Hubbard Motorcycle Adventures

But firstly you have to like this - says it all really  Anyway back to Santiago de Compostela. We visit the famous cathedral where lots and lots and lots of happy walkers are gathered in the courtyard  Regal buildings  As we head East  there are Camino walkers everywhere  And the Camino trail itself  We stay at a town on the Camino trail  Then w head to Bilbao - home of the famous Guggenheim museum. It does not disappoint. Stunning architecture that is impossible to capture on camera.  So having had our shot of culture we do a short hop down the road to San Sebastián where there is a shot of culture of a different kind  It is quite incongruous to see determined Camino walkers with their packs and walking sticks walking at a determined pace on the promenade next to all the topless sunbathers on the beach who are - dare I say it - “ basqueing “ in the sun !   And to finish off on that note from the ladt  post where I talked about “ The rain in Spain staying mainly on the plain “ Well as

It’s time to leave Gibraltar with it’s cacophony of English voices and head to the most westerly point of the whole of Europe. And of course we were so close to Africa  But first we have to now get to Portugal. A click of the fingers and there it is - And then we enter the Algarve  With tens of thousands of British tourists stranded there as a result of the Thomas Cook travel collapse in the UK this is not a happy place  There is some useful signage on the road of how to ride a motorbike. Note to self - must practice riding on the front wheel only when following a car  We stay at Faro on the Algarve - a forgettable town with a forgettable hotel. Then next day it is on through Lisbon and out to Cabo del Roca - the most westerly point in Europe. The little rock  there is the most westerly tip of the tip of Europe  And the  Cape  itself And there are lots of self congratulations  as this is the most westerly point of Europe and therefore the most West   from Vladivostok in Russia. We hav

We leave Luchon and ride through  Pyrenees to Andorra. As we ride  we cross three mountain passes -  And pass nice Spanish villages  We get to Andorra  Now about Andorra. It is an independent country. It has a population of 77,000. The official language is Catalan. It is very small and the people live just in one tight valley. The town was established by Charlemagne yonks ago Because Andorra sits between France and  Spain and sits in a valley between the two it’s main activity was smuggling up until the formation of the E.U.  And here are two interesting statistics. Firstly Andorra has the highest average life expectancy for males in Europe. Secondly it has the highest annual per capital cigarette consumption in Europe ( 6397 cigarettes per person per year )  Go figure that one!  Then after Andorra we head down the coast to Valencia. Yes, there are Valencia orange groves in Valencia ! And the famous Caletrava architecture  South, south we go down the coast. Then we are suddenly in Gib

There is not much you can say about them really. But we travelled on about 6 different motorway systems as we moved from one side of France to the other over two days  So we leave Chamonix and head down the  valley to the start of the motorway system.  Then 4 motorway systems and 7 hours later including the very busy (and fast )  motorway from Marseilles to the Spanish border  we come off the motorway system and head into the true French countryside  We come to a roundabout and there are the famous French Yellowshirts having a little protest ( as you do in France)  But the French country roads are delightful. So quintessentially French I almost start singing the Marseillaise !  As are the lanes  And the villages. Note to self - must get a black beret !  We stay at a wonderful restored French farmhouse that has been converted to a small boutique hotel. I like to think of it as a micro chateau!  It was superbly restored and just as importantly it came with a superb French chef. Sitting

No, that is not ladies making passes at me. That certainly would not be eight in two days! No, these are the eye-candy passes of Switzerland. And we have been blessed with two days of gloriously fine weather, slightly autumnal but not cold, fully sunny and not a breath of wind.  We start off riding the grand daddy of the passes, the Stelvio Pass that goes from Italy to Switzerland.  It is a high pass that in about two weeks time will be closed until late April next year. In fact it has beeen closed recently because of early snow and has only been open for a day before we went over. And talking of going over that is something you do not want to do.  There are 48 very tight hairpin bends coming up the Italy side. Each bend  requires a tight turn of nearly 180 degrees in a turning circle of about 3 metres. Plus an upward slope. Plus an ever changing camber plus traffic coming the other way.  Get the picture! And talking of pictures here is Stelvio Pass. Just a fraction of the hairpins  T