valley from another, and sections down here near the coast that are desperately dry looking, especially in a year where at least Spain is supposed to be experiencing a big drought.

Sept 29 Port Bou, Spain
Well, we officially have biked from Switzerland to Spain. Without a whole lot of thought, we followed the coastal route under the correct assumption that you cross the Pyrenees lower on the coast. However, the riding to the border is probably a lot tougher along the coast after we left the now almost monotonous flats and had 5 or 6 solid, winding climbs of a couple hundred meters each in elevation to get here. The main route would have entailed one longer climb up maybe 500 meters, but this would have been it I think.
However, after the many days of flat riding, it was almost fun to climb some hills, and the views of the sea were suddenly much more pcitureque from the perspective of height. And after each climb, we quickly learned, there was a long swooping downhill to the next seaside village, strategically placed in every cove big enough to stick some buildings. Most of these villages were uninspiring new construction, except Calliure where we stopped for lunch. Here was a bay surrounded by old forts and castles with colorful old houses and a fair crowd of ambling tourists that had much more life than the many soon to be closed beach towns we have passed.
We reached the border by 4:00, so unassuming as to be almost comical. All that indicates you are in Spain is a small roadsign (no "Welcome to Espana!" or "Spain, A Good Place to Live" signs dotting the entry). A bit further on was a small boarded up shack that once housed the customs office, almost intentionally run down and haggard to indicate the desire to eradicate borders and international conflicts forevermore.
From the border, it was 3 last km down to the town of Port Bou (60 km for the day) where we were quickly thrust into Spanish time, just lolling around the harborfront with the local old folks and teens, in no particular hurry as everyone knew dinner wasn't for another 4 or 5 hours. To our utter amazement, given the complete absence of toiurists and the end of season feel to town, the nice hotel right in front of us was full, and the other recommended hotel was closed for the season already. The hostal that was supposed to open at 5:30 again leisurely reopened at about 6:00 and was also full! The last hostal in town, however, had plenty of rooms, but would only give us two rooms for two, but considering the competitive price (35 euros per room including breakfast), this was nothing to complain about.
So we lounged around in our seperate quarters, which is actually kind of nice for the kids to be apart a bit. Then we patiently w aited for the magic dinner hour. I even went for a stroll to appreciate that unhurried Spanish time, as shops began to close around 8 and we joined the early bird eaters for a reasonable, if not spectacular, paella dinner. On the food front, we were happy to see children's menus here featuring noodles as well as the ubiquitous steak hache (hamburger) that neither of our kids eat (of course, one restaurant featured squid on the kid's menu, which must be directed at the local market more than picky American youth). The regular menu, at least in this town, was kind of a joke of pricing with a la carte entrees costing like 25 or 30 euros (30+ dollars!) but set, three course menus (of the same stuff) of 10-12 euros. Being the savvy travelers we are, we opted for the fixed menus and were quite satiated at a cost at or below dining in Italy or France.
It is fortunate we are getting accustomed to drinking wine with dinner, as it seems to cost less than water here. I am particularly fond of the cheap house wines--even the red ones are served chilled, and especially in Spain, I am recalling, they are sort of light and easy to drink. I learned that remarkably Spain produces over 50% of the wine in Europe, which is astounding when you see the many vineyards of Italy and France, let alone smaller production in Hungary or Germany and elsewhere.
To get out of Port Bou you can see the big climb we must start the day with. Both Elaine and my knees were a bit sore at the end of yesterday, so we hope this doesnt persist. We have decided to go the long way to visit Cadaques, home to Salvador Dali and other artistic luminaries, and are trying to shift our thinking to touring on bikes more than simnply getting from one place to another. It seems we have plenty of time to get to Granada at the pace we have been going, and it probably makes sense, as others have advised, to take a train or bus from Girona to somewhere west of Barcelona to avoid the crowded roads and unscenic terrain. Koby is a bit bored with the biking lately, so the prospect of skipping some less appealing riding is welcome to him.

