Today was a turning point on the Tour, since leaving Coimbra to ctycle south to the Algarve I had been doing nothing but heading further North until yesterday I found myself cornered in the NorthEast and had no choice but today to satrt heading south.
I left town towards Samil and very soon had a lovely view looking down on the Castle with the City of Braganca below.
Next I dropped 800 ft to the Ponte de Penacal and promptly had a 1000ft climb back out of the valley up to Paredes.
The climb was lovely except for that creaky bottom bracket which was still annoying me. I could see houses way way up the valley but strangely enough in no time I was passing them and at the top - not a single car passed me on the climb which means one of two things ..
There were no cars, or I was cycling up faster than the cars ! I suspect the first was true.
Next there were rolling, undulating roads through Calvelhe and Izeda, before another 400ft climb which took me to Morais where I stopped for lunch after 33miles. The only option was yet another Cheese Toastie, but heyho beggars cant be choosers.
From Morais a quiet 4 miles to Lagao and then the highlight of the day...
I had a 1200ft descent into the Sabor valley followed by a 1600ft climb back out and up to Mogadouro. An immense valley opened up, this was the very top of another mega reservoir which is damned probably 20 miles downstream near Pocinho just before the Sabor runs into the Douro. The countryside was rocky, tree lined, landscaped by generations of farmers. There were eagles flying from yellow sulphur laden rocky outcrops, the bridge crossed the river and immediately ramped up to a thigh snapping 12% gardient for the first mile. Fortunately it then settled down and the next 10 miles were a mnice steady 5% and the only problems I had on the climb were hundreds of fruit flies following me and attacking my face. Even the Botton Bracket was behaving itself and the gears were running true an smoothe.
I visited the remains of the castle in Mogadouro as I was here whith 2 hours of daylight spare and have found a rather nice Cafe bar called Montanha to have a celebratory pint and to sit and type this up while watching sunset ... Just need to decide where to go tomorrow now !