Last night's overnighting spot was very peaceful and our only (known) company all night took the form of roe deer and dozens of bats. The views from the spot this morning were stunning, we were above a blanket of early morning mist that had completely consumed all of the valleys beneath us (pic) . Of course, once underway we lost height and it was rather less fun having to drive through it.
As we descended yet another steep and twisty climb at about 20mph, we decided to do something we ordinarily don't. Because the roads were so tortuous in the part of Euskadi we were in, we took to the tolled motorway to clear the 'worst' of the mountains. It turned out decent value at about €7 for approximately 50 kilometres; all of which were either through massive tunnels or high over valleys on teetering viaducts. The engineering was impressive, it must have taken some building!
After the tolled section we mixed things up by taking the scenic route following the northern coastline towards San Sebastian. This turned out to be a very pretty affair, with seascapes and many an old and well kept seaside town to bumble through. We didn't see any gaudy amusement arcades.
What we did see were literally thousands of cyclists and hundreds of people taking brisk walks on just about every highway and byway they were allowed on.
We'd already seen huge numbers of cyclist yesterday (once into the Basque country), but today was extraordinary. Some were solo, some were in huge road-dominating groups, plus there were all denominations in between. We know from being attuned to the pro-cycling scene that Basque riders are fairly common in the pro peleton, but seeing the popularity of the sport here offers something of an explanation. As does the severity of the terrain. With this many at it and the going so desperately tough, there's bound to be the occasional superstar.
And yes, the cyclists did slow and hinder the free-flow of traffic. And no, none of the local drivers seemed to care in the slightest. Everyone just got on with their day.
To France, then. We crossed the border around lunchtime and (avoiding toll roads) were immediately thrown into a seemingly never ending series of frenetic, try-hard, pretentious towns (clustered around the Bayonne / Biarritz / Capbreton area) full of beautiful people doing beautiful-people things.
We found the area nothing a determined drive further north couldn't cure.
With about 100 kilometres between us and that area, we headed for a previous lunchstop we'd used, and that's where we can now be found. It's a nice little area dominated (as is much of this bit of France) by sandy soils, heathland and pine forest. We both took to the bikes from here and enjoyed some warm French sunshine on our backs: a nice change after the cold and dank conditions we've had for the past couple of days.
There's not been much bird life to report here but for a pair of hoopoe. We've had rather more luck with lizards and mammals, though. Lizards skitter everywhere and, as darkness fell, the thermal imaging camera revealed an excellent fox and two wild boar sightings.
More chugging north to be had tomorrow...
This post was composed at 21:30 on Sunday 6th April from our intended overnighting spot N 44.46567°, W 00.79549° / http://maps.google.com/maps?q=loc:44.46567%2C-00.79549