The pleasure was mine!

Today I finally had the chance to meet the charming Ben Curtis and his wife, Marina, the brains and brawn behind the Notes From Spain (http://www.notesfromspain.com) website. For the last couple of years, Ben and Marina have been channelling their love (and, sometimes frustations) for Spain into the website, which covers topics as diverse as fiestas, expat life and how thin the walls can be in apartment buildings.

One of the most fun things about their website is their weekly podcasts, where they take time to sit down and talk with diverse people about the diverse things they get up to. So, after much searching for a quiet enough place to do a recording, we settled down in a Starbucks with three cups of hot chocolate, and had a chat about the Trans-Iberian.

It's always encouraging to speak to people who are interested in travelling by bicycle, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Ben and Marina will be able to join us, even if it's just for one weekend!

Check out the podcast at:
http://www.notesfromspain.com/2007/12/10/cycle-ride-lifetime-notes-spain-podcast/ !

Where? Where? Where? Where? Where?

No sooner are we out of the hotel than I become very, VERY thankful that we didn't go to Andalusia this weekend. A cold front has blown in from the Atlantic and has shrouded the northern half of the peninsula in cold air, which means that if you're anywhere near a river, you're in fog. Thick, dangerous fog that makes biking treacherous, especially since there was no notice in the weather forecasts that this was going to hit this far south.

We're somewhat lucky in that most of the fog we encounter hits us on the way to Toledo, and even though the ride into Toledo requires a bit of zigzagging along some very large roads, we don't have to deal with a lot of traffic and the signage is more or less clear about where we need to go.

This is NOT the case with the Ruta del Quijote signage that we can't see for the life of us. Even though Toledo is effectively the trailhead for the Ruta, there's very, very little signage that directs us to where we're supposed to go to pick up the trail and get out of Toledo - not helped with the nonexistent maps that are in the guide book. Eventually we do find the road out, and head up to Cobisa, then hit the Ruta full-on, but until we get out of the Tagus Valley, it's a bit complicated finding where we're supposed to go.

And even when we're on the route, it becomes clear, very quickly, that you've really got to keep your eyes open for the signs. I'm not sure how, exactly, the signs were planned, but you have to be very, very vigilant for the signs. Paranoid, almost. We end up messing around for a couple of hours before finally giving up after a serious dog-leg; we blow down a secondary highway to the town of Mascaraque, have lunch and promptly give up the idea of trying to make it down to Consuegra before nightfall.

I don't want to criticize the people who worked to create the Ruta del Quijote, because there are some things about the route which are very well done - the rest stops, the signpost markers which tell you how far you are from the next town - but it's not the first time that I've been on the Ruta and come away with the distinct feeling that someone in a government office somewhere sat down with an army map and tried to loop together as many back roads as possible, without actually getting on a bike or putting on a pair of hiking boots and doing the route itself.

We roll into the town of Mora at five PM, check into the hotel and collapse on the beds, partly from exhaustion and partly from the effects of so much frustration in so little time. Fifty-six kilometres in seven hours. Even discounting having stopped for coffee and lunch, we're frustrated that we're nowhere near where we thought we would be.

Fortune's Hotel Room

When the bunch of us go out on scouting trips, we often don't make hotel reservations. I know that we should, especially on weekends like this when it's a holiday weekend for almost all of the weekend, but -- knock wood -- we've never had trouble. So even though we know that Toledo is going to be busy, I don't bother making a hotel reservation before we leave because there are only two of us, and there's always somewhere for us to stay.

We leave Aranjuez just after 11.15, and ride out towards the Tagus River, on a slightly ratty secondary highway which, blissfully, doesn't have much traffic. The ride between Aranjuez and Toledo is something thaty I've been wanting to solve for a while - it looks like it should be a fairly easy trip, but because of the way farm land has been settled in the Sagra Valley, it's not easy to follow the course of the Tagus and make a straight trip between both towns - let alone cross the Tagus and follow the river down to Toledo.

Generally speaking, it's not hard to follow the trails. The path rolls along the old rail line for most of the distance, which makes navigation easy. The only problem is how to get across the Tagus River, since there aren't a lot of and while we could take a hand-barge to cross the Tagus, the thing doesn't come with any kind of instructions. At times like these, it's best to go with your gut instinct and trust your tripas: If it looks too good to be true, it probably is.

