It is tough now to look back on the past 11 days of travel for myself. To both accurately detail and to also minimize the time to read my account I am going to cut this into 4 parts. First is the beach. Then I will have a trilogy for my trip across Spain.
Friday, September 26th . I attempted and completed my first ride of the ole bike here in Granada. This ride included me climbing nearly a thousand feet on my first ascent near the Alhambra. I was not quite ready for these hills though, and as the ride wore on, I was forced to concede to the fact that I may not be ready for the big mountains yet. This picture was just as a storm was approaching.
Saturday, September 27th and Sunday, September 28th. After sleeping more the night before than any time I can remember here in Spain (because of being exhausted from the ride) I woke somewhat sore, but ready for an adventure in San Jose. My group, API, has a few excursions during the semester, apart from the first few days near Madrid. This trip to San Jose was one of them; in the future we will go to Sevilla, and Paris. Anyways, we left Granada early on Saturday and began our drive towards a beach that is about 3 hours east and south of Granada. During the trip we passed the cave town of Guadix, and a flat open plain with countless windmills and solar panels. Finally, around 1pm we arrived in San Jose, and we were met with a light rain, gray skies, and cool weather. The sad part, San Jose is in an area of Spain that is considered a desert (Granada should be in it too) and it rarely ever rains there. This area is where they film many western movies, including the old Clint Eastwood Man with No Name series.
Enough about that, other than the extreme dryness of it, it reminded me of southern California, and a state park called Montano de Oro that is not far from San Luis Obispo. There were beautiful cliffs,
mountains, beaches, and yes the Mediterranean. Although it was wet, my roommate Keith, my friend Shawn, and myself decided to make the most of it, and as you can tell from our pictures it was a really good time. 
On Sunday, the weather turned warmer and better as the day progressed, and I was able to show my fair skin a treat with some sun burnage. We left San Jose around 4pm, and headed back towards home. Along the way we stopped off at a castle in a town called La Calahorra that used to be home to a knight that ruled the area. It was pretty incredible, very windy, and cold at this castle up in the mountains. It doubled as a fort on the outside, and I was not able to take pictures inside, but it was very beautiful.
We returned to Granada at 845, and I then decided to call it a night. I ate dinner, and then hit the hay.
Monday September 29th. A day that will live in infamy. I decided that I could take on the mountains. On Friday, I felt my problem was too many down hills between climbs, and these breaks helped me build up the lactic acid in my legs. So on Monday, I took to a road that went nearly straight up, and I climbed out of Granada, and reached a point that was nearly 3000 feet higher two hours later. Yes, I climbed for two hours. It was insane. For part of the way back down I dropped through a section that had taken me almost an hour up in only 5 minutes. Insane. I was of course under complete control, and it didn’t feel like I was pushing any limits, but just the length of the hill and the straightness of the downhill were amazing.
Tuesday, September 30th. I spent the day researching, packing, and going for a short ride. Wednesday the trip began.
My photos are all uploaded on my picasa site. If you have forgotten the link, here it is : http://picasaweb.google.com/baxterburnworth
1 comment:
wawawoowah. that's alot of uphill climbing, an experience i don't care for too much...and good call about the lactic acid building up between climbs...
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