Sandy's Blog

The last week or so I have been mountain biking over in Spain with Freeride Spain. Cheap, direct flights ~£160 + £30 for the bike, £300 all in (accommodation, food, guiding, transfers, banter) and about £100 spending money - which was pretty comfortable.

after ~800m of uphill on the last day - The “is my camera working?” look

Most of the earlier rides were not extremely difficult, the group I was with were of very mixed ability so I fitted right into about the middle of the pack - although I was the only one on a hardtail. The first day it rained which suited me just fine, when everyone else was cursing and swearing at the rain and wind - I was right at home, and also really appreciated the additional grip that the wet terrain provided. Got to the bottom first a few times too (well, after the guide) which was really cool!

Playground - you don’t get a sense of scale or how nadgery it was!

In general it was a very mixed week for me, had some good days and bad days, and the harder rides towards the end of the week really did knock my confidence, I concede. I knew the Granada ride was beautiful, but also extremely scary. The singletrack climb is very committal - if you are not “on it” you will be stopping and pushing a fair bit. I having an ok day but still was very difficult. Think a corner with a rocky off-camber step up, and a huge drop to the left.

Going down sir! This was quite steep - need a wide angle lens

Got to the top in one piece though, it was just the guide (James) on a hardtail and another guest (Rob) on a £3k Turner full suspension bike. The next bit was really good for me, tight corners through woods and such a blast! We eventually get to lots of rocky contouring singletrack (mostly downhill). Again a bit hit and miss for me, although I gave it a damn good shot. Two over the bars crashes and a complete bail, and all I have to show for it is a 2cm scratch! (Thank god). Touch wood I seem to be reasonably good at crashing.

I’m going to have to practice big (> 1ft) step ups, the guide was really really good and proved to me its not all fancy bike and suspension! Definitely food for thought, thats for sure.

Lanjarón - The mountain town where I stayed

Was practicing the lingo at every opportunity too, I’m convinced that a few mistakes were made, but I was surprised how smooth everything was going with a very basic grasp of the language. I needed my dictionary to change money at the bank, but everything else was sweet! Aye.