chapter six

After spoiling ourselves in the hotel at Castro-Urdiales we found it hard to return to the simpler comforts of camping, so promised ourselves a night at a first-class campsite if the opportunity arose. Sure enough, as we pedalled around the busy resort of Laredo - complete with it's long seafront of high-rise hotels, and on to the quieter village of Noja we found just what we were looking for. Surprisingly, the site was full of English cars and English people, all of whom had travelled over on the ferry to nearby Santander. We felt a bit antagonistic towards them all, as if they had 'cheated', by not coming all the way around from France - as we had done! Yes I know it's childish, but we were beginning to feel a bit superior by now, as if we were REAL travellers, not just holiday-makers!

Jess enjoying the ride through the Costa Verde

Anyway, the site was lovely and very peaceful in an English sort of way, but we only stopped the one night before pressing on (God knows why) to Santander itself.

We had trouble getting into this huge city, it wasn't that they wouldn't let us in, it was just that we couldn't find the right way in! "All roads lead to Rome" they said, but really it should have been "All roads lead to the motorway", for that is exactly what they did. No matter which way we went, we simply couldn't find a road to take us around the bay and into the city.

Eventually of course we did find a way, but it took us over two hours of wandering around, and then having to dice with death on busy city dual-carriageways!

We discovered the tourist information office right on the front overlooking the sea, and they kindly gave us some information on campsites within the area. We chose to stay at the north end of the city on the Cabo Mayor (literally big cape) and spent two nights making the most of the brilliant hot weather to do our laundry. We even washed the sleeping bags since, after six weeks on the road, they were probably in need of it!

We chanced to meet an Australian cyclist while we were here, who gave us some excellent information on what to expect on the journey ahead. He had just spent three months cycling from Portugal and had a wealth of horror stories for us; similarly we in turn couldn't resist telling him of the WORST aspects of his journey north!

The Camino signs led us to Santiago

Our hirsuit Antipodean (oh alright - hairy Aussie!) advised us to stop at Santillana del Mar, a historic village with close links to the pilgrim's route to Santiago. The Camino (or road) which the pilgrims follow passes through the village, and the small shops in the centre certainly know how to exploit this fact! Almost all of them had little trinkets for the pilgrims (or just interested tourists) to buy which sort of lowered the tone of the place. Yes it was very old and picturesque, but possibly very commercialised as well.

On we went, ever westward, and enjoyed the endless variation in the coast - sometimes long golden beaches, sometimes high rocky cliffs; but always lovely blue seawater. The campsites were not fully open yet as the real season doesn't start until late July, so we had to be careful to make sure that we didn't pay 4* prices for what was really a 2* pitch - at this time of year most of the facilities were not operating and the sites resembled ghost-towns - if they were open at all.

We had our first glimpses of the Picos de Eupopa mountains in the distance, with the snow-capped peaks looking like clouds about the hazy landscape. We had been told not to miss them, and despite the fact that they are almost 8000' high, we should not be discouraged just because we were riding heavily-laden bikes - apparently the road up was fairly easy going.

We decided to give it a go and after turning off the main coastroad we followed the valley of the River Deva up into the hills. After the 'frontier' town of Panes we entered a delightful limestone gorge, with towering cliffs of weathered rock on all sides, and high above the shrieking calls of Griffon Vultures.

We stopped regularly to admire the tremendous scenery and take lots of photos, but around every corner there was something new to see and shoot. It seemed to go on for hours and certainly took our minds off the steady, but gentle, climb up into the Picos. Eventually we emerged out from the limestone gorge onto a high plateau, before climbing once again from the small mountain town of Potes up into the real mountains. Luckily our campsite was only a couple of miles outside of the town, so we were spared the full climb up to Fuent De at 1070 metres!

We only stopped for one night at the site, since we didn't have any suitable walking boots, and it was impossible to cycle over the mountains with anything less than a proper mountain bike. In short, we were unprepared for the mountains so did the sensible thing and returned to the coast to continue our adventure.

