Thursday 6th December: Heart House, Dublin

I arrived back in Dublin on Tuesday afternoon and within hours I had caught a cold. Heart House had kindly put on a welcome back home event with coffee and mince pies and it was an opportunity for me to hand over a novelty over sized cheque representing the 5,000 euros raised so far. I'm delighted to see that the target has been broken and with further sponsorship to come in the final amount will be even greater. Many thanks to Kerry and Mary for today's event. and a huge thanks to everybody who has donated and supported the Cycle to Africa.

The Final Day: Saturday 1st December: Gaucin to Ceuta (75km)

It was a beautiful morning, blue sky and warm. The road down to the port of Algeciras was mostly downhill and allowed me to complete the 70km in about 3 hours.

The scenery was fantastic and so green compared to other parts of Spain. As it is close to the Atlantic it has the benefit of being warm and fertile and with the longest evenings in Winter in Europe, Cadiz provence ranks as one of the best places to live in Europe in my mind.

Once I got to the ticket office in Algeciras I began to be reminded of Morocco. A good bit of shouting and Q jumping. I was delighted to make the 3pm ferry to Ceuta. I had NO idea what to expect. I had been in Tangiers last year and it is a huge difference from Europe.

If Ceuta was anything like Tangiers It was going to be fairly stresful. Like the Tangier ferry last year the boat was fast and modern so I couldnt read anything from that. The crossing was amazing. It is only about 10 miles but during it you get to see 2 continents, Spain, the Rock of Gibraltar, the Atlas Mountains and Ceuta all at the same time. One of the great crossing points of the world. As we pulled into Ceuta 40 minues later and all looked calm. The Spanish flag was flying evrywhere and I could pick out christmas decorations on land from the deck. I went down to the car deck and waited for the door to open. What was going to greet me, was this going to be chaotic. Not at all, I quickly realised that this was not going to be the culture shock I was expecting. The streets were quiet, empty and clean. I cycled out from the port and made my way to the Tryp Ceuta, my hotel for the night. The city looked a little like Cadiz with its defensive walls and as it it was almost 25c and sunny fely like a real summers day. Within a few minutes I was in the centre and at my hotel. This was It. After 3,855km on the road, the hotel marked the end of the journey from Dundrum through Ranelagh and Ringsend to Dublin Port to Wales, London, Paris, Lyon, Provence, Barcelona, Valencia, and the South of Spain. I tried to remember it all at once as I went. I had arrived. I presented myself at the check in desk and for the last time I wheeled my bike into a hotel for the night.

Friday 30th: Ronda to Gaucin (45km)

The shortest day of the trip but I didnt mind. I was having some problems with my front tyre and brakes and didnt want to risk the long downhill without getting them seen too. Besides Gaucin was the obvious stopoff point on the way to the coast. It is a high hill top town about 65km from the coast and the first place where you can see Gibraltar and on a good day the Atlas Mountains in Morocco. The road from Ronda had a fair bit of uphill but nothing compared to yesterday. The road runs through the stunning Genal Valley and every few minutes I found myself stopping to take photographs. I was shocked to later read that they are planning to build a motorway through the valley. About 3km before Gaucin I reached a pass and knew it was all downhill from here. It was warm and 4pm and from now on it was flat or downhill to Africa. I decided to celebrate with my first beer during the day of the trip. I enjoyed it and took a photo of it and send it to a few people. Gucin is a beautifully located town of 2000 people, 300 of whom are english. The town is quiet now but the few places that were open were busy and alot wilder than you would expect from a rural village.

