Inland to Portalegre and south to Sevilla

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I have arrived in Sevilla in the south of Spain and i´m staying with Spanish Capeoira friends from Brighton; Jorge and Marta, in a lovely flat close to the old city centre where it all happens. There is deffinitly a strong flamenco culture going on here and I have already had the chance to catch some fantastic playing and some late night drunken singing in the yard. I am looking forward to going to a few lessons and more shows while i´m here and judging by the first couple of days here there will probably be plenty hanging out in bars and cafes on tiny little streets that reveal all kinds of hidden secrets.

The journey from Porto on the Portuguese coast was a fantastic ride through so many different places its hard to know where to begin. Having been on the beach for a couple of days it was actually great to head inland again but i did take a few days to get away from the more populated coastal regions and get back out into the wilds. First i followed the River Douro inland for a day or two and then up into the mountains and into the Serra Estrallas; the mountains of the stars.

The valley was pretty spectacular but also pretty full-on on a bike as you can imagine up and down those hills. Gradually the sprawl of new concrete houses receeded and the landscape revealed some lovely vinyards and more oldschool villages, there was even some forests and more wild corners as i climbed up out of the valley.

It took sevral days heading south east through towns such as Trancoso, Gaurda, Covilha, Castelo Branco and Castelo de Vida befor I reached my friend in Portalegre. the land became more and more empty and also dryer the further i rode. Endless fantastic fileds of cork oaks and olives that continued all the way to the mountains just north of Sevilla.

In Portalegre I stayed with Luis who i had met at the transition town conference in Liverpool in the summer. We did a little gig at the conference with Keith and Will on trombone and there was a small crew from Portugal who were the party corner, singing and dancing while the more reserved English folk were slowly warming but we did get em all up dancing in the end. Anyway Luis was pretty inspired by my cycle ride and invited me to come visit along the way. I had a great couple of days there with him and also Paulo and his other friends who showed me around town and stayed up till the early hours talking nonsense.
It is great that the transition movement is becoming such an international phenomenon and interesting how it will need to adapt to such different circumstances, but these guys are on the case so perhaps there is hope after all.

Whilst in Portalegre i had great fun doing an interview for some journalism students getting very confused with our languages but it was also quite insiteful in terms of the questions we came up with as to why someone would do such a journey as this. It´s all about Living the dream! Having a big idea and doing it. I´m thinking about developing a new career as a motivational speaker for corporate events and earning huge amounts of money.... Live the Dream! Hopefully they will actually complete the film and i can stick it up on the blog for all to see.

It was hard to leave. Even after just a couple of nights there i felt very much at home and it seems to be a bit like that. It´s hard to stop when you´re just cruising on and hard to get going again when you stop.

Any how from Portalegre the road lead south and east back into Spain and on the the Via de Plata which is another pilgrimage route from Seville to Saintiago. It was great to be on the Camino again staying in cheap hostels and meeting other folk on the road. The route took me through some beautiful vast landscapes of cork oaks and cattle ranches, olives and vinyards. The landscape at times almost felt African in its vastness and dryness. It was great to cycles through and the weather was always sunny, infact the land felt very dry and it turns out that they hadn´t rain for 7 months....

That has all changed now though and it has been raining even here in Sevilla.

I have passed so much road kill this last few weeks from hedgehogs, snakes, birds, frogs, foxes, badgers, cats, dogs and unrecognisable clumps of fur bit this beautiful creature did really touch my heart so here she is.

oh yes and i passed the 3000 km mark on my journey ever south!
So many other tales to tell but that will do for now.
Back to the city streets and the home of flamenco. Much love from Sevilla

A map of where I am!

hi folks,

I`'m in Portalegre in Portugal staying with a friend that I met at the Transition Towns Conference in Liverpool in the summer. Having lots of fun and I will write a post soon....
.... but he has just shown me how to have a map showing my location on the blog.
So this is where I am.....




Wahey, the technological advancements are leaping forward!!!!
More tales of adventure and photos to come.
I was also interviewed by some journalism students here today so there should be a little student movie coming soon to.
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Down by the Sea Side

After my first month of cycling across France and then the Camino to Santiago I decided to rest up in Vigo at Pablo´s house. I had only had 2 days off from cycling untill then and it was great just to hang out in one place and meet a whole bunch of sound folk and be spoilt by Pablo´s kind Galician hosptilaity so a massive thankyou to you for everything P.

It was great to play a bit of capoeira again and meet up with a small but perfectly formed crew of Angoleiros there and mess around doing our thing.

The Galician coast is a beautiful rugged coast line with little islands and gorgeous bays and there were plenty of beautiful sunsets across the Atalntic. Infact it seems that we are having an unusualy hot hot autumn and every where i go people tell me that the weather patterns have completely changed over the last few years..... climatre change is happening for sure!

I do also need to big up a fantastic little bar in Vigo called the Charlatana bar run by a great English woman called Fleur who has spent many years wondering the globe but now settled down here to run the bar and be the hostess with the mostess. We spent many a happy evening drinking in her place and felt very welcomed by the vibe there.

