Spain 2014 - Day 11 - The voyage home

Our last day abroad today as we're due to catch the 9pm boat home.

We had another make shift breakfast and ate some bread products at the harbour and were joined by the sparrows again, they're going to miss us.

Mark went sweet shopping but after an extensive search, he couldn't find any and blamed the Americans.

We made up a replacement number plate for Tim's bike and asked the woman at reception for some sellotape., she didn't understand so Tim looked up the word and showed her and she still didn't understand, so we had to call a translator who basically said 'sellotape'.

We checked out and headed to santander the long way. We stopped for fuel and a crazy fat ginger woman was going crazy at us, we don't know why and when she had a go at Tim, he signed the receipt "fuck off".

We stopped at a town for lunch and realised it was the same town we'd stopped at about a week ago. Tim was boasting how good his Spanish was when he ordered his burger with cheese by mistake. By the time he'd cut all the cheese off it was about the size of his thumbnail.

We travelled about 300 meters down a toll road and got charged €3 each, and whilst queuing, Cheesy dropped his ticket and in his panic stalled his bike. Just when we thought he'd got the hang of the toll booths too.

Nearing Santander we went up one last mountain and we're at the same height as the clouds when we were at the top. We stopped to admire the view and cheered on two cyclists who had just made it to the summit.

We managed to get home without the help of eagles.

With just motorway ahead of us we went into Santander and stopped at the shops for some supplies before getting lost trying to find the ferry. At one point we had to play frogger on our bikes crossing three lanes of traffic.

We were made to wait forever before getting onto the ferry and once on we made it to the shoebox like cabin.

We made our way to the restaurant and got out the food we'd purchased earlier and made our own picnic, after seeing the tripe on offer at the restaurant, most of the boat was jealous.

The Wifi on the boat is pathetic, it kicks you off constantly, won't let you rejoin and when you do, there isn't enough bandwidth to go around and you get about an email every 20mins.

We sat in the bar to watch the football next to some loud mouthed cornish idiots who hadn't got a clue about anything. Tim kept 'accidentally' blocking the view for them and we had to restrain Cheesy from reverse elbow striking them.

After the match the evening entertainment started, it was a man and woman act who made shadow puppets before doing the same magic tricks we saw on the way over.

This was a camel eating from a tree. Allegedly.

The French waitress who was serving us didn't speak any English despite the ferry running to England. They only served two types of beer on the boat and she was unable to comprehend 'Becks'. Brilliant.

We headed to bed for the snore off which we think Cheesy won but only because Tim was putting so much effort into farting his face off. We were surprised Tim slept at all as when he was in the bathroom we all stuffed his pillowcase with our sweaty socks.

After the breakfast on the way over we took Adrian's advice and upgraded to the posh restaurant. It was the breakfast of Kings with a decent cooked buffet so we all stuffed ourselves. At breakfast we also saw Peter Griffin from Family Guy.

The two deck rule was adhered to after breakfast where you're not allowed to poo within two decks of our room for fear of stink contamination.

Tim was in the trap letting rip and he heard a voice from the next stall over say 'that can only be one person'. Apparently Steve has heard Tims facts so much he can now identify him by them.

We spent the rest of the day chilling out on the boat playing crappy games on our phones.

The Piss stop score for the final leg was 2-2 making the final score 5-4 to the Cheese!

So thats it for this holiday, thanks for reading.

Spain 2014 - Day 2 - Meat fest

After about 5 mins sleep due to the snoring twins it was time to get up, partly because it was breakfast time and partly because the room stunk so badly we had to get out before our lungs dissolved.

We then went for our free breakfast, it should have cost £7 but got a deal when we booked. It's a good job really because it mostly consisted of a raw hash brown, some bean juice and a portion of salmonella.

We then were going through the Bay of Biscay where you often see dolphins and whales, in fact the viewing is normally so good some people take the ferry just for the whale watching. Obviously we didn't see anything, not even a newt.

An hour later it was time to prep the bikes. For some reason they were 45 mins late letting us off the ferry so it was like a sauna. It was quite an orderly system with the ferry crew waving you out in turn. Tim got bored of this so we just cut everyone up and made our escape.

The sweat box.

