Bilbao - Valence

After three nights in Bilbao i could finally break away from this amazing city and its wonderful people. With only five hours of sleep i went on to Zarautz were i slept in an "albuerge" for pilgrims who are on the  Camino de Santiago de Compostela. 

On the way

On the next day, 2nd of August, i passed San Sebastian after climbing a huge mountain.

On the way to San Sebastian

San Sebastian

And then it was already time to cross the boarder with France. First i wanted to sleep in my tent somewhere in the forest but then i was so tired that i decided to go to the youthhostel in Anglet. They also had a Camping so i put my tent there.

The street was never as flat as on the next day. I followed the river Adour and it was just amazing! I slept again in a pilgrim hostel. 

The day after it was unfortunately finished with this nice flat roads and i had to cross a lot of little valleys with steep roads. But for the night i found a wonderful place to put my tent and everything was fine.

my bike with plenty of dirt :)

As i wanted to avoid as many mountains as possible i decided to take the canal du midi and then go up the rhone river to geneva. So my next stop was Toulouse where i had a wonderful flat on my on thanks to warmshowers. I didn't see much of the city but what i saw i liked a lot.

On the way to Toulouse

The cycle lane along the canal du midi was just perfect in the beginning but there were a lot of roots and gravel so it was less easy to move on. Once i decided to take the street but there was so much wind against me that i turned back to the canal du midi.

Canal du midi

It was beautiful to cycle along the chanel and evidently it was all flat. In the evening a huge thunder storm came and i got wet because i put my tent to late.
On the next day i met Hildegard in Bezier. I lived with her daughter in Lisbon. Hildegard wanted to join me on my biketrip. So we went together to her sisters house were i could stay two nights. It was all great!
On my rest day we went to the mediterranean.

On the way to the beach

Mediterranean sea

After this rest day, Hildegard and me; we went along nice cycle lanes and sometimes along less nice big streets to Montpellier. There we could sleep again in a really nice house.
On the next day we get up really early to avoid the traffic and the heat. The road was really nice but we had to fight quite a lot against the north wind. We were really happy and tired when we found in the evening a hotel in Venejan.

On the road

Also this morning we got up early and again we had a lot of north wind along the rhone river.

Early in the morning

Rhone river

After a long day we arrived in Valence. This night we stayed in the house of a guy from warmshowers. By chance i also met a friend in Valence and so i decided to stay one day more in this beautiful city.