Day 8 - Saturday 4 May, Carcassonne to Lleida

I didn't get the best night's sleep due to traffic noise and when I opened the curtains I realised that Carcassonne market was being assembled right in front of my room. I got up pretty early and met with Eddy for breakfast. It was a good job that we did get down early as the restaurant filled up very quickly. Breakfast was excellent and suitably refreshed, we loaded up the bikes and got ready to head for the Pyrenees.

Carcassonne Market

We got out of Carcassonne easily enough and headed for Andorra. The weather was initially a little unsettled - it alternated between dull and sunny spells and there was a threat of rain in the air. Luckily the rain never materialised and we blasted through the countryside on fairly quiet roads towards the Pyrenees for a couple of hours or so. At first they just look like a bunch of hills on the horizon but as we got closer they started to rise up and dominate the landscape. We were eventually forced to pick up the motorway a little north of Foix and headed into the town for coffee about 11am. The town which has a magnificent chateau was busy with market day shoppers and traffic, we found a table at a cafe and discussed our route. Eddy suggested that we cross the Pyrenees via Andorra and then it was about 2 hours to Lleida, where Badger was scheduled to rejoin on Sunday morning.

Chateau de Foix

Foix

After coffee we got back onto the motorway, which soon turned into a single carriage-way road. The sun came out and the road got more interesting following steep-side valleys and climbing all the time. I went through places like Ax-les-Thermes, which I'd only seen on the Tour de France coverage. Eddy and I had picked up our pace and were zooming along overtaking cars and trucks. We then turned right for Andorra and the roads really began to climb. I led the way and as I was starting to get more confident started to give the Pan plenty of gas and Eddy had to start to work hard to keep up. We were soon up past the snow lines and the temperature started to drop quite rapidly - thank goodness for heated grips!. After about 30 minutes of serious climbing we were in the queue for the Andorra frontier crossing. It took quite a while to get through, but eventually we were waived through without checking our passports.

My first impression of Andorra was not a good one - it looked like someone had dumped some aluminium warehouse onto the top of a mountain. I should have taken some pictures at the top of the Pyrenees following out testosterone-fueled ascent, but opted for a quick swig of water and day-old croissant from Eddy's top-box. There were loads of 50 kph speed restrictions in place so we just dropped gently down through to Andorra la Veille stopping only for fuel, which was about €1.40 per litre as opposed to €1.60 plus in France. We seemed to be descending for ages but at last the Spanish frontier appeared and we whizzed into Spain.

It was nice to be able to get a bit of a wiggle on again and it was much hotter once we got off the mountains. Eddy spotted a road-side cafe outside La Seu d'Urgell so we stopped for lunch. €12 for a 4-course lunch - excellent! It must have been good as the local police were dining there! Much to my obvious disappointment Eddy suggested that we skip coffee and postres - so off we went again. Eddy wanted to get at least as far as Balaguer to stop for the night so that we only had a little way to get to Lleida to meet up with Badger on Sunday morning.

The ride down to Balaguer was very dramatic. The road seemed to follow huge gorges containing rapid flowing rivers, we spotted white-water rafting going on a lot. They seemed to empty out into huge lakes surrounded by mountains. The road tended to follow these river valleys and frequently followed tunnels cut out of the mountains followed by viaducts. Whilst it was very hot, there was a strong cross-wind, which coupled with the scenary, tight bends and high-speeds made for an exciting afternoon. Eddy led most of the way through this section.

After an hour or so we cleard this landscape and moved on to a flatter, more fertile area. I pressed on at the front and we were zooming along on virtually empty roads at over 90mph - great fun. In my exuberance I drove straight through Balaguer, which didn't look that appealing anyway and we pressed on to Lleida. We got there just after 4pm and tried to get into the old part of the city, but weren't allowed to because of a demo - we could hear the drums banging and saw loads of people streaming into the town centre. We got diverted south across the river, which must have been fed by the melt waters of the Pyrenees as it was very full indeed.

By now it was swelteringly hot so we stopped as the first bar and had a cold drink then headed back towards the town centre in the hope that the demo had finished crossing town by then. There seemed to be no vehicular access to the town centre so I stayed with the bikes while Eddy reconnoitered on foot. He had no luck in finding a tourist office so we just followed the traffic and ended up in a side street. I tried my broken Spanish on a local, who took me to the local Indian shop, who in turn suggested there was a hotel round the corner. So off we went and came upon the rather lovely train station, part of which was the Catalonia Transit hotel. We were able to get a decent room for about €30 each per night.

Lleida Station and Catalonia Transit Hotel

We had definitely fallen on our feet. The hotel was basically just a section of the station that had been given over to the hotel. Our room looked onto the platforms - but was totally quiet and mercifully cool. We unloaded the bikes and left them in a bike park a few yards from the hotel. Unlike France where you can leave a motorbike pretty much anywhere Spain seemed a bit more restrictive - you had to use a proper bike bay and couldn't just leave it on the pavement. The rather pretty hotel receptionist spoke decent English and was very helpful - we even managed to get a smile out of her. Once we had unloaded our gear, it was time for a quick shower and change of clothes then off to explore Lleida.

I had never heard of Lleida, but it's both a province of Catalonia and a major town. We went for a walk through the town centre just as the entire town was out promenading on a Saturday evening. The town is overlooked by a major castle and the town centre looks to have been tastefully modernised. The centre is totally pedrianised and is one huge shopping arcade, filled with lots of local shops as well as many of the global outfits. The demo we had seen as we entered the town was in fact a Catalonian Independence demo that finished with an open-air concert in the main square. We watched for a few minutes, everyone was draped in Catalonian flags and very excited. We then walked for about 20 minutes until we found a nice bar and had a few beers. The atmosphere was great, the entire town seemed to be out being seen and chatting to friends. We walked back the way we had come and people were starting to thin out a bit, but the concert was still in full flow, a pretty good band had replaced the acoustic singer/guitarist. Everyone eats late in Spain and not wanting to try a Tapas bar we headed back to the station and had a meal in the cafe, which doubled as the hotel restaurant.