Our ride up to Begur probably turned out to be my least favorite. Mostly that’s because the weather wasn’t great. It was overcast and eventually it rained.

We didn’t actually have that many miles planned for the 12th, but the first two thirds of it was pretty challenging. Almost right out of the gate we were climbing. Most of our climbs up till this ride we’d been doing pretty tame grades – they were just long climbs. These by contrast were short and very steep. Actually, more akin to my neck of the woods back home in Austin. More like “Big View” and “River Place”. No mention of what the grades were, but it was steep. The views of the coast though were great, so we took the good with the bad.

We had a nice long coffee stop in Begur after all the climbing though. There were lots of shops in Begur and several people took the time to shop a little. That made the coffee stop longer than average. Kinda wished we’d moved on sooner. We were there long enough to completely cool down. The sun had not come out, there was a breeze blowing and the weather seemed to be changing – and not for the better. Occasionally I could feel a rain drop. Just one, then two. I thought: “we should get going”.

Finally, everyone was assembled again and the group headed off. We got maybe a couple miles and the rain came. Not just a sprinkle, a full on cold rain. I didn’t really have the right gear on based on what it was like when we left. Wow, I was cold quickly. Chilled to the bone and pretty wet. I mentioned to Chris and he magically pulled a small rain jacket out for me. It helped. Chris seems to always have what you need when you need it.

Thankfully the rains did not last long. But long enough that our route was insufficient to warm me back up. Mercifully, the route back was mostly down hill and short and it wasn’t long that we were back to our hotel. I made a bee line for the hotel room and a hot bath up to my chin. Ahhhh!

Unfortunately though, within the day, the chill was enough to bring on a sore throat and cough that got progressively worse. Ugh!

Pictures here include one shot after our initial climb that looks down over Llafranc (foreground) and Calella de Palafrugell, where we’d come from that morning.

Then, a shot of Chris and Larry taking in the view at the top of another hill. And a final shot of the group at our coffee stop in Begur.