But then sometimes you just have to let yourself be persuaded, which is what we do when we get to Mocejón. The owner of the Tic-Tac Café is intrigued at the sight of us travelling by bike, and asks where we're headed. Toledo, we say. Got a place for the night? No, not really. Mocejón isn't that far from Toledo; is there any place to stay there? He pulls out a cellphone, rings up one of the hostales in town and half an hour later, we're in a small (but VERY well cared-for) hotel. True, that leaves us with a twelve-kilometre ride before we get to Toledo tomorrow, but we'll manage.

Bedtime! (Part 2)

Over the past couple of days, I've been getting in touch with the managers of the various hotels, hostels and campsites where we'll be staying along the Trans-Iberian Express. I won't provide a day-by-day breakdown here, since it's not like the options are totally that different, but to give you an idea of what's available where, here's how the nights break down according to category.

YOUTH HOSTELS: Irún (March 21st and 22nd, just before we leave;) San Sebastián (Day 1 - March 23rd); Pamplona (Day 4 - March 26th); Estella (Day 5 - March 27th); Burgo de Osma (Day 11 - April 2nd); Toledo (Day 18 - April 9th); and Jaén (Days 24 and 25 - April 15th and 16th).

CAMPSITES: Lekunberri, Navarra (Day 3 - March 25th); Estella (if we can't get into the youth hostel on Day 5 - March 27th); Fuenmayor, La Rioja (Day 6 - March 28th), Haro, La Rioja (Days 7 and 8), Retortillo de Soria, Soria (Day 12 - April 3rd), Aranjuez (Days 16 and 17 - April 7 and 8), Arcos de la Frontera (Day 30 - April 22nd), Medina Sidonia (Day 31 - April 22rd), Zahara de los Atunes (Day 32 - April 23th) and Tarifa (Day 33 - April 24th).

Keep in mind that most of the towns we'll be staying in also have some kind of hotel or hostal, so if you're not into the idea of camping, there's usually another kind of alternative.

HOTELS, HOSTALES AND OTHER PRIVATE ACCOMMODATION: We've got several options in the following places: Atapuerca, Burgos (Day 9 - March 31); Salas de los Infantes (Day 10 - April 1st); Brihuega (Day 14 - April 5th); Estremera (Day 15 - April 6th); Consuegra (Day 19 - April 10); Castellar de Santiago, Ciudad Real (Day 21 - April 12); Aldeaquemada, Jaén (Day 22 - April 13th); Úbeda, Jaén (Day 23 - April 14th), Luque (Day 26 - April 17); Puente-Genil (Day 27 - April 18); Osuna (Day 28 - April 19); and Coripe (Day 29 - April 20).

The great question is what we're going to do in Andoain, just south of San Sebastian. When I was planning the route, I wasn't aware that Andoain is famous for only having one hotel, and unless we can make some kind of arrangement to stay in the sports centre or some kind of rural tourism centre, we may have to give Andoain a pass. Hopefully the Consorcio of the Plazaola Vía Verde can help us find a solution!

Bedtime! (Part 1)

One of the biggest concerns that potential participants have - rightly enough - is where we're going to sleep. So that's been this week's project: find the beds and the places where we're going to stay.

In planning where we would sleep, there were two problems: first of all, guaranteeing that there would be beds or places to sleep when we got there; and, secondly, making sure that there was as much of a variety of places to stay as possible.

Campsites and youth hostels give us the greatest amount of flexibility; if it should come to pass that the group gets really big, we know that, in most places, we won't have a problem getting everyone a place to sleep for the night. But there are limitations. Not everybody is crazy about camping, and there are going to be some days when people are going to want the comfort of a warm bed and a hot shower after a hard day's riding.

At the same time, none of us is made of money. Being on the road for an entire month is going to mean spending at least €350 on places to stay (and that's being conservative.) So there'll be a need to keep costs down, as well as being able to cook for ourselves. No one is going to want to survive on restaurant food every day. There's nothing like being able to cook for yourself while you're on the road, and staying in campsites and youth hostels will give us a better chance of cooking our own meals.

So what I've done is try to get a good mix of places and options. Where possible, we'll stay in campsites; and it's worth noting that any town that's big enough to have a campsite will have other accommodation options, so you're not obliged to sleep outside if you don't want to. In Sunday's post, I'll set out the options that we've got, and where we'll be staying when.