Leaving Vigo i decided to take the coastal route and have now spent the last couple of days on the coast road heading south. Its so good to be by the sea again and have little time lounging on a beach. I took a little ferry boat across the river at the border with Portugal and entered only my third country of the journey but with a whole new language and different way of being. It´s good to be speaking portuguese again although all my languages are now mixed up into a strange melange of Spanish, Portuguese and French but poeple seem to understand some of what i ramble on about.

After a couple of days i´ve made it to Porto which is a beautiful city on the Beach at the inlet of the River Douro. It reminds me so much of Brazil but I guess it is really the other way round that Brazil very much takes after Portugal. I bet this place kicks off in the weekend but I´m not hanging around to find out but going to follow the river east heading inland into rural Poirtugal and slowly back towards Spain.

Oh yes and most importantly i gave my bike a make over in Vigo. As much as i loved the pink plastic flowers i had been given on my departure from Lex and Daisy it was time for a new look. The comments of ´les belle fleur´ or ... ´the women in my country have baskets like that´ will be no more. My beautiful, and i must say incredibly reliable, Thorn Sherpa now proudly sports the red gold and green of Africa!

The Camino de Santiago

It has been quite a while since I have written a post and I feel like I have been in another world traveling the Camino de Santiago west from the French Pyrenees in the Basque Country to Galicia in the North West of Spain. Obviously this is not on the way South to Africa but it has been a journey that I have wanted to do for a very long time and a part of the world that I have been intrigued to visit.

The Camino is a pilgrimage route that began in the 9^th century after the apparent discovery of the tomb of Saint Jaque, or Tiago, or Jacob depending on where you from. He was an apostle of Christ who during his life time came to preach in the Galician peninsula and after being beheaded by the baddies of Rome his body returned to this part of the world on a boat with some of his disciples and friends. It’s a pretty wild tale that seems a little unlikely yet the faith and compassion that is born from the experience of the journey for so many leaves me with little interest in really questioning the truth of the myth itself. The journey became really popular in the middle ages and a whole series of stunning old churches, monasteries, hospitals and rest places have grown up along the route that takes you through all kinds of landscapes from stunning wild mountains, wide open dry plains, valleys and also now quite a lot of urban areas to. The route has become really popular again in recent years and feels very much alive with travellers from all over the world walking hundreds of miles to pay their respects to the tomb in the fantastic cathedral in Santiago itself.

I began the Camino proper in St Jean de Pied de Port at sunrise on a stunning misty morning. The road takes you up through beautifully wooded valleys high in to the mountains, over a pass and into Spain. It was so great to arrive here and leave France after so long of feeling quiet culturally starved and ripped off by expensive campsites full of old folks in ridiculously large camper vans. At last things are more affordable and there are plenty of other great folk travelling the road to hang out with. The journey of 777 km normally takes walkers about 35 days but on a bike it took 9 days on roads, tracks and footpaths, sleeping in pilgrim´s hostels and feasting on fine Spanish food and plenty cheap wine. Indeed a bottle of wine can cost the same as a bottle of mineral water, which incidentally is generally the same price as petrol which I have always thought was pretty bonkers.

Any way I soon hooked up with other cyclists along the way and by the time we arrived in Santiago we were a crew of 5 all kitted out in the full spandex cycling gear…. We love it! After days of riding the high ways, or rough tracks up and down mountains or through hundreds of miles of flat grain fields we would meet up and feast on the local foods and wine. Que Vida Rica! The rest of the crew were all Spanish lads so I´ve been getting into the lingo and having a whale of a time.

Arriving in the fantastic city of Santiago was an extremely powerful experience. We pulled into the square outside the epic cathedral as the bells struck midday to announce the daily Mass attended by thousands of devoted Christians and arriving Pilgrims. The service was incredibly emotional for so many people who have travelled hundreds or even thousands of miles to be there in the footsteps of so many before them for a thousand years. The Mass happens at this time every day and includes prayers,  readings and blessings with a full power climax involving the swinging of a huge incense burner billowing the sweet smoke of frankincense the full length of the Isle. This is accompanied by full-on dramatic organ music and the gasps and amazement of the congregation. The whole experience, empowered by such strong intentions and faith, leaves the entire congregation in a much heightened state. The cathedral itself is also full of magnificent imagery and ancient artworks that adds to the whole experience.  Together with the relief of completing such a journey that for many would have been pretty demanding, this makes for a very magical moment that I will always remember. The journey of pilgrimage offers deep insights into our own spiritual worlds and I am very grateful for the learning of this time on the Camino and for the companionship of my fellow Pilgrims. Of course the whole thing ended with more feasting and drinking in true Spanish style until some crazy hour of the morning

I hit 2000km on the road to Santiago which felt like quite an achievement but many more to go. 

It is time to head south again now, but this time through Portugal and then back into Spain to Seville and Andalucía to seek out some Flamenco in its true homelands down South.