Day fifteen 15 June 2013

Stage 15 Utiel to Albacete

67 Miles

Today’s ride was shaping up to be another reasonably easy day. However, the forecast was showing a big glowing sun and with temperatures over 30 degrees. We left the hotel just after 8am and set off for our first stop in Villatya 22 miles along the N322. The conditions were perfect, light winds, cool temperature and flat smooth roads so we made good progress and met Steve at a Hotel/Truck stop service road and, as usual, he had picked a great spot in the shade. Suitably refreshed we set off towards the next stop. Our spirits were high and the previous days tiredness had given way to the urge to sing.

That would have been great but none of us could remember the full lyrics of any of the songs. Rawhide was popular, as we knew most of the words, but dum dedum substituted the forgotten verses. Various incomplete rugby songs were sung and other rude versions of popular hits were warbled out and thankfully the sparseness of the local population meant that no innocent bystanders suffered. We took a break from our X Factor practice sessions and stopped and took this picture.

 The singing stopped shortly after we left the truck stop as we needed all the oxygen we could suck in as we had a 7% climb for about 5 miles.  This proved not to be so tiresome as the ascents on the previous days. Over the past couple of weeks we have  developed our own ratings for the severity of the climbs we have encountered. Unfortunately some naughty words have slipped our grading system and therefore we cannot publish details. Whilst climbing this challenging hill, the temperature started to rise and we encountered a blistering 40 degrees and combined with the the arid air made the part of the ride a bit uncomfortable. Off the top of the hill was a different matter. The super smooth roads had a long decline, which made for fast and effortless pedalling to our next stop.

We met  Steve at the small town of Fuentealbilla. He had selected a shady spot once again and we tucked into our french bread, cheese , salami and Spam (yes Spam). Whilst stuffing our faces with the necessary nutrition we were approached by a local lad on a bike.Not just any old bike but an Specialized S Works bike (Binky, you need one of these , in white). The lad was Felipe Medina and he is the owner of the town's petrol station and he was keen to swop cycle stories and he wanted to swop

cycle tops. We duly swopped one of our Sky tops and we are now the proud owner of a rather nice top from the local cycle club (see tomorrows blog).

We were quickly joined by Felipe's friends, Jose Juan, Jaunito Spuknik and Arturo Valero.

Felipe's excellent English ensured that we were able to chat about cycling. They had already been out this morning (thus sensibly avoiding the heat of the midday sun) and they are planning to cycle over the Pyrenees next week.

Whilst chatting to Felipe, he asked if we knew anything about Spanish football and Andrés Iniesta. He is  a famous Barcelona player and he scored the winning goal (1-0) against Holland in the final of the 2010 world cup. It turns out that Andrés Iniesta is the son of Fuentealbilla and that he still has a house in the town. Felipe then took us to see the house and the small statue placed opposite it in his honour. All around were pictures and posters of the local lad made good and it was obvious they are very proud of his achievements.

Andrés Iniesta

 

We said our farewells to Felipe and we made  way back to the route to the next stop. Whilst cycling along, Foz let out a joyous cry. It turns out that his odometer on his bike hit 11,000 miles so we had to stop and take this picture.

Stage 16 tomorrow and the weather forecast is, you guessed it, sunny and hot and we are only cycling 59 miles, yipee!

Ride stats

Distance 68.96miles

Average speed 13.79 mph

Max speed 35.6 mph

Ride time 5 hours 0 minutes

Total miles 1209
(only 391 miles to go!)