Just off the ferry despite all of our planning, two of the radios have failed, Marks had no battery despite charging all night and Steves had no mic. Off we went anyway for approx 2 mins before we needed a break, we'd stopped at a tiny bar type place full of people who apparently hadn't seen a motorcycle before, we ordered some drinks and ice cream and they gave us free olives and crisps. Tim didn't want to leave as he's partial to the odd freebie.

On to the mountain roads and they were as good as we remembered, lots of twisters and switchbacks, all pot hole free and no traffic. If Carlsberg made roads...

After a couple of piss stops we ended up in a picturesque town where we could try on suits of armour and have more ice creams. The place really was gorgeous but also deserted, we've no idea where it is but recommend it!

It was then a short hop to Bilboa, our destination for the day courtesy of Cheesy so we checked in and freshened up.

We decided to see what Bilbao was all about so Steve led us on a 45 minute route march across the city climaxing at the Guggenheim museum which is the weirdest building ever. Steve has been going on about this place since we first thought about doing this trip so he wasn't impressed to the point of crying to find out that it's closed on Mondays, the only day we're here. 

It was getting on for beer'o'clock so we stopped at a bar for one, they only had Heineken which was disappointing although it wasn't like Heineken back home and was actually quite nice. Following this Tim called the shots, he'd seen a ribs restaurant earlier so it was a case of retreading our steps back there. It's worth saying at this point that Bilboa has some gorgeous architecture but for some reason we decided to eat in inside the darkest restaurant we could find.

We had the giant Godzilla mega combo mofo platter between the four of us which consisted of so much meat we could've rebuilt the cow. We also ordered several buckets of beer which had a novel built in bottle opener. We couldn't figure that out though so the waiter showed us and spilt half the bottle over himself. He the came back with a normal opener.

Full up we headed to a more lively district to find some lively bars. We found one, as it turns out that Monday nights aren't that popular for getting smashed but as most of the Spanish don't have jobs they have nothing better to do. We ordered some gin and vodka based drinks that were served in oversized wine glasses but the barman kept getting the orders wrong and ended up throwing half of them away.

On to the next bar which was full of Germans, they were all merry because Germany had beaten Ronaldo 4-0. We talked to these guys for a bit and had a laugh, they'd been told that the English are good to drink with so we tried not to disappoint.

The Germans hadn't heard the rule about not mentioning the war and kept going on about his grandfather who was shot seven times, two grenade wounds and stabbed with a bayonet once. He died after the first bullet mind, but he felt that he had to tell us several times. He also told us that the war was finished by the English giving the Germans a bowl of pea soup, must have missed that one when we learned history.

Following feedback from yesterday's blog entry we were given the challenge of learning a new swear word, so we asked a German. He told us of the word "Hurensohn", we don't know what it means but apparently it was so bad that if it was said to his friend then it would start World War 3. He did go on to say that as we're English he'd then lose WW3 but he may beat us at football. Next challenge please.

We also met a suicidal Ukranian called Schlucha, he was so depressed as he also wanted to tour Europe on a motorbike. Tim fixed this by just telling him to get a motorbike and then go on holiday, a concept he hadn't considered before so he was a bit happier after that. Hope he doesn't choose Russia as a destination though.

Today's piss stop tournament was won 3-2 by Cheesy. 

 

Spain 2014 - Day 1 - Here we go!

Here we go again...
The mission this time is to conquer the Pyrenees on our bikes, but this time there are four of us. As per normal we have Mark (Teapot), Tim (Skiddy) and Steve (Daisy) but we also have Carl (Cheesy) too.

Between us we have an S1000RR, Fireblade SP, GSXR 750 and a KTM RC8, so a fiesty bunch of bikes which also means no luggage. We're going for a bit longer this time, so there were more compromises with what we could take. 

It was a late start leaving Birmingham at 10am to meet up at the services just south of Worcester ready to nail it down to Plymouth.

Leaving the services, Tommo decided to pop a mighty wheelie on his BMW only for the anti-wheelie to kick in and nearly bin the bike. 

We then had to make an emergency stop on the motorway as Mark hadn't done his bag up and his passport was about to fly out which would've taken some explaining at customs. 

The motorway is mostly boring so Steve ran over a dead rabbit flicking it up at Mark behind who is now sporting blood drenched leathers. 

