Motorcycle Tours - Spanish Pyrénées
- the route
This year we’ll be able to go Portsmouth/Bilbao to
Spain, so you’ll have 36 hrs of luxury to wind down
before the twisties start (and don’t they just start -
straight away!). We’ll return to the UK through
France, as usual. but due to the loss of the P&O
crossing from Le Havre we’ll go from Calais.
Our first day is an easy one and gets us to a small
market town just south of the Spain/France border.
It’s only 130 miles to this stop but don’t imagine
you’ll do it in 2/3 hrs!
We’re bang in the middle of Navarra here - very
green Spain, and it’s not green for nothing even
though it’s on the Spanish side of the mountains.
You might well need wet kit! We have three nights
here. France is only 8 (slow) miles away and if it’s
wet on one side of the border it could well be dry
on the other. The terrains on opposite sides are
totally different. The French side has lots of wild
moorland while the Spanish roads are more
winding and often in densely wooded hills and tight
valleys. Steam train buffs could have a happy day
from this stop, as a rest from scenery bashing.
Then from Basque country we move to the central
Pyrénées - the ORDESA National Park - for four
nights. This is our prime stop scenery-wise and we
could well spend the whole holiday here and not
explore it fully.
The excursions we suggest will take you through
incredibly narrow gorges, many of them dead-ends
as you arrive at phenomenal rock faces, miles long.
There’s a beautiful Medieval town only 5 miles
away, miles of walking territory, off-roading as far
as you want, deserted villages, and as we’ve said
earlier, nearly all on billiard table surfaces. And
every time you cross the border it's not just a
different country - more like a different world.
Our third stop, for three nights, is south east of
Andorra - Catalan country this time. And again a
host of exciting rides are suggested, not least of
which is a blast (rare on this tour) over the Col de
Puymorens. In France you could visit some of the
famous Cathar castles, or spend time studying the
most powerful solar furnace in the world.Then we
return through France in three leisurely days, with
a night in the Dordogne.
