Today was day #3, and it started bright and breezy with my usual breakfast – a cup of coffee from my moka pot (and coffee) that I brought with me. I needn’t have bothered as my wonderful Airbnb host, Mia, has several pots of varying sizes. But, she doesn’t have cream. And what’s the best thing to have in coffee, apart from cognac? Cream! Or montar, if you’re looking for it in a Spanish supermarket.
So coffee’d and packed, I headed for to Deia and Valldemossa. Turns out that attempting to miss the summer fiesta fiasco in Spain is harder than it seems – coming late September is not good enough. The roads were pretty busy with many coaches and cars again, but as I was earlier today, I had an easier time on the road.
Deia was lovely, Valldemossa even lovelier and heading into Palmanyola, I was stopped by a parade of sorts. The road was blocked and there were people on horses and people in horse-drawn carts. I thought we’d moved on, but apparently parts of Spain have not. However, with the power of the Googles in my back pocket, and the kind Spanish policeman who let me through, I was able to plot a new route and soon was back on the road. Happy days!
I landed on the motorway and seemingly, this is fine in Spain, and soon was making good time towards Coll del Soller.
This has 61 hairpin bends up and over towards Soller. This is insane in just 14km! The road is graded very nicely and seldom nudges over 6%, making it simple enough to just spin up and enjoy the ride. The hairpins themselves are the fun part and I got good acceleration out of each on the way up. Down is another story – I kept having to look down the mountain to see if there was traffic coming up, and if not, I was able to take wide corners, using the whole of the road. So much fun! The reason that the road carries so little traffic is there’s a tunnel through the mountain that cuts the travel distance in half, leaving the old road to the cycling community. Thanks Spain!
After the descent, I trundled on to Port de Soller and had ice cream. I thought it was just desserts! Literally!
Valldemossa 
Port de Soller 
Just desserts 
Lonely roads 
Coll del Soller 
Into Valldemossa
This would be Puig Major – a mere 14km climb that my GPS eventually recorded as a total of 1000m. The road (MA10) was eerily quiet and birdsong, sheep bells and the swish-swish of my tyres were my anthems for the day. And my heavy breathing… But, being on holiday, I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and I took it really easy. Because the climb went on forever. I knew there would be a pay-off later in the day when this would be a forever-descent back home… If I was to survive the day.
