Au Revoir France, Hola Spain!

Day 26 Monday 22/5/17  A grey day of 19C when we set off from Carcasonne so Kay decided on long trousers and a thicker top, which would prove to be unfortunate. We first looked for the spot above the city in the vineyards where we could capture one of the iconic images of the wall and towers, we did find a place and took some photographs but perhaps due to limitations of an iPhone or perhaps because the sun was not shining they were a bit disappointing.

What we saw...

What we hoped to see! 

Today was to be a no motorway day again and we chose a middle route down to Barcelona deciding against both the coast and the high Pyrenees. Along the way we passed through yet more gorges including the Gorge de St George which is very narrow and has a single track road blasted out from the rock. We drovealong with a massive overhang only a couple of metres above your head.

Although we had decided against the high Pyrenees route we still reached a height of 1711 metres near Les Angles one of the ski resorts on that part of the Pyrenees.

Les Angles

As we wound our way down the mountain the temperature began to climb. The car thermometer showed eventually should 28.5C, a new high for the trip, and Kay was rather warm in her colder weather gear.  We made a mistake in the last 40 km to Barcelona by avoiding the motorway, instead of a smooth drive into the city we had a fairly difficult drive through small busy roads.

On arrival in the city we drove to Katy’s school to pick up keys for her flat.....

Look who we found! 

...and then drove to the parking garage we had booked (a very smart and clean underground garage in the University area at Mulhacen). Driving around the small streets of Barcelona and the broad avenue of Le Diagonal with 4 lane roundabouts and dubious lane discipline was an interesting experience !! After leaving the car we walked down past a Gaudi park to pick up the metro and with a single change from L3 to L4 we made it to Katy’s flat. We unpacked and chilled then went out to get some supplies for dinner. Katy was home about 9:30PM and we were just about to eat when Louise arrived unexpectedly early so she joined us for dinner on the terrace.

Carcasonne to Barcelona 202 miles, total trip distance 2825 miles