Bonus

My first time ever on a plane was aged 12. An SAA 747-200. London-Paris then Paris Jo'burg - around the bulge of Africa in 1976! Since then I've been on several SAA 747's, an Air Namibia 747SP (Ex SAA) and a BA 747 from New York last year. Technically 2 BA 747's because we sat on one for three hours which then couldn't take off because of an issue and swapped to another plane!

When the break passed us, not one of them took a bottle or a musset. When the bunch arrived it was a different story. Aside from me, there were only two other people watching the race at the feed point, so I managed to pick up a few goodies for myself . . . . 18 Bottles and 6 Mussets, a dozen gels and assorted bits of food! I came away happy . . . .

20 minutes before the first riders arrived, the rain came in from the west and one of the team drivers I was talking to told me that the riders were already soacked!

After a while more team cars arrived and I was able to get some nice pics.

Sunday I was able to drive 30km west of where we live to see Stage 6 of La Vuelta. I was going to go to Sabiñanigo so that I could watch them pass twice there (they looped the town) and then up to Biescas, where the stage started, to see them pass on their way to Formigal. I could see that the weather was closing in so when I saw several team cars parked at the side of the road on a long steady climb about a third of the way around the route I realised that I was passing the feed-point and I decided to stop there and watch.

Just watched that bit. You can hear the wind whistling across the mike!

Watching the TV highlights now. 40km to go and the three groups are tanking along! Valverde is 40 years old this year!

It's warm & sunny here where we are today, but watching todays stage on TV it just looks grim. I guess there's a good reason they don't run a Grand Tour at the end of October!

Lufthansa 747's landed at an airport for storage and now they can't leave...... https://simpleflying.com/lufthansa-boeing-747s-stuck/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook&fbclid=IwAR0ufKrc1fTboNQ0Iw6r6M4-yXZDijZt7808DIVdgT-S7nCQOnWV4AyHF2s

The latest from AC/DC......

Carapaz - the new race leader.

wow - this road was not expecting a Grand Tour to come up it this year!

The colours here are amazing at the moment. What you can see on TV is exactly the same as what we have all around us. I must say, although I'm not a big fan of Winter, I do like having actual seasons :-)

Roglic in trouble? 15:06 Primoz Roglic (Jumbo-Visma) is chasing on his own some 20'' behind the bunch with 22km to go. Roglic gets back 15:09 Goerge Bennett (Jumbo-Visma) has helped the overall leader of La Vuelta 2020 return to the bunch. Gorka Izagirre (Astana) is some 20'' ahead of his chasers with 21km to go. The gap to the bunch is down to 3'11'

On the radio this morning they were talking about snow in Formigal. Not sure if they meant snow on the ground, sleet or it was actually snowing. Either way its going to be tough and cold.

They're about to come into Biescas - the town they started from this morning!

Ineos pulling the Peloton . . .

I could see the weather coming in from the foodstation, which was on a long straight-ish climb. By the time I left with my stash of goodies (photo's to follow) it was raining hard. Now I'm home to watch the end of the stage and it's still raining and the roads look well dodgy!

From what I'm reading online, the breakaway group has some big names in it. Much like this day in 2016!

Today I'm at the Stage 6 Feedstation. The bikes are quite a way off yet but the team cars are here with the food bags....

:-)

We had a really nice day yesterday at La Vuelta. I've posted some pics in the "La Vuelta 2020" thread. Last night we watched the "highlights" on TV and it was amazing to see the area we live in from the air. It's easy to get used to the mountains around here and to forget just how cool this countryside is. So much that we still haven't properly discovered! :-)

Def. true! I fell asleep for 10 mins one sunny afternoon laying in what looked like a beautiful green meadow. I was eaten alive by bugs, the longish grass - which looked dry - turned out to be wet underneath so I woke up wet and caught a chill as a result. Disaster!

Closer than I would have got!

Happy Days!