bikenav wrote:Simon
The more I look into this, and look at my photos of the journey to and from the 2013 HISS, to try N-S in may I would be more comfortable in a small group, due to the potential difficulties of undertaking the water crossings. Going at the end of summer would educe the potential problems I would imagine, although I would prefer to ride in the spring as all my past exploits have been in a dry sunbaked landscape an early summer ride would be welcome change. Any thoughts on that from the local man or others ?
Hi Paul,
Weather-wise it's pretty much of a muchness. The only predictable issue is the thaw in the Pyrenees, which begins in May and if it's a big one
all of the small rivers are unfordable for days on end. Otherwise rivers will flood anywhere after severe rainfall incidents, which can happen anytime and anywhere - all those big 'dry' riverbeds are caused by flash floods like in Morocco. If anything these phenomena are more likely in summer, including early September.
More importantly for your planning, perhaps, will be restrictions on riding trails in summer. This is especially important in Castilla-la-Mancha, which is totally in your path unless you head well east of Madrid. There
all vehicles are banned from trails from the beginning of June until the end of September - and these rule are rigorously enforced! - so your plan for May should be OK.
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Above pics From that HISS return journey, the clutch pressure kept up for about 30mls then it was gone, lucky the journey to Zaragoza was straight forward till the city centre, then a few suicide runs through junctions and red lights got me to the KTM dealer. They were very good appeared to drop everything to do my bike, whilst I fell asleep on the showroom floor. Did some nice trails back to ferry after that including the military desert all good in the end.
Good, I'm glad all those phone calls paid off! (thumbs)
By 'The Military Desert', do you mean the Bardena Blanca?
P.S Bumped into the "foot doctor" and his lovely wife in Romania last year rode with them for a few days to the Bulgaria Rally, great company, did I see your name on that list at one point?
Lucky you! I was indeed hoping to go to the Bulgaria meet and meet with Dermott and Amanda once again - some of the nicest people you could ever hope to meet (thumbs) - but sadly I had to scratch the trip as a) I got too ambitious and planned too much, riding over the Bosphorus and on into Asia Minor b) the Bulgaria timing was too close to the Catalonia HISS and c) as well as the shock of Lucky dying suddenly (and mercifully although it didn't feel like it at the time) we had a lot of personal stress last year (all fine now) and it would have been very unfair to leave Polly running our holiday cottage alone all summer. So I think the 'Big Trip' is going to have to wait until I/we 'retire' from that side of our lives after 2019!
On a brighter note, we've decided not to get any more dogs until after we retire - not fair on them really - and although that's hard at least it means we can travel more easily, including running up and down the Pyrenees and out int the 'desert' for short breaks on our two bikes, exploring more HISS locations of course (thumbs)
Regs
Simon