We needed to get there early as Tim had a plan, it's worth noting that this was the only thing he's planned for the trip, and it involved Nandos. Wary that his Nando's loyalty card expires at the end of the month, he was keen to get his free chicken. Steve had never had a Nandos before but was mostly impressed with the free refills on drinks. Tim was chuffed though as he finally got to claim his free chicken although only about 3 of the 12 stamps were legit! 

We found out that Cheesy and Tim have the smallest bladders and piss stops were needed every 10mins, with the final score 3-2 to Cheesy, looks like this could be a daily competition. 

We made it to the port with seconds to spare, Tim would've rather missed the ferry than rush his Nandos. 

On the ferry we have the smallest room ever, plus four of us have to fit in it this year, not quite sure the maths for that stack up... 

At the bar Cheesy recounted in great detail the time that he spent as a sex slave on a trawler around the Arctic. It didn't sound it was for everyone but it does explain his funny walk. 

After watching the footy the evening entertainment started. This was headlined by a singing comedic magician. I kid you not, this guy was a master, unfortunately he was a master of being shit. His magic act consisted of cutting up a piece of A4 and then getting a new piece of A4 out of his pocket and then doing it again and again. Amazing. His jokes were worst, in fact the biggest joke was his singing. 

We made our own entertainment by seeing who was wearing the worst t-shirt. We thought we had a winner with the group of lads who had a batch of t-shirts printed for their holiday that had a typo on it. But this guy took the cake, his shirt had wolves and Eagles on it. We're pretty sure he rides a Harley. 

After a few more beers we called it a night and returned to our sardine can for the night. Cheesy then realised that he'd left his wash stuff on the bike, fail. 

This is where Tim and Cheesy started their snoring competition. At one point the captain came over the tannoy to ask us to wake up the foghorns they were that loud. 

Spain 2014 - Day 10 - Beach Bums

For some reason we were all a little hungover this morning, it must be the sea air. We had more time to check out the view from our apartment, if you hang off the balcony and crank your neck around, you can just about see a bit of the sea. Result, free sea view! We do overlook a church though, probably the reason Steve chose it.

We don't get breakfast at the apartment so we found a breakfast tapas place, aka a bakery. We took our bread products down to the harbour to eat if and were engulfed by little birds who also wanted our breakfast. They were wary of taking it out of our hands, so Tim lay down and put some bread on his forehead.

There was also an odd moment when we looked over at the pier to see some old dude having a naked swim, he dried himself down then covered up his top half, photos courtesy of Tims collection.

We were then tricked into another route march by Gold Leader, who would point at something in the distance and say something like "Cheesy, I bet there's fish in there" and he'd rush over to it, repeat this for 5 km and you've got a march on. We did find a good view of the one side of the coast though:

After our march we returned to the room to change into our trunks and headed to the beach. Mark, Tim and Steve went into the sea whilst Cheesy was on sentry duty. We played with a skimming ball and the people around us soon learned to move away.

To dry off we lay in the beach and relaxed for a but, the sun wasn't out but it was still around 25C.

A heathy McDonalds lunch followed and then we walked around the shops for a bit. The town is full of Americans who are trying to act all cultured by buying French berets and plastic tat. We decided to return to our room for a siesta.

Food'o'clock, so we headed out and grabbed a beer to watch the England game. They had two TVs so we could watch the Italy game too. Bloody Suarez is an animal, ban him FIFA. Enough said about England. 

Mark had a slight confession, he didn't count the blog posts correctly so this isn't the 100th post, it's only the 94th or something. This is a shame as we'd already had no church day and got the picture of a naked person...  As soon as Steve heard that it wasn't the hundredth, he marched us to a church. 

We decided to eat at a seafood place on the harbour, they had steak on the menu so all of us had some food. Sat opposite us was the best moustache ever attached some some blokes face:

There was a debate about local tuna and what coloured tuna was available so Tim bribed the waitress to help him win the argument. Cheesy, the expert on all things from the sea wasn't impressed.

After dinner we had a few drinks whilst trying to avoid the Americans and then decided that it was time to finish the holiday off with a kebab. Tim led a sweep of the city trying to find a kebab shop, and the only one that we found was closed in the mall. 