It was while we were descending back down the mountain, that we had a very unusual problem - we had a puncture! In 1407 miles we had not had any problems with tyresor tubes, but in the next hundred miles or so we were to have no end of trouble. Even our puntures had punctures, and we eventually put it down to our tyres and changed them forthwith. This seemed to do the trick and we had no further problems for quite a while.

Once we'd returned to the coast the weather took a turn for the worse and we were treated to days of overcast skies and drizzle. Things got so bad that by the time we reached Villaviciosa we'd had enough and decided to take refuge in a hotel for the night.

Our stay at the Casa Espana was delightful and certainly picked our spirits up, and when we left they even gave us a metal keyring of the hotel as a good luck charm. We duly fastened it to our panniers and all our woes disappeared.......even the punctures!

We headed next to Gijon, a busy city but with lots of atmosphere. After pitching the tent on the outskirts of the city at the Municipal campsite (where they intended charging us for our two bikes!) we rode into the centre and found two wonderful venues. The first was the Roman remains of a bath house built when the city was founded by Octavian in 5AD, and the second was a Lidl store where we bought muesli and new cycling gloves! As if that wasn't enough we also managed to buy a long-awaited book on birds - our own knowledge had long been surpassed by the new variety of birds we were seeing.

The beautiful Picos de Europa mountains

We didn't pay for our night's stay at Gijon; not because we didn't want to, but because the office was closed when we left. At least that's our story - though the fact that we would have had to pay more for two bikes than a huge four-wheel drive might have tempted us not to look too closely for the site manager!

As we left Gijon all the helpful roadsigns directed us for the WRONG road to Aviles. It was the wrong road because it was the motorway, and we would not have been able to use it; instead we had to find the alternative old road out of the city. Of course town planners don't want traffic to use these smaller roads, so they don't signpost them - which makes it all the more frustrating for cyclists!

Aviles turned out to be a very industrial town, so we continued on into a strengthening headwind for the village of Cudillero. The campsite was at the top of the hill on the edge of the village, and the shops were in the centre at the bottom of the hill........of course! However, this hill was no ordinary hill - it was at least 1:4 gradient and cobbled! Going down was bad enough but returning back up it with panniers full of shopping made us wince, especially since we had to walk!

The next stretch of coast from here to where we turned inland for Santaiago, was a long series of undulating rises with beautiful forested hills on one side, and the sea on the other. The landscape was becoming more green again as we headed west into the wetter region of Galicia, and the population noticeably sparcer!

We were travelling on the only road west - the N634 - which meant sharing it with fast cars and heavy lorries, but thanks to that magic white line along the side of the road we were at least able to keep a few feet from the traffic!

At Valdepares the fine weather again decided to have a rest and heavy rain was forecast. The campsite owner told us we could stay in one of the holiday chalets for no extra cost, since they were empty at the moment. After a little indecision we accepted his generosity, but when he repeated his offer the next morning we felt a little guilty (if not a little uncomfortable) and said we had to move on. It was a shame that we had become so suspicious of people that we probably didn't recognise a true good Samaritan when we saw one.

At Ribadeo some of the traffic headed off inland to Lugo, but we preferred to stay on the coastroad a while longer and take the quieter road via Mondonedo. It proved the wise thing to do as we had very little traffic, and we had enough food and gas (we always carried two spare cartridges now) to last a few days.

As we bypassed the busy wood-burning town of Mondonedo we met a couple of English cyclists on their tandem coming the other way. They had been over here for a couple of weeks now and were heading back to Santander, after completing part of the pilgrim's Camino. We would have liked to have chatted for longer than we did, but having met half-way up a mountain pass we felt eager to get the rest of the climb done, and so parted company with good wishes for the rest of our journey.

We stayed at Villalba overnight, and since there wasn't a campsite we had to stay in yet another hotel. Yes I know it sounds more like a holiday now, but we simply had no choice....... none whatsoever!!!!

