As I set off this morning it was very gloomy with thick low cloud, I thought the sun would burn it off in an hour or so but as I climbed out of town I was being hit by 20-30moh winds. I was heading NE and was fighting the wind off my front right.
As the first 3 miles were mainly downhill I didn't realize how bad this actually was but as the gradient levelled it became a struggle. At 10 miles I reached Les Puentes de Dom Francisco which was a fascinating place were two old stone bridges straddled two sections of water which I had thought were rivers but they are actually a distant arm of a huge reservoir formed on the Tagus about 12 miles away to the west.
I had a straight froward 400ft climb back out of this canyon but between 11 and 24 miles the road was still going up but also it turned eastwards directly into the teeth of the gale. I was labouring between 5 and 8 mph and it was another 20 miles to the next town, Torrejon el Rubio. Eventually I reached it and there were two bits of good news - there was a tapas bar open for lunch where I duly obliged with a totilla and Croquettas and the road turned North - at last some resite from the wind, now I just had yo lean 45degrees to the right to avoid being blown over. Even the poor caterpillars crossing the road were being picked up and blown away by the wind.
After 38 iles all my hard work was worthwhile as I entered the Monfrague National Park and more specifically the Salto del Gitano where the mighty Tagus carves through huge rock formations, there were eagles circling everywhere and it really was an impressive site.
I followed the Tagus rather than crossing on the new bridge as there was an old bridge a mile upstream, when I got there it had been overwhelmed, despite having lots of holes in its structure to allow for high water levels the water had obviously been over the top, A tree was stuck in one of the bridge holes and the road had been washed away down to the hardcore, the side walls of the road had been deposited onto the missing road surface. I even wondered if it was passable but I managed to walk my bike across, carefully !
Once over it was a fairly straight forward ride into Plasenscia 18 miles away, I had intended to cycle further up the Tagus and pick up a Via Verde cycle route but this would have involved heading east again, uphill into the murk and as it was 3pm I decided not to take the chance and stuck on the EX108 which was quiet.