Tim even resorted to enlisting the local law enforcement at one point but the search was fruitless.

Instead we opted for ice cream and stuffed our faces.

Spain 2014 - Day 9 - Final Destination

Not a lot happens in Longrono so we quickly left that place behind, or we would have if the satnav would let us. The road to San Sebastián, our final destination sported more great roads and we made good progress.

With not far to go however we turned off the main road on to what can only be described as a single lane donkey track, this was hard going as it was up and over a steep hill and it was bumpy as hell destroying our wrists. At the bottom we rejoined the main road and carried on for a minute only to find the satnav had doubled us back and we'd done a massive loop.

We decided to stop for something to eat and found a place with an Irish speaking Greek Spanish lady. Tim had the worlds thinnest steak and Steve and Cheesy had something described as potato soup that wasn't soup.

Back on the road we pushed on and quickly made it to San Sebastián. The satnav again had us at it and we rode our bikes through a packed pedestrian only square where people were enjoying their lunch, down the wrong way of one way streets and through some no turn signs.

We were baking in our leathers at this point and had to wait in the sun with our bikes while Steve checked us in to our apartment.

We only have two rooms in the apartment and there are at least 3 others rented out all sharing the same bathroom, it's bad times for those other people I think.

We left in search of a large festival that celebrates the summer equinox, we were told that it involves lighting fires and jumping over them which sounds pretty good. What it really was was some pied piper playing the pan pipes while some people danced around in a circle.

The square then cleared and some bloke proped a ladder against the tree in the middle and everyone charged it trying to get a piece of the bark that this guy was cutting off. We didn't want to be left out so Mark and Tim rushed in, rabbit punching children out of the way and dragging women off by their hair. After several fatalities, they finally got a piece of bark each and returned to Steve and Cheesy.

No one had any idea what we were meant to do with this magic bark though so we threw it away.

Following that we got some drinks and ate some tapas as the rain came down outside, Steve was in heaven. We then took refuse in a cafe and got Mark some chicken wings. We found a bar with a picture of a strange bearded man outside and realised that the barman looked the same:

The Brazil vs Cameroon game was on so we went to watch that, the sports bar didn't have any TVs so we went next door to a busy bar and watched the onslaught. We were served beers in glasses so large that they doubled up as kegs.

After some more beers and some spirits so large the barmaid couldn't fit any mixers in the glass, we decided that we weren't happy about not seeing the fire jumping so we stole some napkins and made our own fire to jump over and had our own festival.

Back at the dormitory for some reason we decided to play football in the corridor with an apple, Cheesy tackled Mark knocking him into a doorway which burst open to a couples bedroom who weren't too pleased. Best we go to bed.

Spain 2014 - Day 8 - The pilgrimage continues

At breakfast we were talking about how noisy the hotel was, Mark mentioned the people talking in the corridor, Tim said that the kids downstairs were making a racket and Cheesy moaned about a continuous droning noise that had been going for hours. Mark and Tim looked at each other and started laughing as Tim had decided to dry his socks that he'd washed and had jammed the hair dryer on to get them dry...

We checked out and got back on the bikes for a fast 3 hour ride to Longono. Partway there Mark noticed that Tims number plate had gone missing so we backtracked a couple of miles but couldn't find it. Mark and Cheesy were riding a long slowly coming up with a plan when a police bike went past, blasted his horn and gave us a non-Highway Code approved hand gesture. Not been told off for going too slowly before!

We passed a procession of old minis who were waving at us as we went past. Mark managed a high five with one of them which was pretty cool. 

There was a breakthrough today, Cheesy managed to get through a toll booth on his own without calling for help. Steve was already off his bike running to help though and was a little bit disappointed Cheesy had sussed it. 

We stopped for a drink at a wier and Tim and Steve went wading in their boots to cool off even though the temperature had dropped to a lowly 30C.

We then pushed on lunch free across some fast challenging bends through the hills and checked in at our hotel in Longono. Tim managed to lose one of his gloves on the way to the car park but later recovered it. It's not his day for losing things, they say things come in threes so we'll take bets for what goes missing next.

