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In Which I Pick The Wrong Day To Do The Washing
March 19, 2008 by Mike
Tarifa
Four-and-a-half months since I arrived in Tarifa and I finally got round to riding back to Cadiz - 60 short miles up the coast and a city I by-passed way back when in the rush to get here and see my friends.
Quite apart from ticking it off on my metaphorical list -- and Cadiz is a city wedged on a promontory almost completely surrounded by the sea, according to the map, so one I wouldn't want to miss -- I had important business in town.
Sir Francis Drake sacked the Spanish fleet in Cadiz in 1587. Or, in his own words, he "singed the King of Spain's beard." I have no idea why this has stuck with me for so long. I may have a History degree, but the last time I studied Elizabethan England I must have been about eight years old.
(That's a gratuitous link to a cute picture of yr correspondent aged about eight. If you don't coo over babies, look away now.)
(And no, thanks for asking, I may not be in the first flush of youth, but that doesn't mean, suggest or imply that I was eight years old when Drake was busy singeing.)
Whatever the reason, here I am, and as a mark of my dedication to history, to the trip and to this blo-- I mean diary, I've even grown a beard 'specially for the occasion. So that I can singe it, as a mark of apology and reconciliation with the good people of Cadiz:
(Note the smoke... but you'll have to wait for the YouTube video to see this moment in all its painful glory.)
Only thing is, the whole escapade was a wash out. I left Tarifa in bright sunshine, not to mention in t-shirt and lightweight summer biker jacket. 60 miles to Cadiz? The last 20 were damp - more to the point, the last 10 were cataclysmic. Torrential. Biblical.
I also managed to hook up with the thunderous rainstorm which decided to follow me south down the coast all the way from Cadiz to Tarifa.
And today is the day I stuck my rainproofs in the wash and left them hanging on the line -- in bright sunshine, remember -- while I tootled off up the road.
I haven't been rained on that much on a bike since crossing the Paraguay border and heading into southern Brazil in 2001. And no I'm not a name-dropper: it's been months since I published the picture of me meeting legendary soul (and Osmonds) producer Rick Hall:
Sad to say after so much time in the area, that this will be my one visit to Cadiz. My philosophy, and Kevin Keegan, not to mention Mike Walker would surely agree, is that you can never go back. I've passed it.. on this trip at least.. and I prefer not to retrace my steps. (It worked once -- thrillingly -- when I found Asterix's little village we know so well back in Brittany.
But never say never. I can't leave and resume my trip without seeing Cabo de Trafalgar, which is roughly halfway between Cadiz and Tarifa. I'm a Norfolk boy and rather more proud of Horatio Nelson than I might expect. Today I was *so* cold, *so* wet and *so* far from home that I couldn't bring myself to stop off. Besides, any pictures or video would have shown blankets of rain and nothing else. Can't have that.
So.. hopefully.. I'll be off oop north again in the next day or so.
--
nb. I could have made a fortune if I'd video'd myself getting out of my sopping wet biker clothes. There's people who'd pay good money for that kind of thing. Especially if I included the squelching sound as I stepped out of my boots. Eeeee-yuck.
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By tryphoon | March 25, 2008 3:35 PM
Trafalgar? What is that? Never heard of it? Another urban myth?!?! And who is that Nelson dude?! Is he famous? Never saw anything about him in my (French) history books...