Before breakfast I booked myself in to Hotel Record in Donostia/San Sebastian, and also the next night in Dax (France already!) Donostia has a reputation of being a bit pricey, and that was reflected in the cost of 60 Euros for a single room in a not particularly posh hotel (compared to 42 Euros in Dax). After breakfast I was sympathising with a fellow cyclist whose bike had just arrived from the airport with the main chain ring bent. He was planning to cycle the...

The coach journey was very comfortable. Arriving at Bilbao coach station, it was very easy to then take a tram into the town centre, right by the Guggenheim museum (see photo album). I spent some time in the museum, and enjoyed the temporary exhibition of David Hockney works, though I did feel it was a long way to come to see pictures and videos of Salt's Mill and the Yorkshire Wolds! The building itself is truly unique and ridiculously flamboyant. The antith...

Rain was forecast for Tuesday, so I booked 2 nights in Pamplona, and will take the bus to Bilbao on Tuesday for the day. Forecast scorchio again from Wed. The earliest breakfast was available was 0930 so I didn't get off till 1055. But that was ok as I reckoned I only had about 50km to cover today. Breakfast was juice, bread, jamon, gingerbread, jam & coffee. Today's journey took me from Aragon into Navarre, which both is and isn't the Basque Country. The f...

Breakfast in the Hotel Sekia, which had only 7 guests. There was no need to hurry today so I had a look round the town (for the first time in daylight), and had a quick look in the main church (San Salvador) where, it being Sunday, a mass was in progress. Route finding today was easy - just followed the A-127 all the way. stopping for a quick bite in Sadaba. There was quite a long uphill to Sos, but I took it easy. The hotel I had prebooked (Asbruixas) was 'bi...

I knew it was a long way to today's destination, and intended to go via the A-1223 to Granen. Unfortunately got confused shortly after leaving Monzon, and headed South instead of West. Even when I realised I had gone wrong I stupidly persisted, thinking I could take a smaller road to rejoin my planned route. But there was a big river to my right, with no crossing until Albalate de Cinca. So this added at least 20km to an already long day. Thankfully the roads w...