Bike Ride Day 4 - Santander to Santanilla del Mar

My ride today, which took place in a combination of fog and drizzle that I will not call “frizzle,” was actually pretty pleasant because it wasn’t as hot as the last few days. And again, I rode past countless beaches in some extremely isolated areas in which I was glad not to have had a mechanical breakdown.

Like this one, which is called a “beach,” but not in my book.

And here’s a place I’m glad my chain didn't break.

I covered a lot of varied terrain – here’s a video that shows some of it starting with leaving downtown Santander.

Speaking of which, Santander was pretty great. In retrospect I wish I’d had more time there. There’s a very vibrant downtown with lots of activity, art, music festivals (one of which I just missed), etc. And as with most Spanish cities, it has its mysteries. Like why, in memoriam to a very large fire in 1941 that destroyed most of the city, is there a collection of statues of nude people standing on the grass? Especially in light of the fact that there was only one death attributed to the fire (ironically a firefighter).

Anyway, as usual I rode up lots of hills (and if you are wondering, yes, my legs are sore), and ended up in Santanilla del Mar, a very old, charming village that is slightly inland and despite its narrow winding streets seems to have lots of room for busloads of tourists. This is the one place I’ve been to on this trip where it seems like the foreigners outnumber the locals.

Like the village, my hotel is also old and charming and smells a little like damp mothballs.

A few miles from here are the Altamira cave where the famous prehistoric paintings were found, and the Altamira museum. I debated long and hard about whether to go there, but in the end did not. The actual cave was closed to the public in 1977 after it was discovered that having so many people visit was destroying the paintings (as a species we always seem to be having that effect on everything). So now there’s only the Altamira museum with a fiberglass replica of the cave. Somehow that doesn’t really call to me. 

So I’m going to have some dinner, go to bed and, I don’t know, maybe go for a bike ride tomorrow.

These are some other pictures from my ride today.