Travel to Spain and Portugal (and France?)

[Tonibe63]

I think that many of us are beyond having school aged kids and are thankfully removed from being forced into having our trips during July, August and early September ......... those with kids will be well aware of the pain surrounding those 'summer' holiday seasons.
If you factor in the European football competitions, the Olympics, the shocking UK weather plus the cost of 'stacations' you can understand the clammer for cheap/convenient European holidays/travel, especially as travel numbers are close to prepandemic figures whilst the travel industry is still lagging behind a little. So hopefully come September/October things will have cooled down a bit .
We've taken a different approach the last couple of years, we booked 'out of season' package holidays with self catering accommodation and found rental bikes to explore the tourist hot spots and also go off the beaten track. Good travel insurance and baggage allowances are a must though.

[SteveR]

Been chatting elsewhere on the "plan" such as it is.

Someone has suggested using a bike transport service for one way.... An interesting idea, so I have emailed to see what sort of money it would be.

Ride down, fly back, sure to save 3 days at least, which might be a factor. Drop bikes at Faro, budget plane to Brum, and bikes delivered back a week or so later??

Or maybe the other way round....??

[SteveR]

Been chatting elsewhere on the "plan" such as it is.

Someone has suggested using a bike transport service for one way.... An interesting idea, so I have emailed to see what sort of money it would be.

Ride down, fly back, sure to save 3 days at least, which might be a factor. Drop bikes at Faro, budget plane to Brum, and bikes delivered back a week or so later??

Or maybe the other way round....??

£700/bike for Algarve to Midlands.....

I think a tad steep!! Will try another quote.

[ErikGustav2]

[/quote]

Everyone says forget camping....
[/quote]

Almost everyone. But not me. I say that camping is excellent in this area

[ErikGustav2]

I will give some views of travelling in this area.
My personal views and experiences.
Take what you want and leave the rest.

I live in Algarve. So I have nothing to add when it comes o getting from UK to Spain.
But...
To fly to Portugal and rent a bike is popular.
Or to book an organized tour, that use this concept of renting bikes.
There are both tarmac and gravel versions.
It depends to large extent on the duration of your trip. One week renting is OK
For longer periods, it gets more expensive.

The time of year has a huge impact. August is the peak tourist period. July is also very popular.
That affects availability of accommodations and prices.
June and September are my favorites, If you want to include mountains. Pyrenees, Picos....
Else October is also very good.
The cost for accommodations drops drastically in early September.

Explore tourist spots?? Why on a motorcycle. If you want to visit tourist hot spots, take a charter tour. The MC is used to get out of the large cities and hot spots. I would not use a MC if I wanted to go to Lisboa or Barcelona.

Bike:
The roads in Portugal outside highways are mainly excellent tarmac roads, Twisty and with little traffic. Average travel speed is usually around 50-60 km/h. There is no use for a large bike. Himalayan or smaller is perfect.
(I had a Kawasaki GTR 1400 for some period. But it is now back in Sweden. It was not to much use in Portugal.)

You can combine the idea with renting and using a small bike:
https://europcarbikes.com/en/vehicle/honda-pcx
And avoid the cost of riding there....
And get a low cost for renting


Some examples for areas to travel: There are much more

Portugal

Douro Valley: Fantastic scenery. Best period is September, While it is still green.

North to South or reverse:
N2. Iconic road, You can ride it in 2 days, And see nothing. Or use 6 days to explore things around the road. It passes the Douro River. So it can easily be combined with some days in the Douro Valley. I did such a trip in October 2021. But the travel story is only written in Swedish. But links to the pictures

https://www.flickr.com/photos/191636466 ... 1688100586

https://www.flickr.com/photos/191636466 ... 1688100586

ACT: The proposed schedule is 5 days. That is rather intense riding. I would add a couple of days

Spain

Andalusia Mountains, Alhambra, Ronda...

North West Picos de Europa, other mountains, Santiago de Compostela, Burgos.....

Pyrenees Mix of Spain and France side.

Final comment
Just do it. This such a good biking area. You will have a great time, whatever way you do it.

[Magnusson]

I will give some views of travelling in this area.
My personal views and experiences.
Take what you want and leave the rest.

I live in Algarve. So I have nothing to add when it comes o getting from UK to Spain.
But...
To fly to Portugal and rent a bike is popular.
Or to book an organized tour, that use this concept of renting bikes.
There are both tarmac and gravel versions.
It depends to large extent on the duration of your trip. One week renting is OK
For longer periods, it gets more expensive.