Sept 30 Cadaques
It is amazing how much you can do in a day when dinner is not til 9:00. After waking up leisurely after 8, Koby and I went out for churros and chocolate (churros are fried dough and the hot chocolate is basically melted chocolate in a cup--a lite diet brekkie). Then we shopped for breakfast and lunch food, waited while Manya and Elaine ate and the churros sat like lumps in our tummies, and then did the mile walk to Salvador Dali's home in Port Lligat. Although Cadaques was home briefly to Picasso and numerous other artists, they simply revere Dali here. He lived here for decades, and his oversized personality probably charmed the region. It is amazingly easy to see his influences here. Many of his more impressionistic paintings are set right in this town, but even more telling is the warped, twisted, and hole ridden rock along sea that has undergone years of erosion from wind and water. Even Koby quickly noticed how this resembled his melting clocks and hole ridden self portraits. His house further reflected his warped view of the world, decorated with odd items collected the world over, including several of the rotund Michelin Man statues among his other curiousities. And although the site of his house is inextricably tied to nature and the sea, there is almost nothing in his house, except the stuffed gooses or rhinoceros head with wings, that is from nature. You too could accumulate this decor, with a bit of money and a lot of kitsch, although I dont know if people would line up to see your house if you didn't produce some perspective changing artwork.
After the Dali visit, we walked the coastline of Spain's easternmost point to find hidden coves and excellent stones for Goldsworthyesque extreme rock balancing. This and a picnic and lazing around got us all the way til about 2, leaving a mere 7 more hours til dinner. So it was a walk back to town, reading the paper (Herald Tribunes are easy to find here as this is a popular tourist area), washing clothes, a nap to try to shake the fever I caught from Manya, and then off to a boat trip in the wind tossed waters to Cap de Creu, the true easternmost point in Spain. We then wandered the town to find a birthday cake for me, had a rooftop celebration, organized photos on the camera (we are figuring out some ways to burn CDs and get pictures on the travelblog I think), wrote here, and it still isn't 7!
So another good day of not cycling, as we are much ahead of where we expected to be at this time and we are trying to change our perspective a bit from covering ground to touring on bikes. Coming here, over a couple extra climbs and out of the way, was a good chance to get out of logging miles just to get to a destination, and we probably will change our pace some here to adjust to the terrain and Spanish time.
Our ride here yesterday was made more interesting by meeting up with a Trek Travel Tour where people pay big bucks to get to use "free" Trek Madrone bikes and be fed little packs of coveted Oreos for on the bike snacks. It was nice to talk to American cyclists, who obviously showed much interest in our journey, and particularly fun to chat with Tour rider Christian Van Velde's wife, who was the trip leader and gave a little insight into life on the Tour (although afterwards I thought of a thousand questions I wished I asked her). Later on, we were passed, briefly, by some other well attired riders, and quickly jumped on their wheel. We cruised on this winding but mostly flat road with these guys from England, and had a nice chat about cycling and their time here in June when it was 100 degrees! So the short day of 40 km went quickly, with only a couple biggish climbs, but again the grade is so gentle we just move on up and enjoy the ride down the other side.

October 3 Girona
After a solid day of cycling (80 km), we are enjoying two rest days in Girona, home to many American pro cyclists, who, unfortunately, are in Zurich for the weekend for a race. Still, we are getting our touch of celebrity by staying at the Apartments Historic, where Lance Armstrong lived for 2 months while his apartment in town was being remodeled. He rented the whole building for his family and assorted support team, so we may even be in Lance's bed! The lobby here is adorned with autographed bike paraphenalia from Lance, and assorted other pro cyclists, all of whom have stayed here (Levi Leipheimer, George Hincapie, Michael Berry, ...).
