Safe Return Doubtful

Despite the storms battering Portugal and most of Spain the northwest, Catalonia in particular has had a week of fine winter weather, though that does seem to be coming to an end tomorrow. 

On Friday morning I moved on from Bovera northwards through the city of Lleida to the foothills of the Pyrenees. Keen to keep at a sensible altitude, I decided to stay for the weekend the small town of Os, surrounded by the cliffs of the Serra d’Os mountain range on one side, and more gentle slopes on the others. 

I expected the aire, which was at the sports hall and the school, to be busy, but I was the only van there until late in the evening. A motorhome arrived, whose owners I only nodded to, and four smaller campervans which belonged to a group of friends from around the area, Barcelona, Lleida, Zaragoza, meeting up for a climbing weekend. Their vans were mostly very basic, like my first T5 with just an Ikea bed in the back, but the weather was good enough for them to sit outside. We got on well. There were two dogs with them, one a Border Collie pup, so it was difficult not to bump into each other. We sat for coffee on Saturday and Sunday morning, and went into town for a beer at the only bar open on Saturday evening. They were from a variety of professions, a hairdresser, a wine producer, a tree feller, and a couple who worked in local government. 

Os de Balaguer is a great town for outdoor activity. Not only is there climbing, but also some excellent mountain biking and gravel riding, and hiking. On the Saturday I walked the ridge that stands over the town, making it into a circuit of about 12 kilometres. It was very overgrown in places, which made the path difficult to follow, and rather than the ridge giving a view of Os, it sat slightly over the other side of the knife edge, giving mainly a view of the opposite side. Most Spaniards consider this weather too cold for any lengthy outdoor activity, but for us from the north of England, it’s not far from perfect. 

On the Sunday I took the Orbea around the Serra d’Os and the Serra de la Guineu which link together. I could see some of this trail from the ridge I took in the Saturday. It begins with a climb up to 1000 metres over about 8 kilometres on rough ground. This is where the electric bike really is a pleasure to ride. There was plenty of clayey and clinging mud that made some sections difficult. Although the days had been fine, there was heavy rain for a few hours each night I was there. Fortunately the parking area at the Sports Hall had a water tap. On arrival back to Os in the early afternoon all the other vans, weekenders, had gone, and I had the place to myself. 

This morning I moved on, conscious of getting over the Pyrenees on a day when the temperature is above zero. I drove for 90 minutes and am now based at Organyà for the evening. I have just been talking to a German couple next to me, also in a self build campervan, and also on their way back from Morocco. They alerted me to a road closure through Andorra. Together we looked it up online, and it seems the road had a large rockfall on Saturday night, 200 cubic metres of rock fell 250 metres and has basically wiped out a 100 metre section of road. It is likely to be closed for 4 weeks, and will cause a lot of problems for their ski tourism. They will try, an article online says, to get cars through by  a series of diversions, somehow.

For me, it means I will need to cross the mountains further east, at Puigcerda. The journey in the direction of Toulouse won’t take much longer in terms of time, though it is further in distance. My plan is to do that tomorrow, before the weather cools down later in the week, and then head up towards the Dordogne. It does seem that the recent dry weather is coming to an end though.