April 30 to May 6, 2013

The first two days of our stay in Urgueira have continued to be very cold, but there has been no more snow and the wind has dropped as well, so things are looking up. Our house is really cold though and apart from going on the bikes a couple of times to the nearest town, Sabugal, to buy supplies at the supermarket, we spend our time huddled around the wood-stove. Fortunately, we had left some wood last time we stayed because fetching a load of logs on the bikes would not be easy. Fetching boxes of milk, bottles of water, potatoes, etc etc is not that easy either.

By the third day of our stay in Urgueira the weather really perks up – the sun comes out and it starts to warm up. I get everything we possess washed, Ken cleans the bikes and we spend the next three days going out on short rides around the local area. It is very relaxing without the bags on the bikes and we feel as though we are flying along. We discover a really nice road heading in the direction we want to go in when we continue onwards towards Santiago and so decide to make a small change to our planned route. All in all, we cover about 106 kms in the three days – enough to keep the legs and lungs working.

The good weather continues on Day 20 when Chris arrives in his camper van to stay with us for a couple of nights. Unfortunately, his arrival coincides with Ken suddenly suffering with an attack of his bad back for some unexplained reason. It is very strange that exactly the same thing happened during a week-long break in the middle of our previous tour. It is hard to work out what has caused it – last time he thought that bending over cleaning and adjusting the bikes had brought it on and it could be the same reason this time, but he does plenty of that whilst we’re on the road and it doesn’t seem to bother him then. We’re a bit worried that he’ll be unable to ride when we want to set off, but we hope for the best.

We decide that we’ll set off again on Day 22 which will have given exactly a week off in Urgueira. After a few days of perfect weather, the forecast is not so good for the next few days – the temperature should be OK but it looks like it’s going to rain. Again we hope for the best.