Day 10: Mortalla to Castillejar

Ok. So the last blog about Pico might have scared a few readers. That's because it is genuinely scary!! At this moment I think I'm more scared about driving it than the boys are cycling! At the moment it is just an unknown thing. We will know more tomorrow afternoon when James and I drive up it as a practice and scout out. Until then, it is sensible to assume it will be the hardest thing any of them have ever done. 

Back to more lighthearted musings from the support car...

So today we reached double figures in our trip!! Looking at the map of Spain it's incredible to think how far we've come already! 

 

The past two nights we have stayed in hotels, due to the actual Spanish heat wave. Today is the last day of way above normal temperatures and it should start to feel just regular Spain hot again today or tomorrow. In fact even now, fine it's only 12, but I've got a cardigan on!! Im a bit odd though and always cold but there we go. 

Here's today's route:

 

Hmmm. Sideways. Sorry...

And for those who like to follow along, 

click here to check it out online. 

As you can see the boys are up hill al the way to lunch. Ra about 80 miles today, I am meeting them at 50 in a town called Puebla de Don Federique or something like that!! 

As today is a little cooler we had decided we would go back to camping tonight, to keep costs down. However, when I was doing a bit of looking around, it seems Castillejar is meant to be dead beautiful, and most of the traditional houses there are cave dwellings. The cave houses have a steadily temperature of around 18-22, keeping you warm in the winter and cool in the summer. I found a company that rent them out as "holiday-caves" so we have a two bedroom cave for the night!! I peuruaded the boys that's a cave house is a good idea... So if it's awful it's on me!! Hahaha. I'm literally so excited to be spending the night in a cave house! It has a little kitchen, a terrace (we've bought a disposable BBQ for tea tonight) and a washing machine so that's good. 

It's starting to grate that restaurants don't open until 9pm. We need early nights if we're getting up so early. Camp site and the cave will be fine, we can cook for ourselves. But the night before Pico we will be staying in a hotel and can't be going out for dinner at 9pm! We want to be asleep then!!

The boys are due here in about 25 minutes. I think the ride is quite relentless here. Just barren landscape, up hill, no variation. I stopped for them at 30 miles in to give their water a top up. This afternoon I will go in search of some electrolytes for them as I failed this morning. 

Thanks for reading!!