Thanks for the write-up. Whilst you maybe saved a little money renting I think I would prefer the ferry option and take in the Picos enroute. Especially given your slog there and back across a dull bit of the country. Understand that bike hire, especially for a Ducati, probably has to start there but somewhere like Salamanca would have been better.
I paid €370 for three days, 200km per day included. Through an app called Riderly, which was actually Hertz when we got there so they’re a broker of some sort.
For what it's worth I have been turned over by Hertz. I booked unlimited miles but they said i had not. I did not have my full booking (lesson learnt) and sure enough i had booked and paid for it. Long dispute process started.
Home now, This all started about 25 years ago when I read about the pilgrimage to Santiago da la compostela. At a push you could ride that but it would be a lot of dirt roads and slow going dodging the pilgrims. I thought about Barca to Porto or Barca to Malaga but settled on this. I road the Dureo from Porto to Pinhao about 7 years ago but made a mess of the tour. Plus half of it was slow urban stuff. about 20 kicks out of Pinhoa it's starts getting interesting and the mountain passes and tributaries are even better, so that was the plan source of the Duero North on Madrid to Pinhao meaning I had road the length of the biggest river in Iberia it was fantastic. Even the flat bits were enjoyable and the closer I got to Pinhao the better it got. It would make a good base for exploring and there are plenty of trips on the river and vineyards to visit. 1765 K covered. Regrets maybe a mistake to go in July. I got lucky but this could have been a different story at 44 degrees C. This could be my last big tour. I get quite bad travel anxiety these days and flying is so stressful. I got everything else about right and what went wrong I worked around. Disappearing lightweight shirts meant wearing the same one each day and washing it. I did run wideish on one corner and had to correct. I was filming with the gopro so shall take a look. A couple of blind roundabout drivers too, but that's common (don't ride Sicily!) Hertz were ok they did chase me up with an Email as I was 40 mins late on pick up this was more to do with the managements side lines. They were pretty un helpful with GPS mounts so I took my kit and clamped it on out of eyesight I pushed the boat out a bit by hiring a v4s multi but glad I did. it was not much more than a gs. The final hotel was great too, they did pre ordered meals so I was dreading it. transpires it was gourmet stuff. So glad I did it
Great pics, keep ’em coming. I’m late picking up on the thread. Hope you had a great trip but slogging across the plains in that heat must have been arduous.
Tour is over. Klicks covered here KM KM Day 1 376 Day 2 386 Day 3 250 Day 4 246 Day 5 501 I shall check the GOPRO for stills and movies soon. Still buzzing
