Day Thirty-Eight
Cerbène train station
14 September 2007 21:16

This morning we headed the opposite way up Las Ramblas to the way we’d gone the other days. Further up, there were a number of pet “shops”, which were set up right there in the middle of the open air mall. Animals such as ferrets, iguanas, frogs, chinchillas, hamsters, ducks, chipmunks and more. We marvelled at the exotic animals for a while and moved on.

Our destination was the cable car that goes from the beach to the top of a large hill; it seemed to be there from the Olympics Barcelona held a decade earlier. Due to the strong winds, the cable car wasn’t running, so we missed out. We checked a scooter hire place and though their prices were reasonable neither of us had a license with us so we were out of luck there too. Instead we had a look at the not-so-glamorous beach. It wasn’t glamorous.

As we strolled into the city we saw a bunch of other Aussies on “cruiser” type bikes. We asked them where they got the bikes from and conveniently they had leaflets. After numerous streets we found the bike hire place down a small alley. Justine got a yellow bike with flowers on the tyres, seat and frame. Mine was grey.

We rode the bikes around town for a few hours, visiting sights we hadn’t seen yet, like other Gaudi houses, a market and even the “Toro Arena”. Realising the hire place closed in 20 minutes, we rushed across much of the city in peak hour traffic — no helmets. We weaved through pedestrians on Las Ramblas and buses on other streets. We returned the bikes with 3 minutes to spare.

Our train tonight is the last overnight one. It’s a new one and the best rooms (not ours) even have en-suite toilets and showers!

Barcelona was nice but crime seemed prevalent and much of the city smelled like a sewer — more than other cities.

I got a new bike just over a month ago, and have been trying to ride at least once or twice a week after week. I had a few days off last week but it was just Too Damn Hot TM so I avoided riding.

I did go out once in a 35 degree day but got so hot after a short amount of time that I simply gave up trying and came home.

Justine also got a bike as we want to ride together; we usually ride along the Scotchman’s Creek Trail as it’s near home, nice and green and has a wide enough path that we don’t smack into anyone (yet; knock on wood!).

Previously, the furthest I’d been was to Huntingdale Road, where I usually turned back, except for one day over the Christmas break where I decided it would be fun to ride home… via work. Round trip around 23km.

This evening after work, Justine and I rode all the way to Chadstone Shopping Centre which — according to WhereIs is around 7km (it seemed much longer than that, and possibly was due to the winding trail we took) — and then home, which was mostly uphill. A decent-length ride, especially considering how long it’s been since I’ve done any riding (of any merit, anyway).