Monfragüe national park

After leaving Cáceres, I met a fellow cyclist. Sebastian was German and was going back home, after doing a bike tour to Morocco. Unfortunately, he was not lazy, so after a quick chat, he disappeared over the horizon. The day was otherwise uneventful, with mostly flat terrain, but a few landscape shots coming from it.

I then slept in a place that would leave my parents wondering why they paid for my education.

I’ve been finding that the Spaniards are really respectful towards cyclists, always giving me a wide berth, maybe due to signs like this.

The next day, I would enter Monfragüe national park, a landscape so protected they had to put wood over the guardrails. In case it’s not clear, I’m not actually sure that’s the reason.

I then saw a cool looking castle in the distance, so I decided to have an unscheduled stop there.

It was a bitch to climb, and a lot of it has to be done on foot, which, with a loaded bike, was Not Good ™. On the way up, there was a place with cave paintings:

And a place with a sign not to leave the path.

But if I did that, I wouldn’t be able to take shots like this:

I finally reached the top, where there was a castle and a small chapel.

Pictured on the right: El Salto de lo Gitano, the only mountain pass around, where the locals would, in ancient times, charge a toll.

It was then time to go down. On foot. on a narrow path. With a loaded bike. It was a slog. Sometime in the middle, I stopped for a rest, where I took a selfie with a Spanish imperial eagle:

If you like birdwatching, this is the place to be.

After getting to the bottom, while crossing a bridge, a tiny nudge to a saddlebag broke a clip.Luckily, I’m trained as an engineer!That mostly held up, and at least never failed catastrophically. A few landscape shots and a climb later, I finally saw a place that had a salad, and took advantage of that.A few glamour shots later, it was time to turn in for the night.Then I learned that you can actually do night shots with a phone now!Let me say I’m sorry for the lack of updates, but I’ve been in the middle of nowhere for four days, now. This was two days ago and I’ll have another post for the last two days. Hopefully, I’ll sleep on a bed, today. See you next time!