February 13, 2024
Day 7: Benidorm to Alicante
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I seem to be running a series on slightly unusual aspects of the included breakfasts we are experiencing in the hotels. Today's entry could be titled the Grumpy Old Men's breakfast.
It started when we showed up at 7:52 for the 8:00 breakfast. Everything was ready and out there, but as we strolled toward the seating, a (grumpy old) man leapt from behind the bar, and sternly told us in Spanish that the breakfast did not start until 8. Dodie replied in English that she would just go then and sit and wait. But she was thereby continuing her stroll, and the man slightly freaked . He took out his cell phone and with animation pointed to the 7:52 readout on the clock. His intent was to show that we were eight long minutes too early. As it happens, I also had my phone out with the clock on, and I brandished this back, but my intent was to show that it was as good as 8:00 as anyone could want. So here were two grumpy old men brandishing cell phones at cross purposes, to start the day right.
We used our eight minutes to select just the right table, from the dozens in the large room. We chose a double one, because we are messy and generally need space. This triggered the man to again leap from behind his bar and ask us in Spanish if we were to be two people or four. When we admitted to being two, he launched an elaborate procedure of separating the table into two. I snapped a picture of our newly separated table, so as not to forget this essential story:
I also took this shot, to show that there was not exactly a shortage of table space.
I think we decided we no longer had an affection for our separated table, and chose another one, closer to the buffet tables. Dodie walked to the chosen table, and put her bag down beside what would be her seat. But a few moments later (and Dodie certifies it was later) a grumpy old man came a plunked his pill case in the middle of our table. "Hey", said Dodie in English, "this is our table". "No way", said the man in Spanish. "see my pill case!". There was a brief grumpy old man/old lady confrontation, and surprisingly our forces withdrew to the next table over.
These events, and others during our stay, led us to conclude that this hotel had many long term residents, and that they were typically grumpy old men. Dodie decided that with the pills situation, she had intruded on what was probably that old man's customary table. The net effect was that so much unlike our experience in Denia, we felt uncomfortable and just quickly ate and left.
We did leave with some sandwiches in the disputed handlebar bag, and were surprised that the bar man had not picked up on it!
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The rather sour vibe inside the hotel was countered by the beautiful beach just outside, though all those high rise apartments do not necessarily make for the most idyllic image. They are stunning in their own way, though.
I walked onto the sand for a look at the birds there, and found a rather common but nice Yellow Legged Gull.
All along this coast there are massive apartment buildings. Some are imposing perhaps block long and twelve story high monoliths, and some are almost imaginative narrow skyscrapers.
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3 months ago
Our route seems destined to generally follow the N332 or N332A highway. In parts this can be very nice, such as with the bike lane shown below.
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All along the way, there are dramatic mountain scenes. The dry slopes remind me on some in Arizona. And often rather than an interconnected range, there are standalone huge rocky things.
Very often on the road as well one can look at peletons of road cyclists. touring cyclists are almost non existent, but we like to see cyclists of all types.
Even though N332 would bring us to our destination, we still are interested to see if our Google Mymaps generated track has something quieter or more interesting. I guess we don't learn, because invariably what it has is some sort of Grampie trap. Here below is what it had to offer during one of its deviations from N332.
We backtracked, and had to get on the main road again. One benefit of this was that we ran into a road cyclist, Geir Kristiansen, from Norway. Geir said hello as he pulled up from behind us, and we managed to have a cyclist meetup as we moved on down the road. Geir cycled beside us, unperturbed by the passing traffic, or just waving to motorists that may have felt we were using too much space.
Gier had a very light road bike, and though he was just idling along to chat with us, we were working quite hard on our ebikes to maintain the pace. We had a nice long chat, as often happens, about all aspects of cycling, of where we had all been, and of life in general. One result is that we will have a place to drop in in Norway, when we make it there .
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Both Geir and Google suggested a diversion from the main road, down by way of Coveta. We gave it a try, and here it was likely us that screwed up. At first there were some nice houses and hills to look at:
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3 months ago
3 months ago
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We did get down to the beach, and with it, to the long long beach front paved walkways. In the particular bit shown, a policeman on a motorcycle came along and seemed to shout at us about not riding bikes here. It's a topic in some kind of Political Science - is it OK for police to dangerously speed, to catch a speeder? Is it OK for police to ride a motorcycle on a beach path, to make sure no one bicycles? Fortunately with some harsh words from Dodie, this one rapidly disappeared, and we did not have to have any further politics or law enforcement debates.
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Nearing Alicante we crossed a dry river, that clearly had been dry for a long time. Dodie has been reading about drought that has been here for some time.
One of the major attractions of Alicante is the Santa Barbara castle, built by the Moors in the 9th century. The castle was captured from the Moors by Prince Alfonso of Castile, in a battle on the feast day of Santa Barbara, accounting for the name. We spent a long time in town looking for our hotel, and though this is right by the castle, we will not have time to visit it.
Near the beach in Alicante, I noticed this uniquely decorated house. I knew Google would know all about it, and indeed it does. It is just a privately owned house, belonging to a local restauranteur. Apparently city council has not liked it's idiosyncratic look, and it has had to be saved from demolition. Weird.
The streets of Alicante as we moved about, heading for our hotel, appeared to be comprised of tightly spaced up to ten storey buildings.
This statue defines the centre of town. It's images are rather strange, including the sort of fruits atop the horses.
Today's ride: 52 km (32 miles)
Total: 239 km (148 miles)
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