Andalusia?

[Mr. Pink]

Watching the Vuelta in beauriful HD on my big screen, and I am blown away at the scenery in Andalusia. I never really knew. Again, this is what I love about watching these races. It's a long travelogue to places you may never see. If only I can get the Giro in HD.
Looks like awesome riding, and great towns and cities scattered about. I assume that one can ride there year round, although summer temps must be almost Phoenix like, but, I'm more interested in late fall and early Spring in Europe, because crowds and prices are lower. Maybe there is a problem in November, if that's when they harvest those million plus olive trees all over the hills, as they do in Italy.
Has anyone ever toured there? Do some pros live there, at least in the off season? If they do, what towns are preferred, like Girona in the north?

[ultraman6970]

Interesting, in English is with a S instead than with a C... nice area, smoking hot chicks :D

[eddief]

The Spain of flamenco, vineyards, olive groves, Moorish architecture, Seville oranges, and of course the sparkling hilltop villages that give the tour its name. This area is sunny and dry, and for most of the year is extremely hot. By starting the tour in early May, it avoids the heat and instead be treated to spring wildflowers.The tour includes visits to the three most famous cities of Andalucía: Seville, Córdoba, and Granada (with their glorious Moorish monuments, the Giralda, Mezquita, and Alhambra). Also, visits include a handful of pueblos blancos (white villages) perched atop peaks, including Ronda, Arcos de la Frontera, and Zahara de la Sierra. The ride passes limestone mountains, vineyards, olive groves, fields of wildflowers, and along the Mediterranean coast.

And I did a short tour with these guys:

http://www.cyclingcountry.com/CycleTours/Spain.htm

[rpm]

I spent two weeks in Andalucia this past June, and the scenery is every bit as good as you think it will be. The sights are amazing, and the tapas were great. It was blast-furnace hot, but going in the spring should be better. I had a bike, but I didn't tour. I toured by van the first week, and then was in Malaga racing the second week. A tour should be great. Just make sure you put on some really low gears. Those grades are steep!

[Look585]

I spent a week riding around Ronda. Beautiful. The town is pretty touristy, but that means easy lodging and loads of restaurants.

The riding is *tough*. North and east gets flatter and windy. South and west is very hilly.

Cycle Ronda (http://www.cycleronda.com/index.php?lang=en) rents decent road bikes and sells a series of maps with pre-planned rides. Plenty of small towns to stop for water, but plan your food more carefully. Siesta is still very much a thing.

A car is handy, but you could get by riding "from the door" if your are sturdy and good with directions. The city outskirts are a bit confusing at first.

[redir]

But I am un chien Andalusia...

[RonW87]

Eat late. Like 10pm late.

[tommyrod74]

But I am un chien Andalusia...

Did you grow up? To be a debaser?

[ptourkin]

Did you grow up? To be a debaser?

A Pixies reference deserves a Clash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-qcy0-7ngw

[trener1]

I spent about 10 days in Andalucia few years back kind of on a whim, we flew into Madrid and rented a car.
I went with the wife, so I didn't ride, but it was fantastic, we spent some time in Grenada and of course drove up into the mountains and spent some time in some of the small villages, one of them was Trevélez, I think that is the highest town in Spain.
Driving up those mountains on the twisty roads without any guard rails was quite the experience
I loved it, had great food and wine, I would definitely recommend going.

[Lewis Moon]

Jim liked it too. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKmkOIlHbok)

[jemoryl]

A Pixies reference deserves a Clash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-qcy0-7ngw

Hmm, I thought it was a reference to the Luis Bunuel 1929 film Un Chien Andalou.

[redir]

Hmm, I thought it was a reference to the Luis Bunuel 1929 film Un Chien Andalou.

Indirectly it is ;) Frank Black (Black Francis) wrote the song based on that reference.

[jemoryl]

Indirectly it is ;) Frank Black (Black Francis) wrote the song based on that reference.

IIRC, the film does feature someone on a bicycle, so not too far OT.

[OtayBW]

No biking, but I took a kayak across the Straits of Gibraltar several years ago followed by some leisurely travel along the coast east of Malaga. Spent a while in Nerja, a small coastal town on my way to Granada and La Alhambra (not to be missed). Enjoy the local cafes, plenty or red, and bring back some single varietal olive oil. Es maravilloso!

[11.4]

I've spent a fair bit of time from Cadiz to Sevilla to Granada, both coastal and mountain routes.

Cadiz to Sevilla is beautiful and relatively flat. Wineries, old towns, great scenery. Cadiz is an amazing town to ride around -- a port from Phoenician days before the Roman empire. There isn't a big street in the area, not a street that is straight for more than fifty meters, and cobbles everywhere. Great views of the Med and historical buildings going back 1500 years BC.