We're Out There!

Great news: articles have started appearing in the press about the Trans-Iberian Advenutre, including a feature on the website of Canada's PEDAL Magazine (http://www.pedalmag.com/index.php?module=Section&action=viewdetail&item_id=12041).

We're also featured in the November edition of SPORT LIFE (www.sportlife.es), a Spanish magazine dedicated to health and wellness; this will be followed up by a four- to five-page report on the Trans-Iberian in SPORT LIFE WOMAN, in May of 2008.

And Bicycling Australia's planning to carry something in their mag about the trip, too, which will be VERY cool.

Slowly but surely, word's getting out there!

The judge speaks!

One of the most exciting things about taking part in SALOMON WOMEN WILL is getting the experience to work with - and hear from - other women adventurers who dedicate their lives to exploring the world. For Spanish climbers, Araceli Segarra needs no introduction: She was the first Spanish woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest, and is known as one of the world's foremost mountaineers. Back in May, she did an interview with SALOMON about the challenges and joys of women in the world of active tourism:

You've spent many years being one of the best Spanish alpinists. Do mountains now signify devotion or obligation for you?
AS: My aim's always been to work as little as possible, in order to climb as much as possible. It's an authentic calling for me: climbing and travelling.

When did you first know that you were made for mountaineering?
AS- Truth is, I don't know that I even know that now. I never had a revelation; day by day, I got here in a fairly organic way. Living, for me, is doing what you really love, even though that means that you've got to be brave.

Do your upcoming projects demand bravery?
AS- Within a month [June 2007] I'm going to return to Everest to do another film for IMAX. The first was in 1996, during that expedition which will always be a special for me, although the goal that time wasn't to reach the summit.

[Gratuitous comment from Patricia: Whatever you do, DON'T miss Jon Krakauer's classic retelling of that fateful May in 1996, "Into Thin Air". She was too modest to say it during this interview, but the members of the IMAX team - including Ed Viesturs, David Brashears and Araceli - put their own summit attempt in jeopardy to help bring the injured climbers down off the mountain. ]

What words do you have for young women who have fallen in love with mountains?
AS- Enjoy it, and to enjoy it, remember that you don't have to go to Lapland or Madagascar. There are an infinite number of adventures to be had in the Pyrenees and the Alps. You can be a good mountaineer right near your own home; it simply consists of enjoying outdoor sports. .

Has being a woman been a help or a handicap during your career?
AS- It's never posed a problem for me. I climb with a lot of guys, and they see me as a fellow climber and a friend who likes to go up rock. But I always try to be realistic and I don't make things difficult for myself by going beyond my limits. That's what keeps you out of trouble - for both men and women.

Finally, what did being the first woman to summit Everest give to you personally?
AS- Some good things and some bad things. Among the good things is that I've always been clear that, in terms of mountaineering, my feat didn't break any barriers, given that I did it with bottled oxygen. It's just that, at that moment, our objective was to bring an IMAX camera to the top of the world. We accomplished that, and the 1996 film is proof of that. That was good, as is being the first woman to do something to help more people get inspired - and when we're talking about women, that is something very positive. I also put a lot of value on how communication works, and that I put in my two cents when it comes to demystifying the danger that the media always sticks to mountaineering. It's not really as dangerous as they say - I'm just saying!

The downside is that I've been labelled "Everest Girl" and my life in sport is a lot more wide-ranging than that. I do a lot of different things with different levels of ability. I don't want anyone to put me on a pedestal, just so that I can fall down later. I'm not trying to sell anything and I believe that words are worth their weight in gold - that's why I always try to put the truth first.

(Big thanks to Toti Rosselló for letting us re-print his interview with Araceli.)

We have beds! (Part I)

Good news on the accommodation front. I just heard from María at Camping Aralar, located in Lekunberri, Navarra (where we'll be staying the night of Wednesday, March 26th). The campsite is not typically open during the work week out of season, but María has confirmed that they'll be happy to open up the campsite for us so that we have a place to stay. They're going to put us up in the refuge (cost: €9.83) that night - it's just as expensive as the campsite itself, and will probably be a lot warmer.

The only catch is that we have to confirm ONE MONTH BEFORE (which means letting them know by February 26th, 2008.) I will make a reservation for six people (the minimum amount) but if you want to stay there, please let me know as soon as possible, so that we can have beds for everyone.