It took us a further two days to reach Santiago de Compostela - our first target of the tour. It wasn't a religious target for us, just that of an enquiring mind; especially since we'd read acouple of interesting books by cyclist Bettina Selby and walker Nick Crane about the place. I have to admit though that after following the Camino for the past few weeks I had grown a sense of spiritual travelling as well as physically travelling towards this city. However, I decline to think of this as a religious experience, more that we were travelling in the footsteps(so to speak) of thousands that had gone before us.

chapter seven

It was June 8th and we woke on our first morning in Santiago to brilliant sunshine. After spending the past few nights in hotels it was nice to be back under canvas - even if it had been a very cold night! We spent the morning religiously (how appropriate considering we were in Santiago!) cleaning the bikes, and then caught the bus into the historic city centre.

The magnificent deep valleys near Ribadeo on the Costa Verde

The receptionist at our campsite had kindly given us a map of the city, and it took us no time at all to find the Museo das Peregrinacios (or Pilgrim's Museum). Inside we were surprised to find that admittance was free, and we were even given an English translation of the museum guide. We learnt all about the life and death of St. James, and what happened after his execution at the hands of the Romans.

It appears that he was deprived of a proper Jewish burial, and had to be transported by sea to Spain for his body to lie in rest. His grave was lost for many centuries, but during the time of the Moorish invasion it was miraculously rediscovered, or so the legend goes. Whether the remains concealed inside the silver casket in the cathedral really are those of St. James, is unclear but one thing is evident. The threat of the Moslems capturing the holy relics was enough for Christians throughout Europe to join together and launch another crusade against the invading Moors.

After spending more than two hours enjoying the museum, we had lunch outside a small cafe down one of the many alleyways. Our tapas arrived with beautiful slices of smoked ham and the obligatory bottle of red wine, ensuring that our reserves of energy would last for the rest of the afternoon.

Which was just as well, for we still had alot to see in and around the cathedral. The main square in front of the huge entrance was very busy with tourists and pilgrims (those that had walked or ridden along one of the caminos to reach St. james's remains, and pay their respects), but this did not detract from it's splendour. On all four sides the square was bordered by impressive buildings, giving us the feeling that we really were in a very special place. This was only heightened once we'd entered the cathedral, where hundreds of worshippers had come to pray or be blessed at the holy relics inside. Jess and I got the feeling that we were intruding on these people's special experience, something that many non-believers feel perhaps, so we soon made our way to the exit.

The sunshine - and the beggars - greeted us outside, and we spent the rest of the day wandering around the narrow streets of the historic centre, before returning home to the campsite on foot.

The Cathedral at Santiago de Compostela

We spent another couple of wonderful days in Santiago, improving our knowledge of Spanish culture and spoiling ourselves with Spanish cuisine. Before long though the urge to move on resurfaced and we made preparations to leave.

Our route took us due south now, headed for the Portuguese border, but first we had some exciting little villages to explore. At Iria Flavia we discovered the ancient port where St. James's body was brought ashore, and also the old church which at one time had been the seat of the bishop. The bishop only moved to Santiago once the remains of St. James had been rediscovered there.

There was very little to see of the port which in Roman times had been a flourishing trading centre, but we did find the stone on which St. James had been carried at nearby Padron. The three foot high stone, which today stands beside the Ulla river, is engraved with the name of St. James but archaeologists have discovered that it is actually a Roman alter stone to the god Neptune! It further complicates the 'truth or fable' argument associated with the story of St. James.

We rode on a couple of miles to the mouth of the River Ulla and right beneath a towering new motorway bridge we found the ancient castle of Torres - which actually means 'towers' in Spanish. This was originally a Bronze Age site, but the Romans were not slow to realise it's strategic importance and built a fort here to protect their trading post at Iria Flavia. Similarly, the Christians seemed to have used the site for defending the river from Vikings and later, the Moors. There was little left of the castle to see, but the fantastic view across the estuary to the hills beyond more than made up for that, and besides there were tiny bits of Roman pottery to be found all over the place!

