Segovia to Guadalupe map. https://goo.gl/maps/sotrDigiYCwL9Awt9 It’s the one with the waypoints, a to f.
Joy Ride We headed south out of Segovia on the CL-601 over the mountain. What a great start to the day. We eased past a group of slow moving Harley riders and couple of other bikes. I was surprised to see a group on a Monday morning but thought good for them. Then we headed back up to Avila which wasn’t the most direct route but so what. We’re here to ride and this took us up to the 502 which took us south again. What a fantastic road, well that section. Just over the peak of that mountain we stopped at what turned out to be a popular bike stop. A group of half a dozen pulled in complete with their girlfriends on the back. How nice is that, all out together for the day in a group. I don’t know what their wives thought. First the slow moving Harley group, then there was a field of motorhomes down in the valley by a river. The hotels in Segovia had been unexpectedly more expensive, although still a good deal, now this bunch. It struck me that it must be a public holiday. One of the bikes was a red Multistrada. I found myself looking on with envy which surprised me. It looked small, it isn’t small but compared to the ‘Rubber Cow’ as my laughing companion calls it, it was lithe. Hmmm, envy, now there’s a thing. I’d never done the section of the N-502 from Talevera de la Reina to La Nava de Ricomalillo and I found it disappointing compared to the rest of it. I won’t be doing it again but when you peel off to Guadalupe it’s just fantastic. Super bendy and the grip, the grip is stupendous. As we rode towards the sun the tarmac glistened, not like a sheet but like a billion glinting diamonds laid out as a super smooth carpet of joy. Pure joy, in every bend. Jorg the Laughing German agreed when I described it later to Pedro the Cruel. Pedro had come up from the south coast to meet us and ride section of the way. We parked the bikes next to the great little hotel which was wedged into the tiny steep streets. We’d admired the bikes, as you do and over dinner Pedro asked me what it was like and my response was, “It’s like shagging a fat bird. It does everything you want, it’s a comfortable ride but it just doesn’t appeal to me. Oh, and it’s difficult for your feet to touch the ground too”. Much laughter all round. ‘Not that I’ve ever done so but it’s what I’d imagine it to be like you understand’. ‘Nah’, he agreed, ‘doesn’t appeal to me either’.
N502 - you turned off just as it gets good again. Talavera to La Nava is mundane as you said, but from La Nava south for the next 50 or so miles to Herrera del Duque is pretty fine. Maybe not as fine as the road to Guadalupe, though. That one IS special...
The Magic Carpet When we stopped yesterday at Vulture Point I realised that my hands were becoming a bit sticky. The heated grips had been off since around midday. So today the summer gloves came out. Those Vultures must have a 10ft wingspan. They look enormous from a distance. When they come up to you to peck your eyeballs out they must be even bigger. I’ll have to find out, via the internet not the close quarters inspection. No need to spend ages route plotting, we know we’re headed south down the 502 to Córdoba then onto Osuna. First things first though, we’re going north east back up the magic carpet past Vulture point to La Nava de Ricomalillilllillillo. I swung my leg over the ‘Flying fat bird’ and once again we were headed into the sun and the glistening tarmac. Pedro the Cruel, aka bro number 2, set a smooth pace. Swift but sure, not too lairy. On 58km of magic carpet I counted three cars and a coach going in the opposite direction and we passed one little van going our way. Bliss. We turned south down the N-502 and a couple of times I saw this black flash to my right, weird. Then on the third occasion I realised something was definitely going on, or maybe off. I hadn’t done my lid up! It was the black strap flapping. How does that happen? Turning heavy bikes around in a narrow passageway, contemplating the first sharp turn up a slippery cobbled street. Unbelievably it got missed, just as well the grip was good. I pulled over immediately. Moving swiftly on, I enjoyed playing with the up n down Quickshifter. What a great piece of kit. It snicked easily and positively both ways. It’s a 2017 GS. The 2016 Multi definitely doesn’t have one. I think the 1260 has one but if the GS has one the 1200 Multi should have had a fully sorted one too. The wheel that links to the Shatnav on the left thumb is a great piece of kit. You