TRANS-IBERIAN, now on FACEBOOK.COM

A piece of news for those of you who use the FACEBOOK (http://www.facebook.com) website: I've now created an English-language FACEBOOK group, so that people who are interested in the trip can keep up to date on the latest developments.

All you need to do is search for Trans-Iberian Express under "Groups" and send me a message, and I'll put you in the group. Be sure to let me know if you'll be able to take part, or if you're just curious to see how things are going along!

Straight Shot

Eighty kilometres seems like a very long distance to do in one day, but when most of the trip is downhill, it's a lot better. We left Brihuega going down a sweet series of hairpin turns to join the valley of the Tajuña River, which is going to take us all the way back down to Madrid.

It's a gorgeous day - the sky an incredibly deep royal blue which looks even more blue when juxtaposed with the bright yellows of the poplar tres which line the Tajuña. The day starts off cool, but warms up enough that, by the end of the day, we all end up with sunburns on our noses. The route takes us past two dozen attractive, historical villages; it's a shame that we don't have time to visit them all, because it doesn't seem fair that we should have to choose one over the other.

The further south we go, the more the valley opens up, and by the time we reach the N320 highway, the Tajuna lies at the bottom of a low canyon, bounded by wheat fields on each side. We stop for lunch at a small town close to the Madrid-Guadalajara border; the afternoon's riding was totally seamless, one of those days when you could go on riding and pedalling forever if the sunlight let you. And then we hit the first big problem: finding a place to sleep.

The Spanish greenways guidebook says that there are four places to sleep: two in the town of Ambite, one in Orusco de Tajuña, as well as a youth hostel in Carabaña. Turns out that the Carabaña youth hostel is just that - no one over 30 - and the hostales in Orusco and Ambite closed years ago. Which leaves us with a hotel in Tielmes whose name I won't mention.

The hotel itself is not bad if you've got money, but it's very surprising to find out that there are so few options along the way. The hotel is NOT cheap; they do have cabins for rent, but they're not good value for the money, and the three of us are woken up several times during the night by drunken wedding guests trying to find their way into bed. I was hoping that the existence of the Vía Verde would motivate more tourism initiatives in the area, but this doesn't seem to be the case....

Lovely Alternatives

Friday, 12 October 2007: Guadalajara to Brihuega, 45 km
Sometimes, when your nightmares come true, it seems to make them go away for the future. I know that missing a train hardly qualifies as a nightmare, but when I was standing on Platform 15 of Chamartín Station, watching the train to the town to Arcos de Jalón pull away, I couldn't think of anything else. Announcements had told us that the train was leaving from Platform 5. My Spanish is good enough that I would NOT confuse those two numbers. And even though we ran like a pair of maniacs, we missed the train.

The first exploration trip to check out the Trans-Iberian route was not getting off to a good start!

In the end, it worked out well. Not only because we missed having to do a lot of highway riding, but because we found a great way of getting around the Alcarria region. The idea behind the Trans-Iberian is to find quiet roads that allow cyclists to travel around Spain, and we found a number of good options that would make a fun cycling weekend around Madrid.

After filling ourselves with coffee, we rode off and followed the CM101 highway up to the turnoff to Tórtola de Henares, a small bedroom community northeast of Guadalajara city. It seems to have a charming centre, but it's hard to tell, what with all the new construction creeping up the sides of the hills around town. We then headed north on the CM1003 regional road - and did well for the first 500 metres - until the highway ran out! The regional government was a third of the way through rebuilding the road, which left us with five or six kilometres of rough gravel riding. Nothing unusual, for having grown up in Eastern Ontario, but it still wasn't pleasant. Gonzalo, our resident public works expert, didn't think much of the road.

The next, best option was to head through the towns of Ciruelas and Cañizar, where we stopped for lunch. It seems like most small towns in Guadalajara province that have more than a couple of hundred residents have, at least, two important monuments: a bar and a church. That's how we came up with our first rule: When in doubt, we'll meet at the first bar or the church, whichever one we come across first. After a quick lunch (including a delicious salad of tomatoes, garlic, cumin seeds and thyme), we set off, did a quick climb up out of the Henares Valley, and set off towards Brihuega.

