Day 76 - Foix to Figueres (Spain) - 86 kms

It was drizzling as we set off for a brief circuit ride in the foothills of the Pyrenees before our planned drive to Figueres in Spain for the next leg of our adventure

Linton was in trouble early forgetting his jacket and the weather obliged soon becoming officially consistent rain. Climbing out of Foix past yesterdays caves we followed a recommended route in the Cylce France book that took in the best of the local countryside which would have been terrrific if any of us had looked up through the falling rain to see it

Chateaux overlooking Foix

At the 30km mark we called it quits and cycled back to Foix or so we thought until we came to an intersection and realised  we were closer to our original planned destination of Le Mars or something like that than Foix.

We decided on cycling forward and looping to Foix which took us on the only road in Europe that goes underground through a cavern - this was an amazing ride 500 metre road mainly in the dark with the cave descending until the road re-emmerged on the other side

Kev and I road back to havre another go while Viv and Linton pressed on keen to get back to Foix. As it always happens the rain then teemed down on our return although Kev and I secured some shelter until the worst had past

Back in Foix we caught up with Kim, dripped our way into a nearby coffee shop, changed out of our wet clothes and set off on the 3 hour as it tuned out journey to Figueres Spain by way of Perpignan running parrallel to the magnificent Pyrenees. A quick dinner in Perpignan and 50 kms later we arrived with an unfolding nightmare about to occur

Figuesres streets in the old town are an amazing series of narrow one way streets -  Linton drove our bus like vehicle a la theItalian mob with wheels up on the footpath and at times almost on the wall to avoid parked cars - we soon found though that we could not find our appartment

After endless circling and Vivs persistence in asking dircetiosn we finally made it at 11p,m now to realise there was no one to let us in. To compound matters most of our phone were flat excecpt for kim´s and in one final try to she got through to the owner to come our and let us in

This was travel stress at its best and to give credit to the crew was well handled or will be well handled when we start talking to each other again in a week or two

With a little "ole" when crossing the border we are now in Spain !!!