4PE Pyrenees Extrem
Welcome to Barcelona Official is today the start of the tour but if you are interested at Barcelona? You should arrive one day earlier to enjoy the town. One option for that is to go with us Tour guides on a city tour and for that we started today at 8 am. Why 8 am – well it is around 35 C out here over the day and that why we decided to be the early bird. We took the train to Barcelona and from there we discovered the town bit by bit. First stop and for me personally the most impressive church what I have ever seen is the Sagrada Familia where Antonio Gaudi made his master peace of art. Even if you are not a person who is not up to look in churches – that is a must do!!! The mix out of nature meets architecture and religion is just breathtaking. On top how he used the light is just unique. After this impressive start we went on to see some early work of Gaudi which has been the Casa Batllo. All in one you have to say he has been a master mind of architecture. From there on we dived deeper into the old part of the town and for that we walked along the Ramblas towards the old Market – La Boqueria. If you are the first time in Spain and you like food? That will be your paradise of food. And it has been also our lunch place. From there on we went to several places like Placa Reial and the Gothic quarter and and and….. It was a pleasure on one hand to see all this impressive buildings and places and on the other hand it was so hot. So that it was time to go back to the hotel because there is a pool waiting for our customers before we all meet again for the welcome briefing of the tour. Well, that has been the start for some of our riders on this tour.
Day 2: Castelldefels to Os de Balaguer Good Morning Good Morning and welcome to our first riding day. SOoooo……. What have we done today ? Well yesterday Jan and I promised that we will ride around 30000 curves on this tour and guess what we started right away in the morning with some rollercoaster roads. First stop has been Santa Maria de Montderrat and the roads towards this monastery has been a nice fun run. After a coffee at Montserat it was time to move on because we got a 380 km in front of us. The weather changed from extreme hot to quite nice and we have to say this Groupe fits well together so that we had a good pace. The next stop on our ride has been the Cardona fortress where we enjoyed a sandwich and a stunning few at the old salt mines where they started harvesting already 780 AD. From there on it was time to catch some more curves and passes like Coll de Jou and Coll de Boixols has been the perfect playground for us. That is a small impression of our day one. To make you not to jealous we will not share pictures with the smile of our riders after the first day of riding. It is almost dinner time and we have to get ready See you tomorrow Jan and Axel
Day 3: Os de Balaguer to Pamplona Here we go again We are riding to Pamplona, and I can say it straight ahead: WE HAD A GREAT DAY IN ANY DIRECTION WHAT YOU COULD THINK OF!!! Sometimes it doesn’t matter if there are some raindrops falling to the start of our ride, because we have been looking forward to this ride after the morning briefing. The headline of the briefing has been: Curves Curves and Curves as a second breakfast. And after lunch? Of course, some more of them. To the start we went out and up the Coll d´ Ares a nice challenging road and if its sunny you will have a stunning few – in our case we still had fun and, on the way down: let´s put it this way – we proofed our skills on roads where the tarmac has been missing quite often. From there on we took on some little passes/ roads where we had just fun and on top it was not aswarm like in Barcelona. I got to say this was a really nice fun run for Jan and Me and we enjoyed it a lot. Now we are in Pamplona where we will stay for the next 2 day but that means not that we are not riding tomorrow. So if you want to know what’s going on tomorrow you got to come back to the Blog tomorrow. Jan and Axel PS.: We would like to chare more pictures of this ride today but we had a great ride and so we enjoyed every second on the road
Day 4: Pamplona Rest day ride or staying at the hotel and discover the town that’s is the question of today!? Hallo again from Pamplona and today the weather did not look that good. So some of us spend the day with me at the hotel and the other half of the group went out for a ride with Jan to San Sebastian. We in Pamplona started our City tour after the breakfast and went out to discover the town by following the Bull run track. First, we stepped back in time and visit a church which has been built in 1279 before we went to the start of bull run track. The history and the feeling what you get if walk there is somehow impressive. All in one we had a relaxed day here in Pamplona. So tomorrow we will cross the border to France and another great riding day will be started. But before, we will go out and Jan organized a Dinner in a Bar/ Restaurant where Hemmingway used to be. So let´s see what tomorrow brings Jan & Axel
