TRANS-ANDALUZ, DAY ONE: The hardest part isn't the riding
Mood:  accident prone
Topic: Planning!
Every time I go on a trip like this, I never get a good night's sleep the night before. Sleep usually consists of a couple of hours of tossing and turning the night before, stomach roiling like the North Sea, and it's not because of the trip per se... it's because travelling the 1.4 kilometres from my bedroom to the butt end of the Regional Expres, without a doubt, is a travail worthy of Luis Bu?uel.

Today's journey was no exception. Get out of the house at quarter after eight; stares from people all along the street. (I tell myself that they're just jealous of my spiffy new Ortlieb panniers.) There's the usual crush of cars trying to get across Plaza Tirso de Molina. In spite of them literally being bumper-to-bumper, I manage to wedge my way through and head down calle Atocha to the Atocha train station, even getting waved through by a traffic cop. Down the escalators in the rotonda (even though that's not really kosher), to the ticket check: "Do they really let you take that thing on the trains?" I'm there with fifteen minutes to spare. Over to Platform Five, then wait, and wait some more. Even though the train's supposed to leave at nine, it doesn't pull up to the platform until three minutes after, by which time the platform is filled with elderly Andalusians who, fearing that they'll miss the train, crush up to the doors and push and shove each other to get on....kind of oblivious to the bike and the fact that I only have one door when I can get on, as opposed to the ten or twelve that they could, logistically, use. Luckily, a guy my age helps me lift the bike up and direct it towards the back of the carriage, gently shooing the grandmas and grandpas out of the way: "Careful! Dirty!" (an old cry that market porters used to yell to get the oblivious out of their way.) I check my ticket. The only space that they have for bikes on this train is in the back. The ticket office has put me in the front carriage. Again.

I don't mind sitting in the back with the bike; aside from one Galician railman who's deadheading the trip down Jaen, I have the entire section to myself. The Galician and I try to swap conversation, but give up soon after; he doesn't seem to have an ear for foreign accent and his accent is so heavily tinged with galego speech that it takes me a couple of seconds to register what I think it was he said.

And so it goes all the way down to Jaen. And I pull out the camera and take some pictures of wind farms situated cheek-by-jowl with fifteenth-century windmills, the kind Don Quijote used to go after; take pictures of myself with the bike, noting how much looser the Gore-Tex pants are this year than they were last year. And then I pull out my journal and start to ponder: What did we talk about last year when we were travelling down south? All the pictures I have of us, we're all smiling and laughing and you can tell that everyone's just looking forward to being on the road. I craved silence before leaving, and I have it now; but what took the place of that silence before?

Almost gone
Mood:  happy
Topic: Planning!
Dani from Ciclos Delicias finally called last week to let me know that my new Ortlieb handlebar bag was in (only took, what, five weeks?) so I got that on today, after I picked the bike up from the old bike shop I used to work for. The Owner wasn't there. Either she wasn't there, or she was hiding. Either way, good for me; I've already told them one porky about teaching English outside of Madrid (which is really only a half-lie, when you think of it: I am teaching English -- I just didn't want them to know that I was as accessible as she might want.)
Only two more days before I go. I had a weird attack of The Lonlies in the kitchen last night as I was making soup, hanging out and generally enjoying the quiet that is so often lacking at our place. Seven days by yourself - even if they're seven days when you're going to be staying in hotels and not doing anything super-antisocial like sleeping in olive groves or something like that - is a lot of time by yourself. I just hope that I don't freak out halfway through, get the heebie-jeebies about being on my own or something like that.
Anyway, this time I can't back out. I have got THE PROJECT. And THE PROJECT dictates that I have to do it for real this time, that I can't fink out or back out. I have to do the entire route by myself.
I wonder how long it'll be before I start cursing out THE PROJECT.....?

Ooh, good new biking drink...
Mood:  happy
Topic: Planning!
Oooh, yum.

Forget Red Bull. I just got given a great recipe for strawberry Mexican (or should that be Mexican strawberry?) licuados (damn, I taught English for seven years, I should know this....)

1 pound ripe strawberries
1 teaspoon sugar
3 drops vanilla extract
500 mL bottle of sparkling water (or gaseosa, like La Casera, if you're in Spain)

Put the strawberries, vanilla and sugar in a blender and puree until smooth. Pour into a bottle and let sit for an hour; if the mixture should separate, pour off the water that forms on top.

When you're ready for a drink, put the mixture in a glass with some ice and top up (SLOWLY) with the fizzy drink of your choice. (If you're using a soft drink with artificial sweetener, don't pour too quickly, or the froth will go all over the place!)

You can use sugary soft drinks like Sprite and 7-Up, but beware of the sugar rush. The first time I made this, I made it with non-Diet Sprite and the sugar rush was so intense I had to walk around the block a couple of times to wear it off. (If I could figure out a way to mix this with cappucino or espresso I think I'd have a hit on my hands!)

Beats powdered energy drinks any day!!

The Website is on its way!!!!
Mood:  happy
Topic: Planning!
Oh joy! It's finally happening! The Spanish Cyclepaths website is now a done deal!

Graphic master Moncho Davila has worked his wonders to create a website that's cool, efficient and stylist - not to mention informative! So we've purchased the domain name, are in the process of putting all the stuff together and will have the brand new, improved SPANISH CYCLEPATHS 3.0 up and going as of the first of March.

This is sooooo exciting!!!

Back in the swing of things
Mood:  bright
Topic: Planning!
First day back: Not so bad. G-Man and I are still in contact - actually, I'm going out to his place for dinner on Thursday, which is the first time I've been to a Spanish guy's house and the guy wasn't a friend of a friend. Meet the parents, kind of.

New plans for May 15th long weekend:
- the Ciudad Encantada in Cuenca.
- bumming around Segovia.
- camping around that funny sticky-out bit in the west end of the Comunidad de Madrid.
- heading out for a three-day excursion with the Pedalibre people.

So many options. So little time....