Day 3 and 4... Into Spain

Day 3  

Leaving Valence, we jumped on the autoroute and boogied south once again. Despite nearly being wiped out by flying car parts we really enjoyed riding on these roads. The road conditions, signage and services are all excellent.

We stayed on the autoroute until Montpellier, then we headed for the sea side. The area of the coast around Montpelier is quite marshy with long sand bars that parallel the sea.  We rode along the sand bar roads to the town of Sete.  Sete looks to be a fairly major port town with a significant tourist element. We worked our way to the centre of town looking for a place for lunch.  There is a canal that runs right though the centre of town and we found a nice outdoor cafe for lunch.

The canal in the centre of Sete

After leaving Sete we got lost trying to find our way to a hotel we had selected. It turned out be long day. We thought that we were about 15 minutes from the hotel but we ended up wandering though some interesting wine country for an hour or so... no problem! Thanks to the GPS.

One of the things that we knew about, but are still trying to get used to, is the fact that restaurants are not open in the afternoon.  They close after lunch (2ish) and reopen at 7 or 8pm.   You can still get a drink at most cafes but food selection is minimal.  In fact I am sitting at an out door cafe now sipping beer waiting for the 8 o'clock opening.

Day 4

Today was a great ride.  We started on the autoroute for about 45K then cut off onto a 2 line highway into the Pyrenees.  Once again we wound through the wine fields of Languedoc before climbing into the mountains.  Beautiful countryside...   Small village, some built on steep slopes, stone chalets, winding roads, sunshine, great motorcycle country and not much traffic.    We were headed for the town of La Seu D'urgell, located at the intersection of the road to Andorra.

On the way we stopped at a couple of cafes.  First for coffee, then for ice cream... two essentials on our travel diet.

 

Linda's shirt says it all!

A couple of railway bridges (left and centre) on and the road on the way to Andorra

Located in La Seu D'urgell is a large kayaking park / training facility. The first picture is of a training session and the others are of other parts of the park.

The Olympic kayak training facility on La Seu D'urgell

 There is certainly an excellent selection of good, cheap wine. (Cheaper than a bottle of Coke) 


We stopped for ice cream in this cafe. Ya gotta love the label on this bottle.  Especially the disclaimer below the name of the wine.


After reaching La Seu we found a nice hotel, showered and went out for a walk through the historic part of town.   It was about 4 in the afternoon. Hardly anything was open. The old town was beautiful, but deserted. 

After a relaxing stroll through the old town and kayak park we went back to the hotel and ordered a wine and beer and sat on the sidewalk deck.   After a few minutes we were approached by a fellow who introduced himself and told us that he recognized our motorcycle in the parking lot. He had seen it at Stefan's place in Heidelberg.   Rod was from BC as well. A veteran European motorcycle traveller.  We chatted for a while over drinks and later met for dinner. 
  

La Seu D'durgell

La Seu D'durgell

We are happy to be in Spain now. Language is not as much of a problem.  Some of my French came back but attempted conversations usually ended up in a mixture or French, Spanish and English words all in the same sentence???  However, you can easily get by with English only.

Tomorrow is the last leg of this trip segment.  We have about 220K to cover to reach the town of Bot. Most of this leg will be through the mountains.  We will be staying at a hotel in Bot for 4 nights and plan to attend the Aragon MotoGP race Friday, Saturday and Sunday.