Day 5: Pamplona to Luz-Saint-Sauveur Let´s do it – Let´s go to France Today is the day that we will enter the border. We will ride around 320 km and it will be a great ride I can promise already. The reason for that is quite simple – The route himself!!! On the way from Pamplona to the French boarder the weather was not the best one but we had been also lucky on some parts with sun and a try tarmac where we enjoyed every inch of the street. The only sadly thing has been for sure the clouds and the rain on Col de la Pierre St Martin but for that we had a nice mix of sun and clouds at the Col d ́Aubisque what was again a pleasure to ride. So we did today from hidden single lane roads/passes to nice well known passes almost everything. That has been so far the nicest ride for Jan and me and we looking forward to the stories at dinner and our guess is – they liked it as much as we. Enjoy the pictures and tomorrow we keep on riding along the Tour the France track Jan & Axel
Day 6: Luz-Saint-Sauveur to Tarascon-sur-Ariège It is Rollercoaster Day – 262 km and 10 times up and down over a pass I would say it sounds like a great day. We started as usually in the morning with our briefing but the weather had once more changed from a sunny start into a rainy one. But anyway – nothing can hold us back from having fun. So, we went out and the first Pass of the day has been Col du Tourmalet with 2114m.Towards the to the rain get stronger and the clouds has been hanging verry deep so no view today from there. But there was hope on the other side – we saw some sun and on the way down the roads has been dry and we had a lot of fun. Next highlight for us was the Col de Aspin and I can tell you this road is just a pleasure to ride!!! For the rest of the day we went up and down several passes and the weather did the same, from sun to rain and rain to sun. Another highlight was the lunch high up in a valley with a nice challenging road and more important good food. Maybe it sounds compared to the other days a little short this day but it was a real riding day and arrived on the hotel we felt what we have been done. This riding day is over and 2 more to do so stay tuned what we are doing next Jan & Axel
Day 7: Tarascon-sur-Ariège to Maçanet de Cabrenys My favorite riding day by far on this tour Welcome to 330 km fun pure!!!! This has been the days of the days – we started with sun and the roads are try and we had an awesome track with passes where you are so blessed that you can´t believe it and on top almost no traffic!!!! We are just finished with riding and I looking for some words for it and that’s rare in my case. May I start with passes which have been just one of a kind. As an appetizer we started with the Port de Pailhères (2001m). The pass himself is nice to ride and you climb up on one side through a valley what is not really exciting and you have no clou what stunning few is you will have on the top. You got one of the best few of the pyrenes towards Andorra. And on the other side you will ride a verry curvy and almost an single lane road down. For the main curse we served the pass: Collada de Toses (1800m) and that is a real main curse!!!!! We had almost no cars and the road were made for us. If you ask our bunch of wild riders if they like to ride it again? They would say yes in milliseconds – I guess that’s all what you need to know about this pass. In between the Passes we had some wore curvy roads which has been almost as good as the main curse. This ride was just what we needed after the last days of rain and sun mix. Just on side: Along the day we crossed from France to Spain and back and finally we are in Spain where we sleep one more time before we will get back to Castelldefels. A great day comes to an end and we know already how the chats along the dinner will be – All About These Roads From Today So see you tomorrow Jan & Axel
Day 8: Maçanet de Cabrenys to Castelldefels The Final Chapter It is day 8 and we jump one more time on our motorcycles. After a good night we started in the day with a stunning road just in front of the door of the hotel. It was such a pleasure to start in the day like that. So, this day shows once more what a great tour this is!!! All in one this day has been almost perfect as yesterday and what should I say we did for sure the 30000 curves what we promised on the start of the tour. After all these curves of the last days and today we took the highway for the last stretch towards to the hotel. A great riding day/ tour comes to an end and that why Jan and I like to thank you for this great ride with all of you. We already looking forward to ride the next tour with you. And we can tell you on our faer well evening there where already some thoughts what they like to do next. It was a great Tour and Thanks again Jan and Axel Tag 8: Maçanet de Cabrenys nach Castelldefels Das letzte Kapitel Es ist Tag 8 und wir schwingen uns ein weiteres und letztes Mal auf unsere Motorräder. Nach einer guten erholsamen Nacht starteten wir in den Tag mit einer atemberaubenden Straße direkt vor der Tür des Hotels. Und es sollte heute nicht die einzige Kurvenreiche Straße bleiben. Diese Tour ist einfach bis zum Ende nicht langweilig Alles in einem war dieser Tag fast so perfekt wie der Gestrige und was soll ich sagen, wir haben die 30000 Kurven, die wir zu Beginn der Tour versprochen haben, sicher geschafft. Nach all den Kurven der letzten Tage und des heutigen Tages fuhren wir das letzte Stück auf der Autobahn zum Hotel. Dort war es dann soweit und unsere Kunden mussten schweren Herzens die Schlüssel zurückgeben. Ein toller Fahrtag/ Tour geht zu Ende und deshalb möchten Jan und Ich uns bei euch allen für diese tolle Fahrt bedanken. Wir freuen uns schon auf die nächste Tour mit euch. Und wir können euch sagen, an unserem Abschiedsabend gab es schon einige Überlegungen, was sie als nächstes machen wollen. Es war eine großartige Tour und nochmals vielen Dank Jan und Axel