Spain! - The End of Day 16

Today's planned destination: San Sebastian

Today is Canada Day. I know that this is an overly patriotic way to start a blog posting, but I have to admit I was thinking that I would rather be recognizing Canada Day riding into Spain than watching some silly fireworks somewhere. OK, enough about that. I left the small surf community of Lit Et Mixe bright and early and feeling about the same as I did yesterday which was a good sign. My cold seems to have plateaued and since I slept outside last night behind a hardware superstore on another cold evening I am glad I feel fine. So from here it was a long day of flat roads that felt like I was in the middle of nowhere. I stopped at many fruit stands which line the French roads this time of year.

I made my way quickly to Bayonne a very beautiful and very Basque city. From there it was on to Biarritz and toward the border into Spain. The riding was quite straightforward today although in this region there is a significant amount of traffic. I found myself longing for the bike paths of Germany or the courteous drivers of Sweden, but instead the further south one travels the more treacherous the riding. As well entering the Basque country means entering the mountains which, this close to the sea, are not unmanageable but they are a challenge. I latched on the the wheel of another of Europe's pro tour wannabes and let him pace him up the climb into Irun. From there it was all down hill into San Sebastian where I finished the day at around 3pm.

I met with my friend Patxi and celebrated the arrival in Spain with some beer and tapas. I also slept warmly and well. This was to be the last day of my great journey after some easy persuading from myself and my friends to stop. I went to bed that night thinking that there may be another ounce of riding in me yet. And definately there will be. But not on this tour.

Total time on the bike: ~ 6 hours
Total time from departure to arrival: ~ 7 hours