Leaving Cadaques offered a climb right out of town, 5 km back on the road we descended two days earlier. This was another pleasant enough time to just go slow and steady, although even the October morning sun made you think how unbearable this must be in summer. From the top of this climb, we enjoyed a rare ridgetop road that provided views back up the coast where we had ridden and ahead to the Pyrenees rising in the North (actually it might have been the west, or the east, as my usually reliable sense of direction is messed up by the coastline that goes more North-South than East-West as my geographical sense of Italy-France-Spain tells me it should). We tried taking some action photos as we rode downhill, which made me appreciate those motorcycle cameramen in bike races. It is a little hairy to try to watch the road, not hit the other bike, and to line up for camera angles that don't involve your shoulder in the way. Once the camera was away, we had a great time on another of these long swoopy descents, down onto the flat and fertile plains of Catalunya. We stopped for lunch beside the Greek and Roman ruins at Empuria, which looked impressive enough from outside, but with a nice beach calling from across the road and enough memories of wandering around piles of rocks in other locations (granted, I struggle to feel the historical weight of these places, with a thermal bath pile of rocks here, a small bit of mosaic floor there, the outlines of a temple or cistern a bit further), we opted for the beach that surely was used by the Greeks and Romans too, and a lot of folks since.
Within 35 or so km from Girona, we all decided to try to get there for the night, and headed out on what turned out to be a sloggish ride through unscenic terrain and some of the smelliest riding, between cow manure and then industrial chemicals and traffic filled roads with car exhaust. The one redeeming feature of this was we were able to have the kids switch bikes, as Koby has gotten tall enough to fit on my bike. So this was a pleasant change for all, especially for Koby who continues to profess his relative disinterest in the simplicity of tandem riding.
We arrived in Girona at the bewitching hour of 7 on a Saturday night, which is ambling time on the Rambla (the Spanish name for a pedestrian road). So we dodged our way through the strollers, and encamped in the old city while Koby and I tried to find a hotel. This proved much harder than expected, not because they were filled, but because we literally couldn't find a hotel. We actually couldn't find two hotels, despite having a map and being within about 100 ft of them. We skunked around the narrow alleys and staricases to no avail, only to return again to finally discover this spot that overlooks the Cathedral.
One of the great pleasures in Spain is eating, which they too seem to enjoy greatly. In what feels like an almost complete contrast to much of French dining, the dining here is loud and exuberant, the food served fast and unpretentiously, and the tastes diverse and strong. In Cadaques, we ate at one of those rare no menu restaurants where the voluble waiter sits down at your table and exhaults all the fresh dishes and recommends everything. Because of language barriers, it was hard at first to tell if he was suggesting all these 20 dishes together, or offering a choice, but we finally figured out it was choices, and we were pleased to find he was right that everything was excellent, and we enjoyed watching the same show he performed with every group of diners when they arrived. In Girona, we have followed recommendations of locals and ended up in these unadorned settings where we get plates of assorted cured meats, cheeses, salads, and versions of Spanish tortilla (basically quiche) along with these excellent and cheap house wines from the region. It is good that ordering is relatively easy since menus at these places are exclusively in Catalan (although the waiters all seem to be skilled in English), which although fathomable to hear if you have some knowledge of Spanish and French, has plenty of food words that seem to be rooted in neither of these related languages. It feels like a great success to discern enough of the menu to get the kids foods without meat or goat cheese, and almost anything we order seems great to us. Regardless, most dishes are less than 5 euros, so you can always order more without feeling like you are wasting a ton of money. The Spaniards eat the same way, with lots of plates on the table and lots of reaching over to other people plates for tastes of this and that.
The other high points of our day here was another great Museum of Cinema (maybe our kids will run a history of film class for Compass) and a walk along the old city walls overlooking the whole old city and the Pyrennees off in the distance. We have also all (but Koby) gotten addicted to Sudoku, so we spend our time in restaurants with pencil in hand solving these puzzles--not very social but pretty engaging at the moment.

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