Day 36: Moraira (Ciclo)

Only one photo today, so I thought I'd get it over and done with! It would appear that the zero degree of longitude passes through this piece of ornate signage that can be found on the way into the village of "Llosa".

I did have a longer route planned but, due to early morning inclement weather the day's ride was shorted to 76 kilometres.

An aim of today's ride was to cycle on some roads I'd either not cycled on before or, I would be cycling in the opposite direction to that which I'd previously cycled them.

Well, it turned out that some of those roads, meeting the aforementioned criteria, had in fact been cycled by me. But, obviously I had not realised I had done so! That is, not until I was actually on the road and I'd seen a familiar landmark. So obviously I must have previously ridden on that road.

I believe that this is due to not being conscious of where you are located alone a route at any point in time, which often is as a consequence of riding routes that someone else has planned, in this instance Lynn, rather than routes you yourself have planned. The problem with "blindly" riding someone else's route is that it is all to easy to simply follow the route without having a true or conscious sense of where you are geographically. It is only when you recognise a landmark or a particular feature about the road that you come to realise that you've been here before!

In previous years I have mostly followed Lynn's routes without paying proper attention to the routes themselves, I just remembered key locations such as the climbs and descents of summits, some coffee and lunch stops and, the odd favourite scenic section of road. However, I do now feel that having planned and cycled my own routes from Denia and Moraira I have a much better sense of place in this area of Costa Blanca.

Today was not a deja vu kind of day, but instead, an "at some time in the past I have definitely cycled this or that road because I recognise this or that landmark or feature whereas just a minute ago I thought I was cycling it for the first time" kind of day!

Distance driven: 0
Distance cycled: 76 kilometres
Weather: When I awoke at about 8.15am and looked out of the window of my van the ground was wet and the skies were overcast. I rolled over and went back to sleep. When I eventually woke up again at 9.30am things were brightening up, so I got up. Eventually, having had breakfast etc and modified my route I started cycling at about 11am. The skies were blue and the temperature was about 12°C. By about 1pm the sun was becoming more frequently obscured by clouds and it felt cooler. It did not rain.

Today's route: