Lisbon (Portugal) to Kent Via Santander

[robgraham61]

HI Everyone,

In June 2009 I'm sailing a yacht from Plymouth to Lisbon, Portugal, and I'm trying to work out if it is feasible to cycle back to Kent Via Santander in Spain within one week. There are a lot of logistics to work out, and I was hoping to get some feed back from the more experienced folk out there, as this will be my first attempt at anything like this.

Here is some of the tasks I need to work out:

1. ROUTE: I only have 1 X week to complete the ride as I will have used up 2 weeks of my holiday entitlement sailing to Portugal, so the route will have to planned accordingly.
As I only have 1 X week, do I travel light and stay in hostels etc along the way instead of camping (which is what I would have prefered to have done). If so then the route has to be planned with accommodation in mind.

2. BIKE TRANSFER: I will need to work out how to ship my cycle gear down to Lisbon and find somewhere to store it until my arrival.

3. SAILING EQUIPMENT TRANSFER: I will need to send home my sailing clothing / gear etc once I leave the yacht. This shouldn't be a problem as I could arrange a courier service to get it back home.

I realise there is probably a lot more to plan but I thought I would just post these for now and see how it goes.

Many thanks in advance for any info given.

Cheers Rob

 

[alicat]

Do you mean you are going to get the ferry back from Santander? If you're intending to cycle all the way it doesn't sound doable at 180m a day!

Is there any room on the yacht to store your cycling gear? How much sailing specific gear will you have? Could you keep it to a minimum and cycle bakc with it?

 

[MarkF]

Good luck Rob.

My first thoughts are that it's too much for one week, tis for me anyway It's hilly too, you are not going to see/enjoy anything even if you take the shortest, noisiest, traffic loaded route. I have cycled along the Cantabrian and Asturian coast, it's wonderful, why not take the train part way and enjoy yourself?

Alternatively, head for the Asturian coast and if you struggle for time then there is a twice daily train to Santander.

Wish I was going.

 

[jay clock]

I read it as cycling all the way back to Kent...it works at at 300km per day for 7 days, so for most people that is a definite no.

If you meant Santander, it works out as 120km per day for 7 days. Spain is the hilliest country in Europe so that is very demanding but do-able

 

[robgraham61]

Hi Guys, Thanks for the replies.

The idea is to get the ferry from Santander and then a train from Portsmouth.
There is no room on the yacht for any of my cycling gear as it is only a 38ft yacht, so I will need to find a way of getting it from the Uk and also finding somewhere to store it in Lisbon.
I don't think there will be a problem getting my sailing gear back to the UK.
Thanks Mark for the tip about the Cantabrian and Asturian coast, i will bear them in mind.

 

[alicat]

Lisbon to Santander sounds much more feasible than Lisbon to Kent!

I think it would be very expensive to ship your bike to Lisbon and there is the risk of it getting damaged. Have you thought of buying one in Lisbon and selling it when you get home?

 

[Percy]

Lisbon to Santander, as others have said, would be a push in 7 days.

Route plotting looks an interesting task - taking a crow-flies route would take you through some very demanding terrain (the Mountains in Eastern Portugal, not to mention the Picos (although I've not cycled through the Picos - there might be relatively easy valley routes)). The alternative is a coast-based route, but even then, with a quick glance of the map, you're looking at a pretty serious 7 days.

I've ridden roughly (the other way round) Santander - Gijon - Ribadeo - Lugo - Ourense - coast - Porto, (then I headed East as part of a bigger trip), and it was wonderful but I wouldn't fancy trying to do it in 7 days.

Camping is possible but if you wanted to hostel/hotel to keep things simple there would be plenty of places to stay and you wouldn't have to book ahead - assuming there's no major festival on in particular towns etc.

 

[robgraham61]

Thanks for the input Guys.

On the face of things it certainly does look as if I was being a bit too ambitious, but as I'm a complete novice when it comes to cycle touring I think I can allow myself the odd crazy thought.

Alicat, I like the idea of trying to buy a bike in Lisbon or maybe there might be a way of renting a bike, and if the shop also had another branch further along the route I could return it to that shop instead of returning it all the way to Lisbon (I like being optimistic). I will look on line in the Lisbon area and see what comes up.

MarkF made a good point when he suggested cycling part of the route and getting a train on part of the route to enable "enjoyment", that then gives me another option.

Percy, I will have a look on the map at the route you took and also see how much of that can be done in the time period.

If only there were more than twenty four hours in the day, just think of all the possibilities.

 

[pdiaz]

As others have said, Spain is very hilly, specially the North. You can look up some altitude profiles of the trip we did in summer to convince yourself
http://www.pedrodiaz.com/cycling/spain2008.php

As far as I know if you want to go from Lisbon to Santander in a more or less straight line you will have to cross the same mountains we did. It was amazing, but hard hard hard

Pedro

 

[robgraham61]

HI Guys,

I have found a cycle hire shop in Lisbon that will supply me with all the gear that is needed. They will even arrange to have it all collected from where ever I decide to finish (not sure how much it will cost me yet).

I need to work out a route that will take into account the fact that I only have a week to ride, as others have so rightly said I will need to do part of the journey by train, but I can live with that.

All suggestions most welcome

 

[jay clock]

I did Porto to Santiago in a week - could have done more as we pottered somewhat. You can fly to UK from Santiago. See here http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/santiago and here for another trip to Portugal www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/portugal

 

[ASC1951]

That's one hell of a bike shop! I suspect it will be arm + leg + very hefty deposit.

What would put me off that option would be getting exactly the fit and set-up that you want. Little adjustments that on your own bike you would have ironed out ages ago will make that sort of distance on a not-quite-right bike very tough going.

My suggestion would be to Google a bike shop in Santander and get them to courier your bike back home at the end. Good bike shops whizz their products around all over the place, including cross-border. Trouble is, you would have to get your bike out to Lisbon first, and in plenty of time so that you knew it had arrived before you set off....oh, dear, this is all getting rather difficlut.

Don't overlook buses for cutting out short bits. A lot of medium range transport in rural Europe is by bus, proper coach types with holds you can put a bike into after appropriate Portuguese/Spanish shrugs from the driver.

 

[jay clock]

I tend to agree that the bike shop sounds too good to be true. I would want to know EXACTLY the model of bike etc and what gearing. Simple things like heel clearance on the panniers. If flat barred, what type of bar ends? All sorts of things....