Brihuega itself is a cute little town, very green and historic, but one thing became very clear very quickly: They're definitely not used to cycle tourists in this part of the country. The clerk at the hostal where we stayed gladly took our money and booked us in - and two minutes later, the owner of the place came out and started whining that no one had told him that we would be bringing bicycles.

I calmly pointed out that, when I'd booked the room the night before, I had told the clerk on duty that we would be arriving by bicycle, so it wasn't like they weren't informed. He grudgingly accepted the bicycles and told us to put them in the salon, but not before he complained that the other guests would have to look at the bicycles. (Later, I took a look at the cubby holes where the keys were kept - only four of the thirty rooms were occupied!)

We didn't last very long that night. We had a couple of glasses of wine, some platos combinados of fried eggs, chips and grilled red peppers, and were in bed before ten o'clock - a good thing, considering that Saturday promised to be a very long day, indeed.

Great stuff!! (Now get back to work.)

Oh, NO. Like I needed another way of wasting time and not getting stuff done:

http://sigpac.mapa.es/fega/visor/

This is a great combination of three different kinds of maps - road map, Army map and Google Earth-style map all in one website. It's totally free to use; you can't save the maps, unfortunately, but there are no restrictions to printing individual pages.

Enjoy!

And be warned - you don't get kicked off the website after a set period of time.

Yes, it's nice. No, you can't have it.

I'm a map freak. I have no problems admitting it. I can do a fair amount of damage in any bookshop, given enough free time and money; but put a selection of maps in there, and you can't get my butt out of there, even if there were a five-alarm fire burning the joint down.

I have most of the maps for the Trans-Iberian Express, but the one thing I don't have is the map for the Ruta Natural de los Dos Bahias, which links the Bay of Cádiz with the Bay of Algeciras, just to the west of Gibraltar. Or, better said, I did have it - but after two years and moving house once, I don't even remember if I still have it or if it was one of the many things that I chucked when I moved.

A quick Google search revealed that the Diputación de Cádiz (the regional authority) had published a book about the trail, but the first printing was sold out. I fired off an e-mail, asking if a second edition was coming out. And then I got the phone call.

For some reason, the automatic answering machine on my phone hasn't been activated, so I ended up playing phone tag with the representative of InfoCádiz. When I finally got ahold of him, the conversation went something like this:

Me: "Hi there. I'm calling about your guide to the Ruta de los Dos Bahías."

Mr. InfoCádiz: "Ah, yes. It's a shame about that book."

"A shame?"

"It's sold out."

"I understand that. Will there be a second edition of the book?"

"No, and it's a shame, because it's a really nice book. The guy who wrote the book got a grant from the Diputación de Cádiz to write it, but they wouldn't pay for a second edition, and he didn't want to pay for it, so... no more book."

"I see."

"And it's a real shame, because it was a great book. It had great information for people who wanted to do the route by car, on foot, riding a horse. And yes, I guess on bikes, as well."

"But I can't buy it."

"No one wants to pay for a second printing."

"Do you have any idea of where I could get another copy?"

"You may want to call the central switchboard of the Diputación de Cádiz and ask to speak to someone there. There's probably someone there who can tell you what you need to know."

And he rang off.

True, it was very generous of him to call to let me know. But I'm kind of confused as to why he went to so much trouble to try to sell a book that can't be purchased.....!

First of many sleepless nights

I'm not particularly fond of doing work on Sundays, but this weekend, I couldn't help it. What with the excitement checking out routes, alternatives and everything that had to be done, my brain just kept going and going and going and going.... which made for a very sleepless night last night.

I don't know why I couldn't stop thinking about the route. Too much caffeine, maybe. But I literally sat awake last night and sweated about what I should do about the section that goes through the Sierra de la Demanda.

The problem is that I don't know when exactly I'm leaving. I don't know if I'm going to do the Trans-Iberian in two parts (one section right after Christmas, the other during and the week after Semana Santa) or all in one go (leave on Palm Sunday and then return to Madrid on May 5th.) In either case, it's going to mean doing the trip during the late winter - early spring, when the snow is still thick up in the Sierra de la Demanda. It is possible to get around the Sierra, but it'd mean a 200-kilometre detour to get around the Sierra, which adds another three or four days to the route, which is already a month long.

And I kept lying awake, thinking, heavens - at the end of the day, it's ONLY a bike ride........!

