Day 2 St Jean to Espinal

St Jean to Espinal

22.97 miles (total 57.54)

On the way up

Up at 5:30. This was going to become a regular happening over the next two weeks. Breakfast in the aubergue was toast and coffee. The coffee was served in bowls and one tablespoon of coffee went into each bowl – strong stuff! As first light dawned I was outside getting the bike ready but I had time to stroll around the walls and up to the Citadel before we set off. This was magical. As the rising sun caught the mist in the valleys there was truly beautiful moment as everything lit up. Lots of photo’s were taken but photo’s do not catch the magic of the moment. St Jean is a beautiful place, though, and would be worth visiting for more than a day.

By 7:00 we were on the road and riding down the cobbles into the centre of St Jean. Malcolm had indicated the road out on the day previous and we followed walkers as they set out towards the Pyrenees. It was a good day, the sun was up and warm with a clear blue sky. A perfect day for the job in hand. Sadly, none of us had noted the comment in the Cicerone guide that we needed to head back out of St Jean on the D933 clearly signed to Pamplona to take the route up the Ibaneta Pass. We were 5 kilometres on when we realised that we were on the walkers route going straight over the top. This climbs up to about 4,750 feet (that’s 300 feet higher than Ben Nevis) and is not recommended for a bike, especially a bike carrying a full load of panniers. But by the time we had realised we were well up (or so we thought) and were not going to go back down to climb up the road.

A Welcome Break

So there followed a tortuous day where we managed to ride 13 miles in ten hours. In the course of that ten hours we met some lovely people including a young lady from Melbourne and a fellow cyclist (mtb) called Jose who stayed with us for most of the day and, indeed, was a great help in some very tough spots. We stopped for coffee at Orisson and enjoyed the views and again later at the cafe van further towards the summit. We also passed a shrine to the Madonna which was both beautiful and poignant as it had various notes and artefacts attached.

The Summit

The views from the summit, once we got there, were spectacular, especially when we look down a thousand feet or so towards the church at the head of the Pass which should have been our route! The descent to the church was twisty and quite rough. In fact, we had more problems on this day then on any other as Malcolm punctured just before the summit and Ricky broke two spokes on the descent. One of the spokes was on the drive side of the back wheel so we could not make a repair.

As we rolled down the road from the road summit we had no clear idea of where to stay. We considered stopping and looking around the monastery at Roncesvalles but we decided against as we needed to make some time up. We were also pretty tired after getting the bikes over the Col Lepoeder and were keeping an eye open for somewhere to stay. We asked at a aubergue in Burgette but there was a festival and we were told the night would be noisy. A lady in Espinal offered us Bed & Breakfast for €18 which we were pleased to accept. We had an evening meal in the restaurant in the village square and we talked to a couple who were wild camping. We also had a long conversation with a Spanish gentleman in the restaurant. In his younger days he had spent holidays in Bangor. And all followed by an early night and a good sleep ready for the next day’s ride.