Our journey took us past Vilagarcia, where we camped right on the shore,and onto the large and incredibly busy city of Pontevedra. It was much bigger than the map suggested and we spent ages trying to find the right road out of the place; it was a case of ignoring all the signposts (which tried to direct us onto the motorway) and finding the smaller road.

The stone that carried St. James body at Padron

Our problems worsened once we'd arrived at Redondela as the N550 which we'd been following quite happily for a few miles, suddenly became a motorway and the nice little red sign ordered us to leave! It didn't guide us onto an alternative road; it just dumped us in the middle of nowhere. We gave up on trying to find the right road, and headed off into the town to seek a hotel - whereupon we instantly found an old rusting sign pointing to Portugal!

The weather was getting very hot now, and we took the opportunity of doing the washing and hanging it out on our hotel balcony. After all the rain we had experienced earlier in the trip, it was nice to have this fine weather and get our shorts (which normally take ages to dry because of their leather inserts) dry in next to no time. Our last night in Spain was to be an enjoyable, if rather expensive, one in which we treated ourselves to a meal in the hotel restaurant. This was partly a necessity, as we had run out of food and the local shops were closed, and partly because we were fed up with our boring diet of rice, fish or curry!

Next morning we took a quiet country road to Tui, the border town right beside the Rio Minho which seperates Spain from Portugal. It has a lovely-looking castle standing high above the deep river valley,but we had no time to spare and rode over the iron bridge that joins the two countries.

Surprisingly there were no border guards to welcome us to Portugal, in fact it was all a bit of an anticlimax. We had to ride up the hill and enter the town of Valenca before we saw any signs of life at all!

chapter eight

As we entered our first Portuguese town of Valenca we were greeted by cobbled streets. Our Australian friend in Santander had warned us about these but, thinking he was exagerating, we weren't really prepared for the uncomfortable ride to come. We were to find out that almost every Portuguese town and village has it's cobbles, and though a few of them have laid tarmac over the top, the resulting surface is far from smooth.

The realisation that we had come to Portugal with touring bikes instead of mountain bikes hit home; we were going to get rather sore in the hindquarters! On top of this we were concerned that our narrow wheels, already straining under the enormous weight of all the camping gear, might not stand up to this extra punishment. We expected to have to catch the train home at any moment...........

After taking a couple of photos of the lovely bridge across the Minho river, we rode up to the citadel which testifies to the on-off relations that Spain and Portugal have had. The views from the top were magnificient and we took our lunch here whilst trying to figure out which way we should go now.

Our intention had always been to follow the coast whereever possible, but we now had the option of heading inland and exploring some of the mountain scenery that we had read so much about. It struck us as odd that a cycling guide to Portugal should rant on and on about the hills but not deem it necessary to mention the cobbled roads!

We decided to head off down the coast for a while, and found our first Portuguese campsite at Vilar de Mouros - which we incorrectly translated as 'village of the dead'. We were relieved to find that it actually meant 'village of the Moors', but they were all long gone.

The road down to Viana do Castelo was very busy indeed, and we soon tired of the constant near-misses that the lorries were inflicting on us, so opted to spend the night there and rethink our strategy. The town has several campsites, all on the south side of the very narrow (and very dangerous!) bridge crossing the River Lima. As soon as we'd pitched the tent we set off into town, and back across that awful bridge, to get some shopping. I would like to say that this was a quick and efficient trip, but unfortunately we had to deal with heavily congested roads and motorway-like speeds, so that we didn't get back to the site until late. The day's experiences convinced us to leave the coast and follow the River Lima up into the mountains - especially since we were no longer scared of our capacity to climb hills.

Next morning, as we left the wails of the fog-horn (which had kept us awake all night!) far behind us, we realised that we had made the right decision. Almost instantly the road had become quieter and we were back in the countryside - surrounded by small homesteads and orchards.

