Shortly after the race passed our nice little spot in Viegu we got going north towards the coast, stopping at an aire not far from the town of Ribadesella. That’s the town that’s made headlines recently for it’s tongue-in-cheek response to criticism from tourists that had complained about the noise from roosters and church bells, etc.
We stopped in Gijon to re-stock on food, then continued straight west on the motorway until just before Ribadeo where we turned south along the route for the next day’s stage.
We followed the route to the town of A Fonsagrada, where we stopped so Colin could get some salve for his insect bites. I haven’t been bitten at all, but they seem to really go for him!
Backtracking to the village of Santa Eulalia de Oscos we once again took advantage of the aire. The race goes by on the road below, although it doesn’t actually go thru the village.
After a lovely glass of rioja we had a nice early night – there are only two other vans this time, as opposed to being almost full two weeks ago.
Early the next morning we followed the route several miles on and picked a nice wide spot to park and watch from.
There was a very large breakaway that arrived at 1:49…
…with the peloton, led by Jumbo Visma – with current overall leader Primoz Roglic – only two minutes behind (love his blue shoes!)…
…and team Ineos and Bernal not far back.
We once again saw our ‘friend’ the photographer who stopped right at our spot to take some photos.
We’ve met him several times now, including the Tour of Burgos three years ago and the world’s in Harrogate two years ago. He liked the book I was reading that I’d set near my chair and commented on it.
Several minutes later, as usual, were the sprinters and others, including Jacobsen and several of his protective Quickstep team members.
After taking down the flags we had a somewhat leisurely drive back past Santiago and a bit south to the town of Padron – it’s the starting point for Sunday’s final stage that is an Individual Time Trial. We know we’re not going to watch from Padron, but it has an aire that was pretty easy to find.
We actually didn’t really care for the site – it’s right across from a canal, and also right on one of the many Camino routes. In fact there’s a marker showing that it’s at km 26,770 of the trail – not sure where they started counting from – China, maybe? Or, perhaps, as Colin reminded me, they use the comma and the decimal backwards here, and it more likely means 26.77 km to go to Santiago – maybe?? Hahaha.
The problem with the site is that it’s surrounded on two sides by large apartment blocks, and since it was Friday night there was a lot of activity, including drunken shouting and verbal altercations from some of the suites.
Leaving as early as possible the next morning we headed out on the route, looking for a spot somewhere on the one large climb of the finale on Sunday. We passed a spot that Colin liked but I wanted to press on and see what was ahead – we ended up going another 15 km or so before turning around and parking in the first spot.
We were eventually joined by another campervan, and many more cruised up and down the road looking for places.
Sally McKenzie's European Adventures 