Ibiza Agosto

I had a nice week in Ibiza mountain biking last week. I spent the first few days riding with Jane's sister who has recently taken up biking. On the Wednesday I met up with the guys from Kandani a group from the local bike shop that I often ride with when I'm in Santa Eulalia. Wednesday was a reasonably paced mtb ride of around two hours. I hung around near the front with the quicker guys who attacked everything, all of the singletrack, every rise and each technical section. The others complained a bit every now and then and the group would ease up. Only to split again on the next technical section or climb. At the end a couple of the faster guys - Jose and Toni asked if I fancied a ride the next evening too as they were training for a Transalpine event. Me and another guy, Cesar from Leon also on holiday, said yes. This was a much faster paced ride and great fun, with a few big climbs chucked in too. At the end of the ride they said we had to come for a ride the next day too, because the club had organised a big ride for Santa Maria's day!





The Santa Maria ride was straight to the opposite side of the island with a couple of big bumps and lots of caminos in between.




The temperature was nudging the mid 30's on the big climbs to the rocky coast and even the locals were complaining of the heat!




We grabbed a quick coke from a cafe at the bottom of the hill. I was surprised at the brevity of the stop, they were setting off before I'd downed my can of coke.



The last 10 km or so saw the pace start to lift on the caminos and back lanes as we approached Santa Eulalia. Me and one of the younger guys Ernesto, managed to get a gap on one of the rises coming into to town( well, he did all of the work and I held on:)) I got to the front to do a bit and he called me back as we passed 'Servifruit' a fruit wholesalers. This was owned by Pascual one of the riders from Wednesday night and he's promised everyone some ice cold water melon at the end of the ride.




We eased up for the others and we all piled into Pasqui's chiller room to get out of the heat. Then he came through and chopped up some huge red water melons... delicious :)