The first village we came to was Ponte de Lima, where we found a beautiful wooded avenue of beech trees to shade us from the blazing sun. The river looked wonderful with birds skimming over the surface and a soft breeze causing the rushes to wave. We had our lunch here and then set about exploring the rest of the village. It was typical of many towns in this region with the oldest houses all cramped together inside the thick fortified walls; only the newest houses were to be found outside of these walls. When we had trouble finding a safe place to leave the bikes whilst we went into a small store, the owner simply came out and carried the bikes into the shop! Now that is what you call service!

The bridge here that gives the town it's name (ponte) is a wonderful combination of Roman and Medieval architecture. The join between the two styles is easily visible, and we came away realising that the Roman part of the bridge is actually surviving better than the newer part - built a thousand years later!

As we left Ponte de lima we started climbing, and pretty soon the scenery began to change again, this time to forested hills with deep ravines cut in between. We continued up the valley and in a tiny hamlet called Entre Ambos we found a perfectly secluded campsite under tall pinetrees.

There was no shop in the village but at least the site had a small bar - we and another couple were the only customers all night. As we sipped our cool glasses of beer we totted up the credit card receipts.......and found it came to rather alot. We were overspending on hotels and would have to try and cut down!

The rising sun soon heated up the inside of the tent next morning, and since we had a big climb ahead of us we didn't mind too much getting up early. Almost immediately the gradient steepened and we had to drop down through the gears, as the sun beat down relentlessly. By the time we reached Lindoso we were ready for a break, and wanting to find some shade, we followed the small sign pointing to the castle - whereupon the road got even steeper!

The castle was small but very well preserved, and best of it it had a museum inside that explained the full history of the building. According to the notice on the gates the castle should have been closed for lunch, and it was only whilst deliberating on this that we realised that for the past three days we had been on a different time zone to everyone else. Portugal is one hour behind Spain - and nobody told us!

We enjoyed a wander around the castle walls, and after taking yet more photos (we were sending our films home to be developed), we set off again to cross the border back into Spain. Our road briefly enters Spain before returning to Portugal for the huge climb up the Geres Mountains.

We were climbing for well over an hour, and being in first gear already, we were concerned that the road might get even steeper. Thankfully it didn't but the exertion involved in toiling ever upward made us weary enough to stop at an unusual structure beside the road.

After deciphering a plaque nearby we discovered that this was a watering hole built by the Romans for their troops on the long walk up the pass. There were several milstone pillars placed nearby, and after scouring through the bushes we discovered the original Roman road - complete with it's paving stones! If only we had a bit of room in Jess's panniers for some artifacts!

We eventually managed to complete the climb, and found ourselves at the top of the Portela de Homem, where some genius had built a cafe. We had not expected to find such a civilized treat as this in the mountains, and wasted no time in ordering a couple of drinks to cool us off.

This also marked our re-entry back into Portugal, after negotiating yet another awesome climb, we emerged into a lovely oakwood  valley and the village of Geres - where we camped for the night.

Admiring the view from Lindoso castle

chapter nine

We had a very peaceful night at our campsite in Geres, and after waking late we dropped down into the village proper to have a look around. Geres is famous for it's thermal waters and in the last century it must have been a very busy resort, judging from all the impressive buildings. Today it still has it's visitors (and indeed bathers), but is struggling to recapture the importance of it's former years.

We had been on a long sweeping descent since we crossed the pass of Leonte yesterday, but once we'd crossed the bridge over the Cavado reservoir the road began to climb again. And climb it certainly did, for we were in first gear and still having to stand on the pedals! This agony went on for over five miles up the near-vertical sides of the valley until we emerged onto a small ridge where we joined the main road from the city of Braga. At the top we stopped to regain our breaths, and believing I'd pulled a muscle in my chest, thought we would stop at nearby Viera do Minho.

Dropping down the valley into the village we were dismayed to see the cobbled road in such a poor state, and instead of enjoying a refreshing freewheel down, had to gingerly apply the brakes all the way into Vierho.

