Jan 20: Elevated and disinclined
I’ve broken the route into 9 sections, if all goes well there’s one per week.
Southern section
Here’s what the first part of the route looks like, weeks 1-3.
There’s a lot of mountains on that route; I hesitate to use the words “deliberate” or “sadistic” or “the route setter didn’t get enough love as a child” but it looks like there could be smoother routes across the country. The theme of the European Divide is avoiding main roads - maybe the result is that it’s all hills? But unresolved parenting issues also fit the facts so well. We can only speculate.
The highlight is the highest part, which is just below the word “Southern”. It gets to 2km up - it’s roughly in the center of the elevation profile below. That’s going to be sweaty.
Elevation profile for the first three weeks.
There’s a few other good climbs before and after. And look out for the spike on the far right, this is roughly on the border just as you leave Spain, where the Pyrenees throw in a coquettish little 600m climb so you’ll remember the time together.
How bad can it be, right? I have a feeling this is one of those things that I’ll look back on and wonder how innocent I once was.
Central section
The next three weeks make up the central section.
This part is a lot tamer; the Southern part looks like it’s going to be the hardest. You might think that the route is deliberately following mountain ranges. Well, I can’t see another explanation.
The elevation profile (below) looks just as jaggy but the peak is 1400m not 2000m so it’s easier.
Elevation profile of the Central section.
The big climbs are all in France, and the most exciting one is the first 1200m climb (at the 200km mark) which I look forward to complaining about afterward.
The route gets flatter and faster in the second half, which is good, because it’s most likely that there will be some time to be made up!
Dear Future Hugh: how was I to know?
The Northern section is about as good as you could hope - well away from the mountains. There’s a few steep climbs - especially the one at 1100km - but they look negligible in comparison with the high drama of the first section…
Elevation profile of the Northern section
The challenge for this part will be managing the long gaps between villages. You need to be self-supporting for sections of 200km. On the plus side the average speed should be much higher; the routes have good surfaces and are fairly flat. But even so, there’s going to be quite a few nights out camping.
But this route is tough, and maybe I won’t be anywhere close to the times I’m hoping for - maybe I won’t make it out to the Northern part. Even if that happens, it’s still 9 weeks bikepacking; we’ll just see how it goes!
Until then I’m going to worry about Spanish mountains.
