Bad

We are in Madrid.  You will only appreciate the significance of this if you have a vague idea of our intended route, which doesn't pass within 150 miles of Madrid.

This morning when we got up the temperature was barely above freezing....not what we signed up for but survivable.  BUT the outlook through to the middle of next week is truly horrid.  On Monday the overnight low is due to be -7!!!  To be sure of avoiding ice on the roads we would have to delay out start until about  noon each day and that just isn't viable with some long and hilly days ahead.  We don't have the clothes, the heart or the balls to ride in these conditions.

So we are going home!  We left our hotel and rode straight to the station where we booked seats and bike slots on the next available train to Madrid.  This turned out to be 5 hours later so we had a lot of sitting around while cancelling hotels, booking flights and generally feeling pissed off. 

We got into Madrid at 5pm and found some bike boxes and hauled everything back to our very small hotel room to play a version of Twister while we tried to pack the bikes away.

That's it.....our first total failure!  We will be home tomorrow evening with our heads bowed and our tails between our legs.

Thanks for listening.