can zoom in and out to check your route. Another simple thing well sorted by the BMW engineers. Plenty of you guys will have been there, done that but this is my first serious ride out on a GS and these are just my observations as compared to the Multi. The real test is when I get back onto ‘The wife’s Multi’. The seat, the height, the kit etc. For a fat bird GS carries the weight well, that is until you’re stationary then she turns into a lump, but so does the Multi. On the Magic Carpet and down the 502 it was great to waft left right, left right, like skiing. For most of it she tracked really well. In fact it’s something that I need to sort on my Ducati’s. When I push them they put on this gentle sway or slight weave in a bend. I’ve had the suspension done on the Pani and I’ve played with the suspension on the Multi but they still do it. One guy in a dealership told me it was the single sided swinging arm that causes it but the GS doesn’t do it. When I rode ‘Uncle Bazzers’ 999r with a d’double sided swinging arm it tracked like nothing else I’ve ever ridden. Like a super sharp hot knife through butter. You set it on course and it stayed there no matter what,super steady, no issues, until you moved it. It was a joy. Why don’t the ‘Audi Ducati’s’ track like that? It’s something I need to deal with but why haven’t they? Sweeping down the 502 towards Córdoba, I led for a while then Pedro took over. The three of us moved as one, like we had an invisible piece of rope tying us together, I love that. You can do it for mile after mile or kilometre after kilometre in Spain. It’s not like squirting from village to village in the UK but it made me think of the British police bikers that you see sweeping off as a pair, perfectly spaced no matter what they do. I respect that, great skill. At that very point, who should come over the hill but two Spanish Police bikes spaced much further apart. We watched in our mirrors just in case they did a U-ey but they were gone and so were we. All too soon Covid filled Córdoba came to us and Pedro had to peel off and head back for a doctors appointment tomorrow. We pulled over at a roundabout and who should be there but two more Guardia on bikes looking to pull the unexpecting uninsured. They looked at us, we tried not to look at them. We stopped a quarter turn around the roundabout before we got to them. I just didn’t want the bother of papers etc. Pedro’s new tyres were on order but the front was overdue,in fact that was one thing he had shagged. They could see we were touring and unlikely to be uninsured. It was 28 degrees so we peeled off more layers. I was now down to a T-shirt and the outer shell of my jacket. Up slid a breakdown truck, not to take away an offending car but out got the driver with a can and replenished one of the Guardia’s bikes! They were going nowhere. I’ve never seen a British Police biker run out of gas. We’d seen what was going on, they had to have been embarrassed. They weren’t coming anywhere near us after that, which was a good thing. They went off sharpish, more laughter. We skirted Córdoba and headed for Osuna. I messaged ahead as requested; ‘We’d be there at 5.30, could we put the bikes inside the gates of the converted Monastery like we’d done before’. We got there on the dot and a really attractive girl opened the gates and in we went. It was just as well because it’s a steep cobbled slope and last time I was here I did a ‘Jorg’. I put my left foot down on the shiney cobbles on the downhill side. I fell off while stationary and rolled onto my shoulder. I forgot to mention that before though ... too embarrassed. We’ve all done it.
Not difficult to plot this on Google maps but 5 attempts to share it. Drives you nuts. Wednesday’s planned ride. That’ll be today then. https://goo.gl/maps/fz35wAZ56K6h6R77A
We go down the famous Ronda to San Pedro road, then we turn round and go back up it. It’s what you do when a road is ‘That good’!
Jat & Expat Jack and any others for that matter, glad you’re enjoying it. As it turns out it’s a kind of diary and I can look back and remember the trip. Never done diaries before, never my thing. If I don’t write it down it just disappears in the mists of time. It’s amazing how many fun little things happen on a trip.
Great write up Sam. Have picked up a couple of gems those being the road to Guadalupe and the route out of Segovia. The road from Ronda to the coast is fantastic and worthy,as you say,of there and back. As an alternative to the 629 route you took from Santander give the 623 a go.Great road leading into Burgos.
