Tag: cycling
Beyond Barcelona: Bicycling through Catalan Country
The Ebro River valley stretches out below the village of Miravet in Catalunya.
With a warm headwind whipping at my pigtails and my legs pumping furiously upon a pair of bike pedals, I’m ten years old again, experiencing the exhilarating thrill of freedom that only a set of wheels can bestow. But instead of cycling around the civilized suburbs as I did in those bygone days of innocence, I’m winding through the wilds of Southern Catalunya in Spain.
Get on yer bike!
Miles of olive groves, green valleys sculpted by terraced fields, and narrow passes gouged from red rock canyons sweep by beneath a blazing blue sky. Mind adrift, I lose myself in the Zen of forward momentum, serenaded by the sound of…well, nothing, save the smooth “whoosh” of tire spokes—and, if I’m honest, my increasingly labored breathing as I embark on a slow uphill ascent.
A cyclists wheels past fields and groves on the Via Verde in Catalunya.
At least I can be reassured that I’m burning some of the thousands of calories I’ve been consuming on my cycling tour of this resolutely resilient region of Spain, which maintains its own language, culture and cuisine.
Tortosa skyline with the Cathedral of Saint Mary and the Ebro River.