Arrived in BOT

We arrived in Bot at about 2pm today. 

The ride from La Seu D'ugell was very enjoyable.  At the beginning of the ride the  terrain was quite mountainous. We passed through narrow canyons and tunnels.  Gradually the mountains gave way to rolling hills, still quite steep and red clay coloured. At time is felt like were in parts of southern Utah or Arizona.  As we continued west the hills became smaller and we were in semi-arid rolling farm land. At first we saw mostly harvested grain fields. Then we started to notice the olive trees and grape vines.  Within about 100 kilometres we had descended to roughly 200 metres about see level and the temperature had risen from 16C to about 24C. A beautiful sunny day for a ride.

Arriving in Bot we were greeted warmly by our host, Tomas.  "Cal Tomas" is small hotel / Guest house. It is an attractive stone house located in the centre of the village of Bot. There are only 3 rooms, all with en suite bathroom and all beautifully decorated. 


After unloading the bike we immediately headed out to find the restaurants Tomas suggested.  The only on that was open was the restaurant in the larger, but still small, hotel. 

They had quite a fancy dinning room with a large windows facing the high ridge in the distance. It was fancier than we were looking for but with few options we decided to give it a try.  The menu format was interesting.  It was the menu of the week. On the menu were  3 separate section, one above the other.  starters (Salads appetizers, etc) , main course and dessert.  Within each catagory there were 6 selections.  You could choose one selection from each catagory. The meal also included wine or beer,.   The price 14.90 E. ($22.00 C)  Everything included. Tipping is not normal practice in Spain. For exceptional service it is optional.

I ordered a beer and Linda ordered red wine.... not just a glass but the 1.2 liter you see on the table.

I don't normally show pictures of what we eat but I would like to show you what you get for this price in a very nice restaurant.  It was way more than we normally eat. We won't need to eat again today!

First Course...  Catalan Salad  A variety of ham and sausages, cheese olives, lettuce and tomatoes.

Second Course...  Pork chops with BBQ sauce, potatoes, 

 

mushrooms and red pepper.

Dessert  ---  vanilla ice cream with hot chocolate sauce

The coffee in Europe is fabulous

 After lunch / dinner we went for walk. Running though Bot is one of the "Via Verde" trails. These are old abandoned rail lines that are use by walkers and cyclists.  Below is a photo of an overpass taken from the trail.

View from the trail.. terraced olive fields with a national park in the background.

Tomorrow we are off to watch some of the MotoGP  practise sessions.  Were we are staying in 65k from the track. It is the closest place we could find and we booked last March.  The other 2 hotel rooms are also booked by people going to the race.  It is expected that the attendance on race day (Sunday) will be close to 100,000.  It should be interesting.