Day 13 — Tuesday 10 May 2011

Bohonal de Ibor – Madrigal de la Vera

This was the last flat day for a while before I hit the Sierra ed Gredos. At times I could see the Sierra tipped with snow in the far distance. I set off from my cold water hotel (after desayuno in the bar) and immediately crossed the Embalse de Valdecañas that the Rio Tajo flows through on its way to form the southern border between Spain and Portugal. My camera was working again having cooled down in my bar-bag. North of the Rio Tajo is the valley of the Rio Tietar that flows into the Rio Tajo a few kilometres to the West and riding across this was absolutely fabulous. I passed storks on top of ruins and after Navalmoral took a small road towards Rosalejo that shot like an arrow towards the Rio Tietar.

The valley of the Tietar is crisscrossed by large concrete irrigation channels coming together at huge square junction troughs and then branching out along the edges of fields. I came across a larger irrigation canal running along the northern bank of the Rio Tietar but failed to take a photograph so I have grabbed one from Google Earth. The road surface began to deteriorate so I turned North up a smoother but steeper road. It was getting time for lunch and I wasn’t near any towns big enough for a restaurant but at the top of a stiff hill out of the blue I came to one sitting by itself in the middle of nowhere. I had one of the best meals of my trip through Spain sitting on a shady terrace overlooking a garden and a swimming pool with a small number of other diners.

After lunch I climbed back on the bicycle and and continued to the main EX203 that turns mysteriously into the Cl501 as it crosses the border from Extremadura into Castilla y Leon. I glided through Madrigal de la Vera and came to the campsite. The gate was shut so I pulled open and wheeled my bicycle through towards the office. A woman appeared waving her arms saying that the campsite was shut. I asked if there was another campsite nearby or maybe a hostal but she just kept waving her arms.

Feeling pretty fed up I retreated to the road and set off towards Candeleda only to notice a few yards down the road another campsite sign pointing to Camping la Marta one kilometre up a side track. I got there and found the gate to that one shut as well. Undaunted I slid the gate open and wheeled in to what looked a delightful site. I leaned the bicycle against the wall of the office and went to sit down in the sun. After a while a chap approached me and he ’phoned someone else who eventually turned up yawning. I must have interrupted his siesta. He tried to overcharge me and offered me his computer with a translation screen loaded so I could explain what I was trying to say. As soon as I started typing he offered me the right change and we were the best of friends after that.

I washed myself and my kit and strung it all out in the sun. Later in the evening a pleasant lady come over and chatted for a while and opened her camp shop for me to buy supper. It was so early in the season they were not expecting campers.

I noticed changes to two fatty lumps that I had had behind each of my knees for some months before I set off. My doctor had said that although they could be removed they were simply fatty lumps and were causing me no other problems. Now they had virtually disappeared, I suppose because my body had grabbed just about any source of energy it could find. I was visibly thinner than before I set out and the sinews behind my elbows and knees were quite prominent. I was feeling generally tired but not short of energy when it was needed.