We opted for an early start so grabbed a bite to eat at a knock off KFC joint called Chic Chic Chicken and then started the walk into town, Mark's best & only full meal so far. The hotel Mark had booked was in the suburbs so it was a bit of a trek, but as there was a church we hadn't seen in the centre of town, everyone was excited.

The church was quite odd, very high ceilings with mist at the top, but the best part was the statues of Jesus with a bazooka. It seems the holy wars were more violent than we thought!

We had a stroll around town and came across an interesting swim ware shop, Pink Leader took particular interest in this and the rest of the group had to stop him purchasing some new attire.

We sat down to watch the football when the heavens opened, we're talking Noah's Ark style rain so we took shelter in a bar. Tim convinced us it was just a passing shower but we started to doubt that when it was still thundering 45 mins later.

When it finally stopped we headed to one of the bar districts and had some tapas, Mark even got to eat some, but it was Tommo who was in his element. Cheesy 'accidentally' knocked over a glass of wine onto Tims shorts and white t-shirt and Tim is convinced that this was revenge for soaking him in the fountain yesterday. Cheesy wasn't available for comment but his representatives declined all involvement.

Rain came again pinning us in the bar just as another bunch of English entered so we chatted to them for a while and one guy said that Tommo in their group kept making them stop for boring stuff. We said that Steve did that in our group except with churches and he said "oh he's the Tommo of your group us he?", how true was that

The rain eased again so we switched bars. Cheesy spotted a guy wearing the worlds worst wig so he pointed this out to us albeit a little loudly and the guy heard and ran off in embarrassment. The place sold sidre and after learning about this on last years trip Steve was keen to show Cheesy. We ordered some sidre and the barman did the stupid poring thing but only gave us about an inch in each glass, so it wasn't exactly the thirst quenching drink you'd have back home. It was ok though as it was like paint stripper so no need for much more.

Our final bar of the night just sold mushrooms, everyone but Mark tucked in, just in case they were the magic variety. They weren't, but we took a dragon home to Candy Land where 7 mermaids greeted us and we went to bed in our hollowed out pumpkins.

Piss stops were 2-1 to Tim, they must be just about even now.

2 days until the 100th entry and we're a little disappointed by the lack of ideas from our readership.

Spain 2014 - Day 7 - I would walk 500 miles

After riding every day up til now we've earned our first lie in. We met up for breakie at 10 where they served mini versions of normal food.

We were soon on our way out to see the sights of Zaragoza. Steve aka Gold Leader led the way as we headed to see the big church. It was very impressive and very big, everything was either gold or silver with massive grand paintings and statues everywhere. Tim was most impressed with the grey painted concrete floors out back though while Steve and Mark debated what a nightmare it would have been to project manage the build!

We paid to go up one of the towers and took the elevator up. Tim memorised the special code the guy put into the elevator to make it work so that we wouldn't have to pay if we came back. At the top, the sights were impressive although the health and safety wasn't quite there as Cheesy nearly pulled the handrail off the wall. Yes, the church has been standing for a thousand years and we broke it.

Back down in the actual church part of it a wedding was just starting so we thought it best to leave.

Just down the road from the church was a nice fountain and Cheesy was first in with Tim quickly following. Mark was taking a photo so Tim though it would be funny to splash a bit of water of him although he misjudged and sent a tsunami in his direction instead. Revenge would be sought.

There was another fountain just next to it and some old dears wanted their picture taken so they asked Cheesy, Tim jumped back in the water and photo bombed the picture brilliantly but his guard was down so Cheesy quickly dashed over and threw his flip flops on top of the fountain. Revenge is a dish best served wet.

After drying off we went to a bridge overlooking the church and gold leader plotted a course across town via every plaza on the map towards the cathedral.

We hit another church on the way because no one was sick of churches at all and couldn't wait for another. There was a wedding going on in this one too so we hung around for a bit but kept getting evils so left for another plaza. 

Who'd have thought that they'd be another wedding at the next plaza, but there was, and they were just doing the group photo. It was so tempting to get in on it, but we figured that we'd have been chased around town like in a scene from Benny Hill if we did and the knife shops were probably still open.

We stopped off for some food at an amazing McDonalds, it had an indoor bridge, a separate McCafe selling brilliant cakes and McMacaroons as well as beer and cookies.