We found the municipal campsite easy enough but were taken aback by the sight of hundreds of school children playing in the river right beside our pitch! This was not a good omen for a decent night's sleep but after futile attempts at finding a quieter spot, finally conceded that we had little choice but to put the tent up and suffer the children's excitement. Which under these circumstances - in temperatures of over 30 degrees - it seemed perfectly natural for them to want to cool off in the water!

Next morning we had trouble finding the right road out of the village; all the signs pointed to places that were not marked on our map! We eventually plumped for the one that seemed to be heading off in the right direction, but we had to travel miles before we came to a hamlet that was on the map. This sort of complication was an all-too-common occurence for us, and since a wrong road meant a long detour, it was very trying at times!

Our new camping guide for Portugal informed us that there was a campsite at Mondim de Basto, about forty kilometres away, and so this was today's destination. Our route headed south around the Serra do Barroso mountains and on to the village of Aboim where we had lunch. From our high vantage point in the shade of the church, we could gaze out on the landscape below and enjoy the splendid isolation of this place.

It was like stepping back two hundred years, with tiny tracks between the old buildings instead of cobbled streets, and a distinct lack of any commercial advertising. We had to ask the way to our next village, as there were no signposts at all, and then began a convoluted (but hysterical) description of how best to get to Varzea Cova.

Everybody we asked pointed down the valley to this mysterious place, and nodded enthusiastically when we repeated their instructions. It seemed that we could reach it by going left or right, but the quickest way was to go straight over the mountain - and that's exactly what we did. Or at least we did after half an hour of helpless indecision and wandering between the barns in a desperate attempt to find the track up into the mountains!

Once we did find the right way we were treated to a stunning ride over heather moorland, with steep granite tors and deep ravines between. At one point we had to push the bikes up a very treacherous part of the track, which made us wonder how on earth anyone ever got a car up there, but we were never to find out as we had the whole "road" to ourselves!

The track finally began to descend, and brought us to another primitive hamlet where we were greeted by a man with a gun. Our early concerns were allayed when he kindly showed us the way down the very steep cobbled road towards Varzea Cova itself. The descent was pretty tricky as our narrow wheels kept skidding on the smooth cobbles as we braked; in the end we had little choice but to release the brakes and just whizz down the hill uttering prayers of desperation!

Over the granite mountains to Mondim de Basto

Our problems didn't end once we'd reached the main village, as we then had to continue across country via more small roads to Mondim de Basto. After a further ten miles though, we reached the deep gorge of the River Tamego that marks the edge of the town and made our way to the campsite. We were again greeted by hordes of schoolchildren - but this time on an organised trip - and after pitching our tent high on the slopes above them we enjoyed a well-earned rest: we had now covered more than 2000 miles!

We had a wonderful night's sleep that night, and woke around nine o'clock to yet another very hot day. By the time we had packed all the camping gear into the pannier bags the sweat was pouring off us - an omen of things to come!

We were heading down the Tamego valley to the large town of Amarante, which would normally have meant a relaxed ride downhill. However the river flows through a deep gorge, so the only road we could take was high above the river on a twisting and undulating path.

The first of the day's many mechanical problems came at the bottom of a steep bare hill, with no hope of any shade under which to effect a repair. As Jess went to change down in readiness for the hill, her gear cable snapped and she was left in top gear. There was no way she could carry on up the hill and find a tree to shade under, so we were forced to change the broken cable under the blazing sun. With the job done, we remounted the bikes and made our way up the hill and into the welcome coolness of a dark woodland for lunch.

In addition to the gear cable problem, we had two punctures that day, but at least we'd had the foresight to bring along a few spare cables and tubes - something we were now very grateful for!

Amarante was a busy place - much bigger than the map had suggested - but before leaving next day we had a good look around the centre. The town was founded by Saint Goncalo who built a bridge across the river for local people and travellers to use. Eventually the bridge became a focus for a village to spring up, which has now grown into the large urban area we see today.

The old wooden bridge has long gone, but in it's place stands a stone one with an equally impressive history. It was here that General Silvadeiro successfully defended the town from the advancing battalions of Napoleon's army in 1809. The General kept the French at bay for fourteen days, and prevented them from crossing the river and gaining access to the town. For his efforts, the town has remembered Silvadeiro with a statue and festival.