Thursday 29th: Malaga to Ronda (110km)

I had resigned myself to cycling along the coast to Marbella today, an easy flat trip of about 60km. But after talking to the tourist office and some googling decided to take the much harder but more rewarding inland trip via Ronda. The cycle was now 110km and rather than being flat involved a climb to over 4,000 feet. Worst of all I had ade the change of heart at midday so now only had 6 hours of daylight to get there. Getting lost on the way out of Malaga was a eal bonus and so it was almost 1pm by the time I was clear of the city and on my way to Pizzaro. Pizzaro marked the beginning of the "Sierra de las Nieves" and I stopped for some lunch and to get some water. From Pizzaro the road climbs steeply and I was hurting after 10km of uphill. The next 10km were flat and I whizzed along treating it as downhill. There were three towns along the route, each invloving a sttep climb followed by flat terrain. I knew I had to get to 4,000 feet so I welcomed the lack of down hill. The last town on the way to the pass was El burgo and 5km before the town I reached a pass of 820m so I was almost two 3rds of the way there. Then to my shock the road descened for the next 5km undoing all my good work. I now faced a 2,500 foot climb over the next 11km and was not looking forward to it AND it was getting dark in an hour and I still had 20km + to go. I ate some peanuts and braced myself for the steepness. In fairness it was tough especially as most of the climb was in the first few km and the rest was fairly level until the final slope to the pass. I reached 1,190m just as the sun was going down and I was very happy and proud to be here as I could have taken the easy way to Marbella. The next 11km were all downhill into Ronda, a nice end to a memorable day.

Wednesday 28th: Salobrena to Malaga (100km)

I´ve been looking for a laundrette for the last week and I was over the moon that a dry cleaners in Salobrena agreed to wash ALL my clothes last night so it was with great glee I picked up my bag of clean clothes. It is so nice having everything clean again. I had to wait till 11am for the clothes so it was late enough when I headed off. The 13km road from Salobrena to Almunecar was corniche like and quite scenic. I was getting hungry and droppped into Almunecar for food but also to revisit a town where I have stayed for two weeks in March 1999 to learn Spanish. It was weird seeing the place again and after some of the places I´d been through It reminded me that it was one of the nicer resorts. The road corniched on until Nerja, a pleasant enough place which proclaims itself as the "Balcony of Europe" due do a short promenade that juts out onto the med. From Nerja the road is fat and striaght and the resorts dull and reminiscent of some of the dull Costa Blanca towns. The road surface was bad and I remembered that wind and road surface are the two most important factors when cycling. Uphill is less of a problem. I was tored of the road and relieved by the time I reached the suburbs of Malaga. I was quite impressed by the town and after checking in explored the city. After a fewhours looking around, I think Malaga has the potential to become a mini financial or IT centre. It has excellent and good value air links with the rest of europe and the high speed AVE trains will cut the trip to Madrid to 2 and a half hours from Dec 24th. All the people who work hard in London but deserve nice outdoor weekends should begin the move down here and the city itslef should continue with its self improvement. Watch this town.

Tuesday 27th : Almeria to Salobrena (140km)

There is a daily ferry from Almeria to Algeria and the arabic script on the road signs around the port reminded me of my proximity to the African coast. The coast road out of Almeria is dramatic and cut into the side of the mountain with a constant risk of falling rocks. Its a lovely ride and ends in the resort town of Aquadulce some 11km further on. Aguadulce marks the beginning of the Campo de Dalias, a vast sea of plastic tents housing the intenstive farming of fruit and vegtables. It stretches for thousands of acres and is ugly close up. The main town in the area is El Ejido and I had heard and read a lot of bad things about the place so I wasnt happy that it was on my route. Expecting the worst I was actually pleasantly surprised and thought that it looked a prosperous place. As soon as I was out of the city I was into the tents and as there was only motorway ahead I had to zig zag through tiny lanes through the tents to reach the sea. This was the closest I got to being lost on the trip and the vast tents, litter and stray dogs left me a bit edgy. I also developed quite a cough from only having to spend 30 minutes close to the pesticides, I can only imagine what it must be like to live there. Once I hit the coast the road stayed close to it for the rest of the day. The almerian resort of Adra wall dull but once the road started to climb around the cliffs the scenry became much more interesting. Maybe it was was the cliffs or I was day dreaming but I looked at my watch thinking it was 3pm but it was 5pm and I still have 40km to go. Wiuth the head down I managed to get to Calahonda by 6pm but that meant the last 20km was in the dark so on came the yellow jacket and flashing light. In Salobrena I stayed in a lovely guesthouse run by a frenchman and his wife near the old town. Salobrena seemed to quite spanish with few foreigners for the costa, although it was mid week at the end of november.