We finally made it to the cathedral and the wedding there was just leaving, we've seen more weddings in one day than your average Hugh Grant film, it's fair to say, there is a lot of live in Zaragoza! The cathedral wanted money to let us in so we told them where to go and had a drink to cool down. Temperatures were soaring now with the street signs reporting 38 degrees.

There was a debate on what to do next but gold leader guilted us to walk to the castle, this wasn't exactly a 2 min walk as it wasn't even on our map but what the hell, why not. I'll tell you why not, because it's 38 degrees and bloody miles!

We got to the castle after an energy sapping walk to find that it was closed. Apparently the Spanish don't expect any idiots out at this time of the day so they'd gone home for a kip. The castle wasn't that great looking, Steve raved about it so we need your opinions:

With no more plazas or churches to see we headed back to the hotel to recharge our batteries.

After a siesta we had a couple of drinks and went to find some food, it turns out that there isn't much for Mark in Zaragoza as everything is either tapas or paella. After walking down every street twice we settled on the first restaurant we'd seen next to the hotel.

We ordered the food and asked for plain chicken for Mark, what turned up was chicken paella, so it was bread again. The waiter was very sorry he got it wrong but still charged us 70 euros for it.

We hit bar street afterwards and had a couple more drinks and people watched. The picture of Wally didn't come out, no doubt he was hiding again but here's the best basin cut we've seen in years.

This is the 97th blog entry and we're wracking our brains for ideas of how to celebrate the 100th in a few days time. So far Tim has come up with 'fireworks' and spent most of the day learning the Spanish word for that...

Spain 2014 - Day 6 - 3 bars & a wedding

Day 6 already! We met up for breakfast and was teased by the Spanish as were only allowed the cold stuff and they had huge trays of bacon, still, they only charged us for one so we showed them.

We hit the road around 10 and took the long picturesque route to Zaragoza. We soon found some nice roads and as we were heading south the temperatures started to rise. We stopped by a nice lake and Cheesy felt the need to cool off so went in for a dip in his leathers.

Back on the road we hit some straight roads so Mark decided to stretch the bikes legs and clock up a new land speed record and managed 147mph before running out of road. We stopped a couple of times to get refreshments and accidentally parked our bikes around a mosque which blocked the entrance. This caused a bit of a scene so we had to move them. We felt safe from the cops though after seeing their vehicles:

There were a bunch of long necked eagles flying around, you may know them as storks, and we saw that they'd made a nest completely taking over a church. Tim thinks this is where they make the butter.

We arrived in Zaragoza late afternoon with the temperature a scorching 36C. The hotel woman told us to follow her to the garage and off she walked, we followed on the bikes as she squeezed between cars went down steps and into an elevator. 

After freshening up we had a quick beer and then returned to the room for a siesta and blog writing session.

We hit the town on the evening and got something to eat in the square. Zaragoza is made up of list of little alleys with hundreds of bars filling them. As per everywhere else we've been, as soon as we arrived places started to close but it was Friday night so there were lots of others. It seems that most shops here sell knives, so we think the popular thing to do must be to go out for a bit of stabbing.

After dinner Mark and Steve had some ice creams and we started our bar crawl. We each had to pick a bar and we'd see whose was best. It was still quietist at this point but Tim started with a traditional beat up Spanish bar. We spent ages trying to order Vodka and Redbull and when we finally got them to understand they pointed out that this bar only sold red wine and one type of beer. Beer it is then.

It was then Cheesys turn and get was starting to feel the pressure and we had to double back at one point but then he came good. There was a busy discotheque that was spilling out into the street so we went in and ordered some drinks to find out we'd crashed a wedding. Cheesy tried to pretend that he was the brides uncle to get our drinks free but that didn't work so well as the bride was Spanish and also black. We were a little out of place as everyone else was dolled up to the nines and we were in t-shirts and shorts, we didn't let it stop us though, although we did have to hold Tim back from stealing the food.

We stayed in this place for a while before Mark had to find a bar. We headed back to 'bar street' and there was a tapas place where he ordered some beers from. As we were drinking pints it took them a while so two bar men did the drinks separately. We paid but only half the drinks were there, when we queried this the other barman had taken the drinks to the wrong table so he got a bit of a kicking.

