New Route in Central Spain

[pistonbroke]

It's about 400km from Barcelona to Teruel, BUT if you can get there around midday on the 14th, take the hourly bus service to Tarragona which is direct, takes bikes and is much quicker than the train, I can pick you up and go by car via Castellon to Teruel, picking up the others en route. You'd have to do the return on Sun 22nd, reversing the trip. I'd need to know fairly soon as space is limited.

[dlovett]

I'm enquiring at work, but won't get an answer for a few days. Don't worry about planning round me, if I can make it I'll get myself there somehow.
Cheers

[pistonbroke]

For those who follow Pro road cycling, particularly the Spring classics. Thomas de Gend and Tim Wellens are planning to ride this route later in the year.
https://www.instagram.com/degendtthomas/p/By5wdcji8qk/

[pistonbroke]

So the Solstice ride happened and was a roaring success. 42 riders assembled at Teruel railway station on Saturday morning and we got away only an hour late. Unusually the group consisted of 25 men and 17 women. A fairly straightforward route had been planned of 60km to a campsite. Once we climbed out of Teuel, it became clear that this is the land of the big view.


Clearly due to the size of the group, the pace was sedate but gave opportunities to take in the views and chat.

We found a couple of bars along the route and refreshing beers were taken. The campsite at 1500m altitude was reached in the late afternoon and Ernesto had booked a local restaurant which served us a 3 course meal with wine for €15.


Sunday morning we rose to another clear sunny day and returned to Teruel, a longer route but largely downhill.


I managed to discuss the September trip with Ernesto, he thinks the timing is spot on but confirmed that it is important to have a good water reserve as it's not a given that every village will have supplies. We passed a couple of the refugios that are on the 700km route and they look well maintained and refreshingly cool. He confirmed that he will try to join us but will send me more info on resupply points and other stuff before we go. Regarding the trail conditions, quite a lot is smooth gravel but there are rocky bits as well, I've not changed my thought that a rigid or hardtail and 29er with 2.2 ish tyres will be the ideal tool.
Here's Ernesto's report which has just pinged into my inbox.
https://montanasvacias.com/2019/06/25/mvsolstice2019/

[ianpv]

Looks good. Sounds like a couple of fork mounted bottle cages may be a good idea for September...

[dlovett]

That looks fab, I wish I could come, but I cannot get the time off of work

So the Solstice ride happened and was a roaring success. 42 riders assembled at Teruel railway station on Saturday morning and we got away only an hour late. Unusually the group consisted of 25 men and 17 women. A fairly straightforward route had been planned of 60km to a campsite. Once we climbed out of Teuel, it became clear that this is the land of the big view.


Clearly due to the size of the group, the pace was sedate but gave opportunities to take in the views and chat.

We found a couple of bars along the route and refreshing beers were taken. The campsite at 1500m altitude was reached in the late afternoon and Ernesto had booked a local restaurant which served us a 3 course meal with wine for €15.


Sunday morning we rose to another clear sunny day and returned to Teruel, a longer route but largely downhill.


I managed to discuss the September trip with Ernesto, he thinks the timing is spot on but confirmed that it is important to have a good water reserve as it's not a given that every village will have supplies. We passed a couple of the refugios that are on the 700km route and they look well maintained and refreshingly cool. He confirmed that he will try to join us but will send me more info on resupply points and other stuff before we go. Regarding the trail conditions, quite a lot is smooth gravel but there are rocky bits as well, I've not changed my thought that a rigid or hardtail and 29er with 2.2 ish tyres will be the ideal tool.
Here's Ernesto's report which has just pinged into my inbox.
https://montanasvacias.com/2019/06/25/mvsolstice2019/

[In Reverse]

Looks great that Duncan. A couple of thoughts:

it is important to have a good water reserve as it's not a given that every village will have supplies.

a reminder that it's worth studying the route on OSM and checking for the tap icons (water suppy). They've been (I think) 100% accurate so far when I've been looking for water overseas, including our trip through rural Spain 2 years ago.

we got away only an hour late.

I trust you were on hand to offer some words of "encouragement" to anyone caught dallying?

[pistonbroke]

Apparently pacing up and down doesn't have the desired effect here
Re water. It's fine to know where the fonts are but given the exceptionally dry conditions we've had recently, there's no guarantee that anything will come out of the tap when you find it. On this year's C2C there were 1 or 2 places where the supply had completely run out. I'm sat in a café in deepest Valencia atm and it's bloody boiling, I'm 350km into a 500km training ride and considering cutting it short as it's 38° trouble is it's 100km back to where I started so I may have to mtfu.

[pistonbroke]

Well that was an interesting couple of hours. Immediately after lunch I picked up the Camino del Cid towards Alicante, thinking it was similar to the fast easy going we find on the C2C. No such luck, it was a goat track clinging to the side of a ravine which involved pushing/carrying for 6km. Took me 2 hours and I was dripping with sweat. This meant that the planned 40-50km before calling it a day was shelved, I hope the 115km left tomorrow is better than this afternoon.

[Chew]

Just noticed this

Those dates work for me, just need to work out the logistics.