Picking a Route

Logistically, picking a route that goes from the north of Spain to the extreme south should be a piece of cake; it should be a straight shot right down the middle of the peninsula, from one end to the other. When I originally envisioned the route, I thought about what the easiest way would be to get from north to south without having to deal with too much traffic.

In fact, it hasn't been that easy. I call it the Moncho Test; Moncho Dávila(pictured right), the designer responsible for the Spanish Cyclepaths (http://www.spanishcyclepaths.com/) website, just had a baby. His girlfriend, Marta, isn't as avid a cyclist as he is, so going on a biking trip for them posing several challenges. They need to find a route which isn't too hilly or too hard to ride; after all, only one of the three of them is an experienced cyclist who likes hills. Infrastructure is important: they can't be that far away from hotels and places to eat. And it's gotta be fun. Dedicated cycle tourists don't mind kilometres and kilometres of boring sights, since they know that, eventually, something cool will come up. Not everyone is that patient.

So when it came to deciding on the route, I decided that it would be much more appealing to set a route that followed simple guidelines:

a) Does it keep you away from major roads? After all, a ride isn't enjoyable if you're worried that you're going to get dinged from behind.

b) Is it going to take you to places that you wouldn't normally go to if you were travelling by car? Sure, the supposed advantage of having a car means that you should be able to go where you want. But many times, we focus so much on reaching our destinations that we don't think about the fun stuff to see along the way. The Trans-Iberian goes through and by some of the most important - and least visited - sights in Spain. That doesn't mean that the route goes through the middle of nowhere - but it's a great way to get away from the tourist trail and see some beautiful art, architecture and areas.

c) Can you use public transit to get there and back? There are two reasons for this: first of all, relatively few people are going to have five weeks to do the entire route - they're much more likely to do a weekend here, a week there. The second reason: taking a bike in a car is a lot more hassle than taking a bike on public transit. That's not to say that taking a bike on a bus or train in Spain is easy. It's a lot nicer than having to plan a circular route that takes you back to your car (which could get broken into while you're away) or having to worry about whether your bike(s) will fit into your vehicle.

d) Does it use already-existing green tourism infrastructure and facilities? I love rail trails, the Camino de Santiago and transhumance routes, but it's always surprised me that no one has thought to connect them on a national level and create a national system. Until I win the lottery and can afford to put up signage all over the nation (and that's going to be a long time coming, I suppose) there's no reason why the route can't incorporate infrastructure that's already there.

So those were the four criteria I used when thinking about the route. Stay tuned to find out how the route's evolving and where we'll eventually go in March of 2008.

NOW THE WORK BEGINS!

I remember the first moment when the thought of doing a Trans-Iberian route came up.

Two years ago, my buddy Scott and I were biking along the Via Verde de la Sierra, east of Seville and north of Málaga, and we were marvelling at how great it was to use a bicycle route where there were no cars, no traffic, no noise – just the sound of the Guadalete River and the wind in the trees. And I said to Scott: Wouldn’t it be great to have a national system of routes like this one, routes where you could get across the country and be able to ride like this, not having to continually look over you shoulder to make sure you’re not going to get hit from behind or honked at, a system of routes that would allow you to spend days on end riding without a care, where you could just pedal and think about your next meal and where you were going to sleep, and not have to worry about anything else.

The idea never really went away, especially as I watched the system of different nature routes grow and develop, but never really connect. Sometimes they would incorporate different parts of other systems – the Ruta del Quijote has a chunk or two of rail trails, for example – but there didn’t seem to be any willingness or initiative to tie all of the systems together so that people could use them to take longer trips.

Well, it’s happening now. I got the call this morning from the wonderful people at Salomon Sports Spain, who told me that I’m the national winner of the Spring-Summer 2007 edition of Salomon Women Will – Live Your Dream competition. The dream is now a reality: To the best of my knowledge, this effort – called the Trans-Iberian Express – is the first effort to tie together several existing systems to create the first route that can take cycle tourists across the Iberian peninsula. At the end of the process, Spain will have its first north-south route, fully marked and documented route that will allow people who want to travel by bike to head directly from north to south. Better yet, this route doesn’t require you to use a car to get there or back: the route has been specifically designed so that you can make the most of the good public transit connections that exist throughout the country.

So stay tuned and join us on the Trans-Iberian express!