This was a busy part of town and Cheesy spotted someone taking a photo, so we all got in the background to bomb it and got caught :)

It was Steve's turn now and it had just gone midnight so most of the places were closing, we walked around a bit and the pressure was building when he found a cool but dark bar playing some good music so we went in there.

It seems like it was prom night as there were lots of foetus' around getting smashed and hanging around doing random things like jumping off curbs, Tim saw one wating his packed lunch in the middle of the street at midnight.

After the drinks Tim fancied a good old kebab so him and Mark found a place and tucked in. We stood outside the hotel eating it and the night Portman saw us and thought we were up to no good and bolted the hotel doors. He soon saw the error of his ways though and let us in...

Tim clawed back the piss stop challenge today winning 2-1, it was a low scoring day today as the temperatures meant all fluids were sweated away. We were issued a challenge the other day to find the weirdest food name, there were a few contenders but we've settled for whipped ham from this menu:

Spain 2014 - Day 5 - Stalking

A new day begins as we wake up in our apartment, the lovely sound of the river running had got boring and was now just constant white noise.

Cheesy had caught Tim using hand cream at last, he'd been secretly applying it when no one was looking for fear of abuse. Now he's out of the closet though he's free to put on his lippy and everything.

On the road we witnessed some eagles fighting or at least we think they're eagles, all birds of prey are called eagles to us.

We stopped for a drink and some guys on BMWs who we'd met earlier rocked up and we started to suspect they were Stalking us.

They told us that the road we were going on was barely possible on sports bikes with gravel and pot holes. So obviously we went down there anyway and just dubbed it death road.

The road was slow going to start with but good for sightseeing but we were going so slow and it was so warm that the bikes were overheating. So we decided to throw caution to the wind and pick up the pace and see what Death Road would rustle up for us.

We came to the end of Death Road with our lives in tact, it wasn't that bad at all. We stopped for some lunch and the two BMWs went past again, then turned around and went past us again. We're definitely being stalked and we were worried that whoever went last on the bikes would be picked off and murdered.

Anyway, we arrived in Jaca, a place none of us can pronounce correctly and walked into town to see the culture.

We started at an old fort where there were a bunch of tourists as the dry moat was full of deer. It closed as soon as we got there though so we only got to see the outside.

Next up was a church and as we got there we noticed that two girls from the fort were there who gave us a strange look as they thought we were stalking them.

Having now seen most of the churches in north Spain we thought we'd get a bite to eat and find somewhere to watch the England game.

As we sat down we noticed that sat on the table next to us were the two girls we were stalking so we just had a beer and moved inside before the police turned up.

We decided to just get a snack and eat after the match and just got some seafood so Mark had bread.

We watched the England game where that buck toothed rat faced racist diving scouser bastard Suarez knocked in two goals to practically put us out of the cup. Shrek scored though so at least that was something.

After the seafood snacks we opted to skip food and get a couple more beers so we found a bar with a giant necked goat thing.

After drowning our sorrows we headed back to the hotel.

The Piss stop challenge was handed back to Cheese with him taking it 4-2 due to having a double stop at one point.

Spain 2014 - Day 4 - Rip off France

We met up in reception at 9am and had the hotel breakfast. The dining room doubled up as reception and also the ironing room. We tucked into breakfast which consisted of bread and bread as the hotel staff caught up with their ironing.

Steve and Cheesy had a rough nights sleep as their room had been double booked with some pigeons who sat at the end of their beds cooing all night.

We used the satnav to leave Pau but it took us the wrong way down one way streets again, we figured that if they had cameras one more fine wouldn't make any difference at this stage.

We were soon at our first stop of the day, the Christian town of Lourdes where people come from around the world to be cured. Steve is hoping to get his hayfever cured, Cheesy wants his VD sorting, and we're all hoping they can do something about Tim's mental condition.

We had imagined Lourdes to be this humble place where we're greeted by nuns and blessed by the high priest or something. It turns out that it's more tacky than Blackpool, more commercialised than Weston and one Elvis away from Vegas. Crappy gift shops line the street selling everything from plastic Jesus Christs to empty water bottles to fill up with holy water.