Sevilla to Jerez is pretty flat, grassy farmland, with antique buildings everywhere. Just south of Jerez is a gorgeous old convent with a tall wall, housing, a separate chapel, kitchen, laundry, and a big garden. It's all abandoned now and closed with tall iron gates, but it's something I always saw as an incredible B&B headquarters for cycling throughout southern Spain and Portugal.

Heading east from Jerez, you quickly get to Arcos de la Frontera. A huge steep ramp up to the tip of a mountain with an old fortress at the top that's now a parador (the paradores are a federally-owned chain of historic buildings converted into affordable first class hotels). You walk up to the fortress (it's too narrow for cars well below that) with a Catholic cathedral on one side of the narrow street and a mosque on the other. Church bells ring at the same time as when the muezzins are calling faithful to prayer. It's quite emblematic of what southern Spain is like -- the place has been overrun a dozen times by Christians, then Moors, then Christians, then Moors. Every building or plaza has served both masters. The view from Arcos is worth the trip.

From Arcos it rapidly gets hilly. Not huge mountains but successions of hills that keep going up and typically take the shortest route possible, at the expense of 20% hairpins and short 15% grades. There are cars, but not all that frequently and they don't drive like idiots. Just be sure you're on the right side of the road and stay there. And don't ride, even with lights, after dark. Every few miles you pass close to one of the white villages, which are painted in whitewash and stand out from miles away. Each village has a bar and a tavern in the center of town, and you can get a superb meal in most for about $10 per person, including local wine. If you're riding, water is scarce and it can be 20-30 miles between villages or businesses where you can get reliable water. It gets dry and hot, but not as extreme as when you get closer to Ronda and Granada

Guidebooks can take you through the area. For cycling I might suggest that instead of doing a long continuous tour, you pick out a few local towns and stay a few nights in each. Sevilla is a sizable city with a beautiful old town center with bullring, old historic landmarks, gorgeous cathedral, and endless shops and restaurants. The old town is surrounded by a rather deep industrial ring that is anything but aesthetic, and the roads are full of big trucks until you get out of town, but the roads then become superb. And there's so much to see in town. I personally like Montefrio, a small town built against a steep hillside below an old fortress. The place was populated since Roman times, and there are old early Christian ruins in the hills. Every square meter has been planted with olive trees (most Italian olive oil is actually produced in Spain) except where they have ruins in the way. They have so many freakin' ruins they don't even have the ability to do anything with most of them so you can wander into them and explore. Montefrio has some old 16th century homes up at the highest part of the cliff that people don't want to live in any longer because of the hillside, but you can rent them and have fabulous views, nice inexpensive housing, and look right down into the town square. Big homes, modernized kitchens, huge azoteas out of most bedrooms, and block stone construction. And endless paved roads everywhere, and thousands of kilometers of dirt roads through all the orchards. You can also get villa rentals out in the countryside -- inexpensive rentals that you can rent for three to eight people and use as a base for a training camp in the region. They all have swimming pools, air conditioning, and good kitchens, and the landlords bring by produce so you don't have to leave most days. Nice way to train.

I wouldn't try to ride close to Granada. It's lots of highways, lots of truck traffic, busy roads that suddenly cut off smaller cycling-compativel roads, and tourists everywhere. The Alhambra is a definite place to visit, but not by bike.

[johnmdesigner]

Can you drive a stick? You'll have a great time!
Sevilla, Cordova, Granada.
Rent a car in Sevilla and drive. The roads are uncrowded.
Take the 902 from Granada to Almunecar to a fabulous fish restaurant on the beach.
You get to play chicken with the tour buses on a road with no guard rails.
We stopped at a fly blown bar on this road several years ago and ran into LA and Johann Bruyneel.
Like a wild west saloon we sat at our tables with our arms folded glaring at each other (no other customers).
Then my wife burst out laughing and we all did.
Nerja is as far as you want to venture into Brit ex pat land.

[Mr. Pink]

Speaking of which, I'm wondering how Brexit will affect this whole British ex pat thing. Spain is Britain's Florida, with a tremendous amount of old Brits living there, and they soon may have no health insurance, which may drive them home and discourage new arrivals. Has to be a big deal for Spain's economy. (Mr. Pink salivates over a cheap condo in Spain)

[johnmdesigner]

Speaking of which, I'm wondering how Brexit will affect this whole British ex pat thing. Spain is Britain's Florida, with a tremendous amount of old Brits living there, and they soon may have no health insurance, which may drive them home and discourage new arrivals. Has to be a big deal for Spain's economy. (Mr. Pink salivates over a cheap condo in Spain)

Perhaps Portugal is the last frontier.

[tommyrod74]

A Pixies reference deserves a Clash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-qcy0-7ngw

That's my daughter's (she's 6) fave Clash song, mine as well.