Real Gone Kid Having arrived a little late at the start, Nick made up for it by leaving a day early. There was a tear in my eye as I waved him off...then I realised I could take his bedroom. This was particularly welcome since Plum's snoring was so bad last night I ended up sleeping on the sofa. Not Fair The Spanish do not appear to have any concept of 'weights and measures'. In Blighty we have rules about such things and people to enforce them. If you buy a pint it will contain 20 fluid ounces....or if it doesn't you are required, by law, to make a sarcastic comment to the barman. Something like "could you fit a scotch in there?" is traditional. Because Malaga is an area with many Brits, every bar offers a beer size called a "pinta". If you are very VERY lucky this may indeed be a pint but usually it is just the biggest glass they have, which could be anything from about 40cl upwards. You won't ...
We plan our trips, as far as is practical, to enjoy decent weather but this is never a given. A bit of rain is to be expected, and nothing to be afraid of, but the forecast for Lisbon was wetter than a wet thing. Faced with the prospect of finding shelter for building our bikes then 20 miles of sub-aqua cycling to our hotel we resolved to get a taxi. Arriving into Lisbon, there was a noticeable absence of rain so figured we might as well revert to plan A and cycle. The promised long queues for biographic data capture didn't materialise. Those cunning Portuguese had found a way round the problem...they didn't bother trying. As a man who has been preparing his stool sample for several days this was a bit of a disappointment. Finding a good spot to build the bikes is always a challenge and today we came up with a corker. We hauled the boxes off the oversized baggage belt and built them right there. This created the tantalizing p...
We were magnificent at the Wok Buffet. In fact, the owner came to our table to show us the bills for his kids' college fees and beg us to leave. An unexpected bonus was that when we wocked up, at 8:15, expecting a wait...it was already open. If the dinner laws police get to hear about that there will be trouble! After the 2 hardest days of the trip we had a pair of easy days to look forward too. Today was still 64 miles but just 1600ft of climb and we were more than ready for a lazy day. When we set off the temperature was 4 degrees C and we were in full winter mode, but the sun shone all day and we gradually removed layers as we rode. As a striptease act I think it still needs work. Today was Sunday so no shops open so we sat on a roundabout and ate rations that we shopped for yesterday evening. We have been a bit taken aback by how little English is spoken along our way. In the bigger hotels we a...
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