Further into the town there was a large cathedral which looked a bit like a castle with a massive open area in front of it lined with stalls selling shit and that's when we realised that Lourdes is basically a copy of Disneyland. All they need is a couple of roller coasters and they're all set. Cheesy brought some God coins to spend but didn't fancy nailing a cross to the front of his bike so he wasn't able to buy anything.

We left Lourdes before someone dressed as the Pope tried to bless us for just €50 each and worked our way towards Saint Lary-Soulan, our final destination.

The temperature started rising and after some punishing twisties we were cruising through a town when a tractor spraying water came towards us. Mark and Steve made evasive maneuvers whereas Tim and Cheesy swerved to get as wet as possible to cool down.

Shortly after, the roads deteriorated due to miles of road works so it was like off roading for a bit.

We stopped at a restaurant that didn't sell any food for less than €20 and only stocked Coke and no other options. We opted to skip this delightful place and find somewhere further in the mountains instead.

As we climbed higher into the mountain there was snow at the side of the road so we stopped for an epic snowball fight in our full leathers and helmets, it was quite surreal.

The road ahead without warning was then closed facing us with the choice of going all the way back or running the road block. Obviously we pressed on and then came to the serious roadworks with the road blocked by a truck on one side and a 500m drop the other with about a bikes width to squeeze through. We all gingerly made it through and started heading down the mountain in search of food.

We came across a bunch of wild llamas so Tim tried to herd them using his bike with some success. The rest of us were really hoping that it would spit at him or something.

We stopped in the picturesque town of Mongie which is a ski resort and finally got some lunch. Tim and Cheesy had a massive plate of raw meat with cheese (sans cheese for Tim), Cheesy's meal of the holiday so far, and the others had a cold crepe. We were allowed a choice of drinks at this place but for some reason the diet cokes came with spoons.

Coming further down the mountain the road was covered in so much gravel that it was 15mph max, we were going so slow that Miss Daisy overtook us at one point.

We rocked up to Saint Lary-Soulan and found our apartment complex only to find that reception is closed on a Wednesday. There is a number you can call though but no one answered, so we tried the UK number which was no longer in service. After an hour of calling and some help from the other residents we finally got into our room. 20 mins later some dozy French cow turned up and couldn't see what the problem was:
Frenchie: Reception is closed on a Wednesday.
Steve: But we only arrived today.
Frenchie: oh well, not my problem.
Brilliant.

Steve, Tim and Cheesy then headed down to the pool and woke up anyone in the complex that had any thoughts of having a siesta. Back at the room we then changed and showered and found that there weren't enough towels to go around so Mark had to use a tea towel to dry himself. Tim mentioned later that he had a spare towel in his Bag!

It was now about 7pm,so time to go out and get some food as we were all getting hungry. The town was deserted, and most places were closed. We found two bars so had a cheeky pint in one and went to the other to get some food and watch the match only to find that it had closed. We did find one tucked away that was open.

We sat at the bar and got some drinks and were joking around, we looked up and everyone else in the place was staring at us; apparently the English had landed.

We sat down to eat, Tim and Steve ordered this three course meal that started with an entrée that could have fed eight. Cheesy had a massive bowl of mussels and developed a technique that allowed him to eat about six per second. Mark had a course of bread as per usual. Not satisfied with the muscles, Cheesy polished off the giant starter and then tucked into Steve and Tim's mains. Mark stuck to the bread.

Afterwards we had some rum at the bar and the staff tried to rip us off by adding extra drinks onto the bill and then short changed us by a tenner, their excuse was that they were tired although it was really more to do with them being robbing French bastards.

We spoke to a cockney who told us he was living the dream although when you got to the details he was really just a dishwasher for four months waiting for it to snow.

We stumbled home and watched some crap on TV before heading to bed. Shortly after lights out, we were all innocently in bed when we heard an almighty crash from Cheesy's room so we all rushed in there concerned. Somehow he'd managed to fall out of bed, get wrapped up in a duvet and his bed had landed on top of him. Coincidentally Steve had his camera ready to document it.

Today's Piss off competition was 3-2 to Tim, and special honours go to his epic 2000m off the edge of a cliff Piss.

As pointed out by Kay's office we forgot yesterday's piss off result which was won 4-2 to Cheesy.