Will drop you a separate note Duncan

[pistonbroke]

Chew's in so atm we're 6 riders plus Ernesto for part of the trip. He has said we can doss at his house in Teruel on Sat night due to our late arrival. Chew is flying Manchester-Tarragona/Reus, arriving at 7pm on Sat. I will pick him up and drive directly to Castellon airport to pick up the Stanstead guys at 10pm, from there it's straight to Teruel and we will build bikes, get going on Sunday morning.
There's still a place for JamesO to get here by train from Nice on Sat evening, there's room for bike and body in my van.
Just a quick question, there's a guarded refugio at the ski station on the 2,000m mountain Javalambre. We should be near there at the end of the 4th leg so it could be a good place for a shower and regroup. They do bed, dinner and breakfast for €30ish but it needs to be booked in advance as it's obviously not ski season so could be closed. Can you let me know if you want me to contact them?
https://youtu.be/kdyvNC0LXs8
Btw there's a bar!

[HUX]

It's a yes from me........but I'm easy on, I'll happily sleep under a bush!

[Chicken Legs]

^^^ What Hux said

[zebraonabike]

Hi everyone. I’m new here! My husband and I are going to do this route a bit slower than you either at the beginning of September for 2 weeks or at the beginning of October. We still haven’t decided when these best time to go is weatherise! We are going to bring our pup so we need to be careful about the heat but equally don’t want to be freezing. It would be great if you could share any extra route/ location information with me :) We will be covering less mileage than you will be a day so good and water will be even more important for us, I’ve been checking OSM for water taps and hoping they will have water!

[jameso]

There's still a place for JamesO to get here by train from Nice on Sat evening, there's room for bike and body in my van.

Thanks Duncan, though I'll be starting behind your group I expect - finishing the TNR a day outside Nice perhaps then riding as much as I can towards Spain. Got some extended time booked off but don't plan around me, I want to be fairly loose RE when I finish TNR and how I get to MV. If possible I'll ride a loop the opposite way or fig-8 / shortcut so we overlap, or something like that. If anyone reading is starting later (~18th Sept) or riding off group pace maybe I'll see you along the way.

[Chew]

Yeah, I need to have a good look at the route and decide which options as the full route may be a bit too much for the time constraints.

[Chew]

It would be great if you could share any extra route/ location information with me

Have a look on the main site. In to downloads there are cues as to how far between villages and food/water supplies

https://montanasvacias.com/

[jameso]

Yeah, I need to have a good look at the route and decide which options as the full route may be a bit too much for the time constraints.

likewise, since getting between the end of the TNR and this route is a trip in itself. I expect I'll pick it up at the east side of the Gudar (orange) section. Then ride purple-green-red using the light blue shortcut (love that map. Ernesto's a proper artist ). Then get home somehow. The ferry from Santander appeals... but keeping employed is also necessary... Need to do some proper time planning.

[pistonbroke]

James, if it was me, I'd ride/train to Perpignan then pick up the route of the Pirinexus over the Pyrenees at La Jonquera and follow it to Girona. I'd try to give Barcelona a wide berth either by going via Montseny and Montserrat or if you're time limited, get the train straight through to Vinaros which is on the Castellon/Cataluña border. Then take the route of the Burrally (available on Strava)via Morella to Puertomingalvo (it's a stunning gravel route) where you can join the orange MV. Depending whether you want to visit Teruel, you could take the purple, 1/3 of green, then light blue shortcut but then take the blue route north following the Rio Tajo which is probably the most picturesque section of MV. Once you get to the end of blue, you're about 5km from my Spanish C2C route which you could take all the way to Bilbao and ferry to Portsmouth. Makes me tired even describing it, if you want the route files of Pirinexus or SC2C, let me know.

[ianpv]

Refugio sounds good to me - happy to do that but also happy with a bush!

[pistonbroke]

Found a pic of the said refugio, hopefully it'll be less snowbound when we get there.

It's just down the trail from this place, the Vuelta finishes at the end of a 1,000m Cat 1 climb here next month, guess where we'll be

[zebraonabike]

It would be great if you could share any extra route/ location information with me

Have a look on the main site. In to downloads there are cues as to how far between villages and food/water supplies

https://montanasvacias.com/

Not sure whether to be offended that you have suggested the obvious. Of course we have looked at everything on the website. Nothing there about water, open source mapping seems to be the only place to find that. I was trying to be friendly and share information,

[pistonbroke]

In Chew's defence, I think he was directing you to the link to Google drive which, under section 6, states that there are water fonts in every village that the route passes through. The problem is that it's been very dry for several weeks and it's not a given that all fonts will be working. Of course this is a bit of a lottery but if you see large bottles outside houses, it's a sign that all is not well. I'm certainly aiming to carry at least 2 liters.
If you join the Montanasvacias facebook group, message Ernesto, his English is excellent and is very helpful and has spent a lot of time researching this.
I'm intrigued buy your mention of bringing your pup, has it run this far on stony tracks before?

[zebraonabike]

I’m not sure I have found the google drive. Thanks for the info, we are now going the first 2 weeks of October, so after you. So any information about water would be greatfully received, we will carry filters too. We will carry a few litres each but this will have to be for pup as well. Yes we have been messaging and he has helped us with where to leave our car. Pup (Skye) will run for about 10 miles Max a day, the rest she will spend in her single wheel suspended trailer (Tour terrain cargo trailer). She is pretty used to our adventures! We have our ferries booked and a rough plan, we will play distances by ear when we are there.

[In Reverse]

I’m not sure I have found the google drive.

Will you be offended by the obvious suggestion to go to the downloads page and click on the bit that says "Link to Google Drive"?