Our route now took us south across the Serra do Marao mountains to the River Douro and our ultimate destination Lamego. We had the usual trouble of finding our way out of the town, but once we were on the right road it was a long slow pull up through the mountains. At the top of the pass we stopped for lunch at a layby, and bought some fresh cherries off a roadside vendor. The old woman looked like something out of a Dickens novel, but the cherries tasted great and we nibbled them over the coming miles.

We now had the luxury of a downhill ride all the way to the banks of the Douro, and it was a fast and noisy ride with our wheelrims screeming as they overheated. These descents are usually over much too quickly, but I have to say that on this occasion we grew increasingly tired trying to maintain our grip on the brakes!

The view of the river as we entered the city of Peso da Regua was fantastic, and I couldn't help thinking how lucky we were to have the opportunity to do this ride. Despite all the atrocious weather and recent mechanical problems we'd had, we still felt very happy to be cycling along in temperatures of thirty degrees and more - even if it was up and down mountains!

After crossing the River Douro we headed up a side valley towards our campsite at Lamego, and since we'd just had the downhill,it was now time for the uphill. And so we climbed for another hour or two until we reached the outskirts of the town, and immediately kept our eyes peeled for the all-important camping sign. We managed to find the direction signs (Portuguese campsites are often well-signposted) but had to continue our climb up the steep mountainside for another hour, before reaching the campsite.

Guarding the entrance to the site were a viscious-looking Husky dog and a young Rottweiller - complete with neat little piles of dog-mess! We negotiated our way around all three obstacles and booked in, much to the amusement of the Rottweiller who was began licking his lips. There were other campers on the site, which somewhat surprised us, and so we relaxed a bit about sharing our night with these fierce creatures - if we were going to die then we'd all die together!

Jess had found the climb up out of Lamego very hard, and we'd had to stop a few times for her to get her breath back, so once we'd pitched the tent we decided to eat out. There was a lovely restaurant beside the campsite, complete with beautiful white marquis, which we'd originally assumed was for a wedding reception. It turned out to be a permanent feature, which was a little unusual - you don't often see large marquis tents perched on top of a mountain!

The food at the restaurant was fantastic, and we thoroughly enjoyed the service from the friendly waiter too; though our communication had to be in German since he spoke no English and I no Portuguese. As we trundled back to the campsite late that night we suddenly remembered that the dogs were waiting for us, and only hoped that they recognised us as campers and not thieves!

chapter ten

The views from the top of 'Hell Mountain' - as Jess insisted on calling our campsite high above Lamego - were fantastic, and in the morning sun we could see right the way down to Peso da Regua beside the River Douro. We took a couple of photos, but in our hearts knew that they wouldn't do this wonderful scenery any justice at all.

Once we'd packed away, we continued our journey south across a new range of mountains, which meant resuming our first-gear plod up the valleyside. There were very few houses or farms in this region and it wasn't until we reached the top of the pass a village called Bigorne, that we saw anyone else.

We had lunch beneath a shady sycamore tree, and tucked into our now-usual meal of bread and jam. We rarely had meat or cheese for lunch as it would certainly have gone off in this heat, whereas we could keep jam for a couple of days.

We enjoyed a well-earned drop down into the narrow and busy streets of Castro Daire, where we bought some groceries for tea (no posh restaurant meal for us tonight!), and then rode on the short distance to our campsite at Carvalhal. On the way we passed an accident between a car and lorry on a very steep piece of road, a testement to the poor driving skills practised in Portugal!

The campsite had few visitors but it's location between two busy roads meant it stayed pretty noisy for much of the evening - not that we really noticed mind you, we spent most of the time in the bar!

The next day we had a pretty uneventful ride to the city of Viseu, where we spent only one night but later wished we'd stayed longer. The city has a great deal to offer the tourist, but unfortunately we never found the tourist office and were not to discover it's interesting history until after we'd left typical isn't it?

