SOME OBSERVATIONS ABOUT SPAIN, AFTER 16 DAYS AND 925 KMS.

FIRSTLY: We never met a Spaniard we didn't like. Some of them we've liked a lot. The guy who gave us the keys to his hotel. The lady who directed us to the Plaza España in Aguilar, and then followed us and whistled when we missed the turn. The girl in the bar who dropped all her "S's" when she spoke and had the patience of Job when we couldn't understand her, until finally we told her to just bring us whatever she thought we might like for dinner. The guard on the train who took care of us after Grady got us on the wrong train. Josa in Mérida, who introduced us to the english learner/pub crawl group of locals after finding us a hotel in Mérida. The english learner who was a forester, to Daryl's delight. The nurse who patched up Laurie's hacked up finger, and the bike shop owner who opened up his shop late at night to fix our bikes. And on and on - innumerable random acts of kindness, mostly people going out of their way to help us find our's. Wonderful people! All willing to instruct Laurie and Grady on spanish vocabulary and verbs, to play charades with Daryl, or to fulfill Ross's oft repeated request for "an cervaso per favire?

SECONDLY: Resist the urge to book hotels online. The best hotels are those recommended by locals or just stumbled upon by chance. The walk-in price is better than the booked price, especially those booked online. Besides, searching for a hotel is a fun way to see the new town. Only once or twice was a hotel full and in each case it recommended another nearby hotel with availability. A 3 star hostal is better than a 2 star hotel, but usually cheaper. Most hostales are family run and very friendly. Only a small fraction of the available hoteles and hosteles are listed on the internet booking sites.

THIRDLY: Make sure your group is compatible. We had a pretty good idea ours was after all the training rides, but it became clear that give and take was essential and we all took our turn, some just more than others. The trip was an incredible team effort as there were dozens of decisions to be made daily, from which road to take, where to stop for coffee, breakfast, when, how far to travel, where to stay, what to see, and on and on. We made some very good group decisions, like, rotating meal payments after 125€, instead of breaking down bills every meal. Perhaps the " fixed incomer" was judged to having an addition problem on his turn, but otherwise it went very well. Gives you another insight into the difference between assisted cycling tours and independent efforts like ours.

SMOKING: Its really upsetting. So many more people smoke than we're used to in Canada. It seems to be endemic, young, old and in between. Beautiful, sophisticated young women walking down the street, sucking on a cigarette or dropping it, still lit, anywhere it happens to land. We saw some indication that smoking is not allowed in some restaurants and public building, but not many. There are ashtrays everywhere. Its very sad and they really need to work on more education on the evils of smoking.

DRIVERS: Spanish drivers are way more courteous and careful than Canadians, at least with respect to sharing the road with bikes. Wherever possible they pulled way out to pass, slowed down and didn't pass on blind corners, and often gave us friendly toots to make sure we knew they were there.

HEALTH: Except for the smoking Spaniards seem to be pretty healthy. They are not nearly as fat as Canadians, and we saw lots of walkers, joggers and bikers out for exercise. They have good health care from what we saw, lots of health clinics, doctors and pharmacies.

DIET: It takes some getting used to. Breakfast is a coffee latte or sickly sweet hot chocolate, with at most a pastry or toasted bun with jam or, more often, tomato sauce drizzled with olive oil, or pig fat as a pate. Lunch is at 2:00 and is either tapas or the menu del día - 2 courses with bread, dessert and a drink, usually for under 10€. Dinner is at 10:00, and is usually a selection of tapas. We tended to eat a big meal late, and then go straight to bed and writhe around trying to digest it. In the end we learned to just have salad for the late meal. The hard riding and heat tended to quell our appetites, except Ross who was always hungry.

INFRASTRUCTURE: The Spanish road and train system is nothing short of amazing! We were not allowed on the #1 system, the Autovias and Autopistas, but the next ones down, theNationales, are every bit as good as our best and we went all the way down to the south and still found them not only navigable but well signed and close to the road maps. Most were newly paved, with, we surmised, German pavement, with almost no traffic away from the main towns. Trains were used three times and while the Renfe system was staffed with some very blunt autocrats, we soon caught on to the do's and don't and except for the fact that we could not ride the FAST train the whole structure was incredible. In Madrid they have a fabulous Metro system, which is very well used. Once we figured out bikes on escalators, it was a breeze to use, and cheap and fast. In short they have a transportion system we will never see in Canada for economic reasons, and they are still building and we might suggest over-building (good for Bombardier) which may have something to do with the strained Spanish economy. If infrastructure spending is a stimulus, they're sure stimulated.

FAMILY LIFE: We all noted that there appears to be a strong family tie across the generations. The paseo, a stroll through the town center or a local park after the sun goes down, seems to be enjoyed by all age groups, often together. There are lots of young guys strutting their stuff, and girls very effectively advertising their wares, but you see little kids with grandparents, and obvious 3 generational groups everywhere. The kids, even quite small, run loose and seem to have the freedom of the town. Laurie was swarmed by a pack of well over a dozen 10-12 year olds in Mérida when he talked to them about a miniature poodle one had. Not a parent in sight. They wanted Laurie to talk english to them, responding at the top of their lungs, all at once. Most of the school aged kids we talked to had some english, even if they were often too shy to use it.

AGRICULTURE: Some of this we're guessing, but a lot of the south is made up of HUGE farms, extending literally for miles and miles without a break. Its either big agribusiness or rich barons (Dons). The small holdings seem to be confined to the rougher hardscratch country. We saw millions of acres of olive trees, corn and cotton, in that order. The machinery is big and mostly new. John Deere must be doing well. It all seemed highly efficient on a grand scale. In the north there are lots of olives, but also millions of acorn trees that the black pigs graze under. Theres lots of cattle country up north, some devoted to.fighting bulls. Incidently, during our trip Barcelona had its last bullfight before a statewide ban takes effect. Like the church, bull fighting has largely lost its support from the younger educated spanish middle class.

CARS: Lots of small diesel cars, mostly pretty new. No american cars to speak of, and no beaters. Lots of cab-over trucks, virtually none american. Never saw a conventional cab (to us) heavy truck. All the buses are Volvo or Mercedes. Gas and diesel is about 40% more than we pay.

PETS: No street dogs. In the big cities lots of small lap dogs, all well cared for. Big dogs are in the country, usually aggressive and thankfully chained or fenced in. No cats to be seen.

COSTS: Food is cheap as are the hotels. Clothing is about the same as us, and pricey in the big cities. There's lots of big money in Madrid, and business people are better dressed than us. Beer and wine is cheap. Overall, considering we ate out for every meal and stayed in hotels every night, it was a pretty inexpensive vacation. We sure saw a lot of country and met a lot of people, neither of which we would have done on a motoring trip staying in chain hotels.

SUMMARY: Highly recommended way to visit Spain. If you can do it, do it. Sancho is already organizing next years tour. Maybe northern Spain, or Uraguay up the River Platte, or maybe just Banff-Jasper and the Roger's Pass. Stay tuned.......