Day 17: Palamós to Salses-le-Château (145 km)

I got up later than wanted. My hotel had very thin walls and my neighbors were very active working their way to the Kamasutra. So I had a little less sleep than needed.

I had about 80km to go until the French border. The route was nice and uneventful and without major towns.

I passed through a couple of Catalonian villages which had the yellow independence ribbon on the roads and buildings. Signs of the huge tensions in this province with rest of the country.

The last couple of kilometers before the border I saw half-naked young women posing at the side of the road. A very bizarre sight in the middle of nowhere. It took me a while to figure out what they were up to. Sometimes I am very naive. However, I had not seen this kind of public “offering” in the rest of Spain.

It was a great feeling to finally cross the border. A couple of days ago I had seriously doubted to ever make it.

After the border a couple of things changed. All of a sudden the long-distance cycling-route Eurovelo 8 was there and in exchange the respect of car drivers for cyclists on roads had pretty much vanished.

Also there were mosquitoes in France. I was bitten directly after the border. The first time two weeks. Maybe Spain uses substances to keep this plague in check.

It felt good to speak French again. My level is quite basic but still much better than my non-existing Spanish.

When I arrived at my hostel the restaurant was closed. However, the host Jeremy simply handed me the keys for his car instead. That was a first for me. How cool! So I drove into the next village and had a great pizza for dinner.

Insight of the day: Always be ready for miracles.