Monday 26th: Aguillas to Almeria (135km)

Todays cycle would take me into Andalucia along the driest coast of Spain. It is thankfully not too developed and where there are towns they tend to be low rise. The cycle out of Aguillas was nice as I snaked through the sand dunes along the coast. I stopped off for a morning coffee in a bar with a vast amount of pottery hanging all over the place. The ride along the coast was pleasant. Soon I was in Mojacar the biggest development on the Almerian coast. It was alot nicer than the resorts further north and I stopped off for lunch in a modern cafe where the staff were extremely helpful. It gave me a good feeling for Mojacar. This area of Spain was very depopulated in the 1960s so much so that the mayor offered free land to anyone willing to develop within a year. Luckily the lack of roads helped save this coast from the mistakes made elsewhere. The road from Mojacar to Carboneras was one of the most dramatic of the journey. The first half is a climb to a viewing point followed by a terrifying descent as you can see from the photo. Once I reached Carboneras I had to head inland as the road did not continue all the way along the coast. There is an electricity plant at Carboneras that emits 3.2 millon tonnes of CO2 a year the most polluting plant in Andalucia and the fifth most in Spain. I would have liked to follow the coast down to the Cabo de Gata national park. I had visited before by car and it is a lovely spot with very laid back resorts and some of the least spoiled coastline in Spain. Due to the lack of roads I had to use the motorway for 10kms which I wasnt looking forward to but in the end it was fine as it had a wide pullover lane. Once off the motorway I had to cycle through the vast fruit plantations again. Alot of the fruit we buy in Ireland is produced here with the help of migranr labout and the towns around the plantations looked very poor with mostly african workers. The sun was now shining brightly and it was pushing 22c as I enjoyed the beautiful views of the med on the road into Almeria. Almeria looked like a lively and pleasant place and I checked into the oldest hotel in town, a 2 star that apparently movie stars used to stay in when maling spagetti westerns in the nearby Tabernas Movie Studios. Alot of westerns used the studios as the scenry around Almeria looked like the Wild West.

Sunday 25th: Carthagena to Aguillas (100km)

It was a bit of a wet morning so i didn´t look around Carthagena any further and hit the road. Today was slightly unusual as I was only going to pass 2 towns on the whole 100km journey. The first destination of the day was Mazzaron, a town with a resort attached. Once clear of Carthagena the scenry improved and it was a lovely cycle up to a pass before whizzing down towards the sea again. The land here is very dry but quite uninque and impressive to look at. After the usual lunch of salami and bread I prepared myself for a further 55km through some very isolated mounatins. There were no real towns between here and aguillas so I stocked up with water before heading off.

I started to see the large fruit plantations covered in plastic. This area of Spain has made a lot of money from intensive farming of fruit in huge plastic covered fields. There not very attractive to look at though. The road began to climb and climb and climb and I felt I was in a very remote place. There were a few county houses and the the mountains were impressive.
There seemed to alot of dogs around but thankfully none game any chase. After an exhausting climb I reached the summit pass and enjoyed the longest freewheel of almost 20km into the seaside resort of Aguillas. It was 4.30pm and I knew I should do another 20km but I was tired so checked into a hotel that advertised the fact It had internet.
I asked the chain smoking grandmother at the reception for a room and she asked me to wait for 5 minutes for her son to return. She managed to squeeze in another 2 fags before her scrufy looking son arrived and gave me the key without looking at me. To be fair the room was clean so after a shower headed out to have a look around.