Paris Dakar Stage 21 to Granada

Stage 21 of 60, day 25 of 71: 144.8 km, 1828m, 5:49, 506 shifts, ave speed 24.9, max speed 71.1

This block of four rides from Cuenca to Granada has been relatively hard. We climbed over 6600m and rode 537 km. But with my secret weapon (riding with Wytze and crew), I not only survived, I had lots of fun. Today’s long stage to Granada was pretty normal. We’ve gotten used to packing up completely dry tents in the morning – it’s easy. Someone fired up a loud leaf blower or something just after 6am so I don’t think anyone slept in.

I had a normal breakfast plus electrolytes. After that, we left together at 9 and cruised on rolling, lightly travelled roads for quite a while. Later, we rode on highways for some time, with more traffic than we’re used to. I didn’t really mind as the surface was good and the cars and trucks seemed polite. We rode right through a morning market in a town around 48 km – then stopped at a hotel which had an open coffee shop. Daniel and Wytze had purchased a large bag of pastries from a bakery so we had a jolly time eating and drinking. Jan was riding with us today and his humor just killed me. I was laughing so hard at his tales I was literally crying.

Then back to work. We rode to lunch at 84 km to find Ype had secured a large covered pavilion. We had a nice cool lunch with more electrolytes for me. By this time it was pretty hot, 31°C. We had already climbed about 1200m and done way over half the distance which felt good.

The afternoon session was in two parts: 1) Ride to a restaurant we found along the way and 2) Ride to the hotel in Granada. At the restaurant we had a round of zero alcohol beer since we still had almost 30 km to ride. They served it with a platter of meat that the guys loved and the restaurant cat ate quite a bit of. I tried but failed to photograph the cat.

Then we finished off the day with a pretty easy ride to Granada. It was a little exciting riding through the city, but we suddenly turned a corner and arrived at the Allegro Granada, a 4 star hotel, quite a change from our normal campground life. Major snacks were had, luggage was found and a shower was a really great thing. So civilized. We checked out the laundry situation and I decided to just wash my own.

About 7, we started walking over to a wine bar Wytze had found for dinner. It was a 30 min walk, through a touristy area. We hung out until 8 at a nearby outdoor café having sangria. Daniel arrived and we moved into the wine bar, a tiny, very local place. Each bottle of wine came with an amazing dish of food, like oysters, toast with shrimp, etc. Ype joined us after a couple of bottles and spent the rest of the evening with us. After four or five rounds, we walked to a nearby square for dessert. We had I don’t know how many desserts, tiramisu, chocolate cake and a bunch of orders of cheesecake (although it wasn’t on the scale of the legendary one from Zaragoza). Then we started with the drinks. First there was coffee with your favorite liquor (mine was Bailey’s). Then some rounds of “Vino dulce” which tasted like Port – excellent. Finally, well after midnight, we called an uber which took Bart, Andrew and Daniel home while Ype, Wytze and I walked. When we made it back to the hotel we chatted in the lobby with a few of our people still awake and at 1:30 I went up to write this up. What a day! It’s like two days in one, one of riding and one of pure fun in Granada. And the rest day hasn’t started yet!