Day 50 - el Pont de Suert to Tremp - Gorging in France ...Then Basquing in the Pyrenees - 2023

June 6, 2023

Day 50 - el Pont de Suert to Tremp

Up and Down - Keeping It Simple

The Readers Digest version of the day.

We had a great breakfast, then climbed 600 m over 15 km’s. Then the sun came out and we dropped 1000 m over the next 35 km’s.

During all of this we had a lot of fun and a nice sit down lunch.

Watch for the full length novel coming out soon.

Heart

Comment

Link

The elevation profile says it all.

Once again a good climb through beautiful terrain with the road more or less to ourselves, and then one of the best downhill runs either of us can remember; the first 10 km’s were a roller coaster of hairpins coming out and going into forests, the views changing constantly, all of them beautiful, and then 15 km’s of nice straight(ish) road with a 2-4 % downhill grade. Just sit on the bike and watch the mountain scenery reel scroll through.

I didn’t take very many pics on the climb. It was overcast, the views were great, but one was pretty much the same as the next and we were both ‘in the zone’ with the climb.

On the downhill there were a few more pics, but I had to force myself to stop to take them. At least on the downhill you can immediately get back up to speed/fun, so there’s not much of an excuse not to stop.

As for the sit down lunch, we were at ‘The col of Perves’ just before noon, with a downhill all the way run to Tremp in front of us. Kirsten suggested we take a run down to the town before Tremp, la Pobla de Segur and have a real lunch. Capital idea K 💂!

That’s exactly what we did. Nice lunch at a very ‘local’ bar / restaurant, good basic food and service, nothing to write home about but absolutely nothing to complain about. Everything here is ‘very local’, in a good way. We’re clearly out of the tourist zone and we’re seeing Catalonia (yes we’re in Catalonia now) for real. We like what we see.

The final run into Tremp along the reservoir formed by the Talarn dam on the Noguera Pallaresa river offered great views of the front ranges of the Pyrenees to the north and the foothills to the south.

We’re staying at La Canonja, a simple bike / traveller hotel hostel and it’s a great laid back place, as is Tremp as a whole.

The one change for today was the weather. Instead of running from the rain or threat thereof, we saw the weather continually improve through the day. That was the case until we were safely checked in and getting cleaned up. That’s when a pretty good thunderstorm rolled through, but is was no issue for us!

Every tour needs days like this, straightforward, uncomplicated and great overall.

SOTD - Chateau, acoustic version, Angus & Julia stone.

Uncomplicated, relaxing, feel good … that was today, that’s this tune.