Day 55: Agost (Drive/Cycle)

I slept in this morning and did not awake until 9am! Probably because I didn't sleep too well last night. Perhaps my conscience was playing havoc with my mind.

Last night I was fractions of a second away from being locked inside the laundaret. This came about due to stubbornness on my behalf, accompanied with a big dollop of a language barrier.

As I understood it, the laundaret was due to close at 9pm. I removed my laundry from the tumble dryer about 8.49pm. Plenty of time, I thought, to fold and pack my laundry by 9pm. However, the women responsible for closing the laundaret was having none of it, insisting I leave immediately.

Believing I was within my rights to finish my laundry packing until 9pm, I was having none of here protestations. What I didn't realise was the closing process was out with her control; it is in fact an automated closing procedure.

Accordingly, as I was just about finished, it was 3 minutes to 9pm, the lights went out and the outside metal security shutters began their descent. Outside there were shouts for me to get out, inside, I threw the last few items of clothing in my bag; ran over to the chairs and grabbed my "man bag"(!); and dashed to the exit; as I ran, the shutters were about 3/4 closed! My impression was that I ducked under the closing shutter at the very last moment - a world champion limbo dancer would have be proud of my manoeuvre to avoid being crushed by said shutter and escape with life, limb, laundry and "man bag"!

Obviously, the good news was:

1. my escape from impending incarceration within the laundaret!

The bad news was:

1. my escape caused the shutters to reverse and return to a fully open state; as a result
2. the woman was now in a predicament because the automated closure procedure had aborted forcing the woman to phone to sort out how to reinitiate the closure process;
3. I felt overwhelming guilt in having ignored her protestations, which due to my limited comprehension of the Spanish language, I didn't fully appreciate why she was being so persistent, thus, creating the predicament she now found herself in.

In mitigation,

1. the signs said the laundaret was open until 9pm, not 8.57pm when the automated closure procedure commenced. If I'd known, a priori, I would have made sure I was all packed and out by then. Instead I, perhaps naively, thought it was open until 9pm.
2. I did attempt to apologise to the woman for the situation she now found herself in. She, responded that she'd told me what was going to happen. I didn't say that she may have told me, but I didn't comprehend what she'd said. Instead, I apologised once more and walked off feeling very bad .... very bad indeed, perhaps how I felt after a scolding as a 5 years old!

Hopefully, her return home was not delayed too long.

As for today, it was all about the climb of Xorrat del Cati (3.8 kilometres in length, average gradient 11.6%, maximum gradient 21%, elevation gain 442 metres). It's a beast of a climb!

Now I can say it's done and I don't need to do it again! I can confirm it is a tough climb. The only disappointment is that there isn't a coll/port/puerto/col signpost at the top to photograph as a record of one's achievement: Elevation 1098 metres.

Tonight I reside in Agost:

• Distance driven: 18 miles
• Distance cycled: 68 kilometres
• Weather: Mostly overcast with the sun trying to break through in the afternoon.

Today's route: