July 2 - Lucia to Ragged Point

The previous day had been the worst. After that it was just fun again.
My alarm clock rang at 7:45 and I got up at 8:00. It had been so silent during the night but as I already mentioned I had lots of weird dreams, so I didn't feel that rested as I should. But my back didn't hurt anymore from walking my bike steep uphill and so I felt ready for the upcoming day.

I had breakfast in my room again and then I met Christoph and we went to the reception to get registered.
Then we were walking around the hermitage and I took some pictures and enjoyed the view as far as this was possible because it was cloudy and misty that morning.

the common kitchen

there was also a small library in the kitchen

the monks were very keen on separating the garbage
(=> reminded me a lot of Germany:-) )

Christoph's room was the left one, my one the right one

we were really hidden in the mountain

the monk's small chapel

 

inside the chapel_1

inside the chapel_2

the guests' rooms

we were above the fog

We had a nice talk with one of the landscapers who was really interested in the European politics. Unfortunately I couldn't tell him much about the current situation related to Greece, Spain etc. Actually I am not that interested in politics and since our arrival we hadn't watched TV at all.

We started biking at 11:00 and it was just a pleasure to go downhill for 3.33 km (hermitage to Lucia, about 15 minutes ride because we had to take some breaks again: Christoph's tires were so small and hitting the brakes all the time caused such a heat that we had to stop and wait for the brakes to cool down again).

the sign on Highway 1 that indicated the way to the hermitage

my favourite sign from the previous day:-)

From Lucia it went another 5km down, it was foggy and we had no or just a narrow shoulder. But I enjoyed it:-)

on the way to Gorda

who recognized Christoph's new black windstopper?:-)

When we almost reached the sea-level again we had to bike up and down 6 more times til Gorda where we had our lunchbreak from 13:50 to 15:30. That time I only had to walk my bike ones:-)

At our lunchplace we met a family from Denmark and the father told us that they had rented a motorhome and had 5 weeks to travel around California. He could also tell us that Spain had won the European Championships (so far we had no idea who the winner was:-).

our lunchplace in Gorda

Christoph leaning his bike against the bannister of the patio

to the left our lunchplace

to the right of our lunchplace
=> that was the whole town "Gorda":-)

After lunch it went steep up again (I was walking, biking and walking uphill), downhill and one more uphill (walking again) and downhill before we reached the Ragged Point Inn & Resort at 17:45.
( the 2nd half of that day-trip felt again more like walking or hiking than biking:-) ).
That day we had a little bit wind but less traffic (it was a Monday and no weekend anymore).

on the way to Ragged Point

our room was on the top floor of that building

We checked in, made a reservation for our dinner and took a shower.
From 19:10 to 20:30 we had a nice dinner in a pretty elegant restaurant (we had cloth napkins instead of paper napkins => what a change!).

Then we went grocery shopping (breakfast and drinks) and prepared our last tour stage. Internet didn't work (it was an external provider we had to pay for but we couldn't get to the payment page already...). When I went down to the receptionist she was kind of unfriendly and felt disturbed (I guess she was talking privately on the phone:.-) and told me that she had no idea about the internet and that she didn't have internet access either.
Luckily Christoph and I had made a copy of the bus schedule so we could look up the location and time of the bus we had to take the following day.
Because our alarm clock would rang very early the next morning we went to bed at 23:00h.


sunset from our window

Tour stage

Tour stage: Lucia to Ragged Point
Distance: 42.87 km
Total time (breaks included): 11:00 - 17:45
Average speed: 13.44 km/h
Real running time: 3h 11 min