Not goodbye...........just see you later.

G.  Well we made it!  What a journey. We were asking a lot of the poor little Yaris.  A 998 cc 3 cylinder engine that had done over 100,000 miles - she was piled high with our stuff, plus roofbox and two bikes. The suspension was put under serious pressure!  My sister arrived to wave us off after we thought we'd said all our goodbyes which was great! We had to contend with high winds down to Portsmouth but we got there in good time for the ferry, which itself set off 90 minutes late due to the weather and was battered by the wind on the first leg to Roscoff overnight. 
415km in 6hrs 14mins at av speed of 67km/h with max altitude of 166m.
We finally managed to relax the next day through the Bay of Biscay after a very busy 3 weeks clearing out the house so if you do any shopping at the BHF, Age UK or the Hospice shops, the chances are that you'll come across some of it! 
The journey from Santander was really hair-raising. Gale-force headwinds over the mountains had us down to 2nd gear at some points and nearly blew us over more than once but we safely arrived at our overnight stop south of Madrid after 9 hours - twice as long as normal! We stayed in a log cabin at a converted mill (http://www.molinodecantarranas.com) which had an on-site winery so of course it would have been rude not to sample the produce........ 
504km in 7hrs 42 mins at av speed of 65 km/h with max altitude of 1480m.

Overloaded Yaris outside the log cabin

  The final leg of the journey took us through some lovely scenery on blissfully quiet motorways to our destination which our friends here had decked out in Spanish bunting! What a surprise and a great welcome. 

The Yaris has landed (and the golden traffic cone!)

We now have to find space for all this stuff! Yesterday saw us cycling in shorts in 20 degrees of sunshine but the temperature is dropping to 15 today and it's been raining overnight - I'm sure you're all very sympathetic! Xx
420 km in 6hrs 5mins at av speed of 69 km/h with max altitude of 971m.