The location of the campsites in Portugal really decided our route, and since we could only travel about fifty miles a day (less in the mountains), we had to detour to the nearest available campsite even if this meant we did not follow our intended direction due south.

So it was that we left Viseu and headed southwest for the village of Penacova, through what was to be some of the best scenery we would see. Our first stop was at Tondela where we cashed some more travellers cheques, and entertained the local population who were obviously not used to lady cyclists. In fact the men would stop and stare at any woman, regardless of what she was wearing, but Jess's tight cycling shorts may have done more to raise their blood pressure than what the other women were wearing!

A few more climbs and then a lovely scenic descent along the River Mondego, with it's picturesque reservoir and deep gorge. We stopped at one point and dropped down a series of steps into the gorge where we saw swallows skimming the surface of the water and warblers in the overhanging trees. The new dual-carriageway had taken most of the traffic away, leaving us with the old quiet road all the way to our campsite overlooking the river.

Tall haystacks -Portuguese style!

There was no need for the flysheet when we erected the tent, as there was little possibility of rain, so we enjoyed the freedom of just using the inner tent. With all our bags unloaded we set off to explore the main part of the village, which just happened to be...........at the top of a mountain of course!

A dog kept us awake for much of that night, and we woke a little tired the next morning. Our road followed the river for a short while, where we saw some women washing sheets in the water and drying them on the gravel banks. It seemed an awful lot of hard work, and we were surprised that they put the sheets on the dirty gravel instead of over a washing line. There didn't seem to be much sense in it, but the fact that thee women were very poor needed little explanation. The gap between rich and poor appeared to be eaven wider in Portugal than it is in Britain.

We were soon climbing up and out of the Mondego valley and through the villages of Vila Nova and Gois, en route to the Serra Lousa mountains. It might seem odd to say that we enjoyed riding a bike up a mountainside, but there were so few people in the hills that it really was a paradise at times. We could roam carefree without having to worry about which road to take (or so we thought - see later!) or bother about heavy lorries and fast cars.

The vegetation became very spartan again as we rode up towards the Portela do Vento (the doorway of wind!), a mountain pass which marks the watershed between the rivers Mondego and Zezere. We could certainly feel the breeze from the south as we stood on the edge of the escarpment, wondering which way to go. All the signposts pointed to places which weren't on our map again, and the place we wanted to get to wasn't mentioned at all. To make matters worse, out idyllic isolation in the mountains was now becoming less attractive - as we now had nobody to ask!

Women doing the washing in the river

Eventually we opted to take the main road down the mountain, in the hope that a sign would materialise later on, which it duly did. We turned right across the wooded slopes and after spotting a Montagu's harrier flying low over some heathland, we soon came to the small town of Pedrogao Grande.

The campsite (unusually) wasn't on top of a mountain this time, but at the bottom of a very long and very steep hill beside the Zezere Reservoir. As we dropped down to the site, hoping to find a nice and quiet pitch, we also prayed we wouldn't have to come back up this way in the morning!

After discussing which was the best way out of the valley, with the warden, we left Pedrogao Grande next morning via the huge dam across the river. As we approached it from one side it didn't look that big, but once on the dam we realised that it was at least 300 feet tall and 1000 feet wide. From the far side it appeared to dwarf the whole valley, and the maintenance vehicles parked at the base of the dam looked tiny in comparison. We took a couple of photos and then set off in the direction of Serta, where we stopped for a coffee and cake. The road surface had been appalling up until now, but once we'd joined the main road things improved somewhat.

The eucalyptus forests through which we had cycled at the beginning of the day also changed to olive groves and pastoral farmland, as the gradient eased. There were no more high mountains to climb today, just a series of smaller undulating hills which meant we could sprint on towards Tomar, a short distance away now.

As we entered the campsite gates we noticed there were a lot of Dutch cars already here, and we read this as a good omen since the Dutch always seem to select the best sites. It looked like we might be staying for a few days............

CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO MAIN MENU