The time of year has a huge impact. August is the peak tourist period. July is also very popular.
That affects availability of accommodations and prices.
June and September are my favorites, If you want to include mountains. Pyrenees, Picos....
Else October is also very good.
The cost for accommodations drops drastically in early September.

Explore tourist spots?? Why on a motorcycle. If you want to visit tourist hot spots, take a charter tour. The MC is used to get out of the large cities and hot spots. I would not use a MC if I wanted to go to Lisboa or Barcelona.

Bike:
The roads in Portugal outside highways are mainly excellent tarmac roads, Twisty and with little traffic. Average travel speed is usually around 50-60 km/h. There is no use for a large bike. Himalayan or smaller is perfect.
(I had a Kawasaki GTR 1400 for some period. But it is now back in Sweden. It was not to much use in Portugal.)

You can combine the idea with renting and using a small bike:
https://europcarbikes.com/en/vehicle/honda-pcx
And avoid the cost of riding there....
And get a low cost for renting


Some examples for areas to travel: There are much more

Portugal

Douro Valley: Fantastic scenery. Best period is September, While it is still green.

North to South or reverse:
N2. Iconic road, You can ride it in 2 days, And see nothing. Or use 6 days to explore things around the road. It passes the Douro River. So it can easily be combined with some days in the Douro Valley. I did such a trip in October 2021. But the travel story is only written in Swedish. But links to the pictures

https://www.flickr.com/photos/191636466 ... 1688100586

https://www.flickr.com/photos/191636466 ... 1688100586

ACT: The proposed schedule is 5 days. That is rather intense riding. I would add a couple of days

Spain

Andalusia Mountains, Alhambra, Ronda...

North West Picos de Europa, other mountains, Santiago de Compostela, Burgos.....

Pyrenees Mix of Spain and France side.

Final comment
Just do it. This such a good biking area. You will have a great time, whatever way you do it.

Excellent advice. I'll steal it for myself.

[SteveR]

I will give some views of travelling in this area.
My personal views and experiences.
Take what you want and leave the rest.

Just do it. This such a good biking area. You will have a great time, whatever way you do it.

Some excellent content and ideas here Erik, thank you.

[Flipflop]

Hi
You through me at first talking about riding to the Med - Portugal isn’t on the Med but I guess you will ride across.
I’m on a trip right now - Belgium, Germany, France and Ireland.
As far as the nuts and bolts are concerned, nothing has changed. If you go down the west of France you will not need a Crit Air.
As far as expense goes - everything thing has gone up everywhere post Covid - but that also includes wages so I don’t think much has changed there either.

It’s always a time v money issue. We always have around a month so we can go slowly: camp, buy and stop for a picnic lunch and cook up on the campsite.
If you have less time it will cost you more.

Ferries - in the nineties and early noughties it was much cheaper to travel through France than get the ferry. Then it evened up for a while but now it’s gone back the other way.
Interestingly the ferry from Cherbourg to Rosslare, at the end of August was so much cheaper than Cherbourg to Portsmouth that we could have got an onward ferry to South Wales and still been better off.
Perhaps look at the Irish ferries to Spain - I know a few Scottish riders do it to save riding through English traffic.
As everyone else has said - just do it the way it suits you - memories are better than money

[ErikGustav2]

I am reading a Portuguese magazine "Motos"

They have a "travel story" called "from Galicia to Hegoalde"
Da Galicia a Hegoalde (da Galicai ao Pais Basco Espanhol)

It is divided into three parts.
In the second part they pass Picos De Europe.

It is a 4 pages long text.
The word Fantástico" is commonly used.
They say that they passed the Picos in one day. But 3 days would have been minimum to explore this area.

As one example , I try to share the route they took.

A picture from the magazine:

Picos Motos.jpg (86.02 KiB) Viewed 4945 times

And I mapped their route in Google maps.

Segment 1:
Llucarna - Riano

Luarca-Riano.jpg (70.27 KiB) Viewed 4945 times

Segment 2:
A loop that starts and ends in Riano

Riano-Riano.jpg (67.38 KiB) Viewed 4945 times

[ErikGustav2]

This is not travel to Portugal.
But flight down and rent a bike.
As an alternative.

One favourite is the Douro Valley.

https://www.allaboutportugal.pt/en/arti ... n-portugal

A friend of me that lived close to Faro used to travel there.
Now when he lives in Sweden, he still went down to Faro, rented a bike and rode Douro Valley, 1 year ago. We met up in Porto.

This can be done in one week:

Faro - Evora on N2
Evora - Porto
Porto- Villa Formoso. First on N108. Than the rest on N222

Douro.jpg (79.95 KiB) Viewed 4349 times

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