Now, order the tents struck, and let us go swiftly,
At cockcrow we’ll be in San Pedro de Cardeña.
...
They loosened the reins, and spurred on their steeds.
...
The cock crowed suddenly, the dawn was breaking,
When the noble Campeador arrived at San Pedro.
...
Once Mass is said, then let us be on our way,
For the time is near, and we have far to ride.
...
The night well-nigh done, and dawn drawing nigh,
As the cock was crowing, they prepared to ride.
Alarms went off at 5am. Everyone was grumpy (except me ... I'm never grumpy). Sharing a room sucks. When we first started touring we shoved as many of us as would fit in a room. The because rooms were so cheap in Colombia we started getting singles and could never go back to sharing. WTF, we are old.
I was circling the neighborhood at 6 in the hopes of finding a 6am bar. No luck. We started riding at 6:30 with the hope of seeing something. Not much to find from that is incredible park. Well lighted and nice paths out of town, only shared with a few joggers.
Shortly after leaving the park lights the sky lightened up and we could see. We were on an excellent bike path beside the road for the first 15km except for a little detour to a monestary. It was an extra down and up to see an old building. There is a lot of that on Camino del Cid.
I got stung by a bee or wasp on my lip as I was riding. Lip got fat.
We ended up going far further than we wanted to get a coffee and some food. Finally about 50km in we found an open spot and had cafe con leche and some excellent tortilla con chorizo. It was in the town of Cuevas de San Clemente were our quiet road intersected with a main road and all the eclipse traffic. A guy with his young sons from Cadiz helped us order. They had come up for the eclipse.
The scenery on these roads today was amazing. We did a fair amount of climbing but the single largest was only 160m. It was at the end of that days and starting to get very hot. I wilted on the two climbs after our cokes in the outdoor sports town of Covarrubias.
When it gets hot I don't push it and the guys left me behind on the last big climb. I was grinding out the last 2km into Santo Domingo de Silos, struggling up the last little rise when a young local guy came up behind me and started pushing me. "It electric, no problem!" as I picked up speed. He said he was a local pro MTB cyclist from Silos. He pushed me all the way to the roundabout at the edge of town. Just helping the fat tourists!
The guys were waiting in some shade across the street from the hotel. I had hoped I would ride up to the hotel patio and be handed a cold beer. We had a few on the patio under the shade of some full grape wines. We checked in and left our bikes in the storeroom. Showers and lunch at the hotel. It was ok but not great.
I had a little nap after lunch as one does in Spain.
Bustling square in the evening with tourists from all over. The town was playing it's cuteness to the max.
We had dinner on the square at Restaurante Villa de Silos. It was better than lunch.
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