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PORTUGAL CYCLING: Days 4 & 5 Baleal – Lisbon – Setúbal – Vila Nova de Milfontes

Total: 40 kms + 95 kms (135 kms)
Avg speed: 20 km/h & 21.5 km/h
Top speed: 52 km/h & 59 km/h
Overall total: 470 Kms.

Roadkill count: 2 birds and 1 stone. 1 mouse.

What a treat Baleal proved to be! We enjoyed our first lie in after sharing our new German and Aussie friends’ 0.49 euro cents wine bottle(s). A great night of storytelling, drinking, but a slow start to Day 4 as a consequence. This was definitely our well deserved half day off., or so we liked to think. Muito obregado to Peniche Guest House and their friendly Portuguese (Joanna) and Canadian (Jonas) hosts!

We enjoyed a lazy start to the day vegging out and taking in Baleal’s beauty. A laid back surf town with 2 beaches (north & south), a small island joined to the mainland by a spit of sand and about 50 or so chic houses tucked into cobbled lanes., Baleal is a marvellous place to unwind. So we took advantage… until we realised around lunchtime that we had to get on our bikes (literally).

Baleal Beach (Sul)

If we decided to hit Sagres or Lagos by Friday as planned, we needed to cut out Lisbon. As we’d both visited before, we made an executive decision and skipped her out. Cheating a little I guess, but we were here on holiday for beaches, nature and exploring new things, not to get stuck in another city. We also learnt that intuition, making your own decisions and going with the flow works just as well as planning, listening to local knowledge and relying on Lonely Planet (LP). We were advised to take the bus to Lisbon at a station nearby in Peniche (bikes not accepted, 1-2 hrs wasted). So we took the train instead, but had to cycle 30 kms inland to find it (and chase it.. more on this later!). Then LP recommended just one of many potential Lisbon stations to connect us to our destination: Setúbal. (Long story, but the train didn’t operate in June). As a result of both, we wasted 2-3hrs. But this was our holiday, why should we care about time? ‘Don’t sweat the small stuff’ and all that.

So… back to the James Bond moment bus/train story. Actually no this is a story best told at the pub, so you’ll just have to contact one of us privately about it. But there are a couple of sneak preview bike photos below

So fast forwarding a few hours and after being kicked off one train from an over zealous, jobs-worth, ticket inspector for using our bikes on the train at rush hour (19.45!), we finally arrived in Setúbal around 9pm. We found immaculate accommodation at a youth hostel for only 14 Euros a night each, then gave into temptation and ripped into an awesome Pizza Hut menu. Mmmmmmm. Yum yum.

We awoke at 6am (our earliest start), to catch the ferry across one of Portugal’s largest estuaries south. A 15 min trip across the water saved us at least half a day. On the other side, we finally found some wilderness. A fast, direct 50 kms through one of Portugal’s many national parks with little transport, brought us to Sines, which the Romans used as a port and industrial centre. The town had a wonderful castle and one its notable citizens was a particular ‘Vasco da Gama‘, the famous Portuguese explorer and commander of the first ships to India.

Ferry from Setúbal

We were making really good progress for the first time on the trip; the weather was perfect, the scenery phenomenol and hardly any cars in sight! Surely something had to give? It did. First my rear tyre below out and later Andy’s derailleur hanger snapped off 12 kms short of our target town: Vila Nova de Milfontes (or ‘New village of a thousand fountains or springs’), what a cool name!

Would be get there before nightfall? The heat was stifling and we decided to walk the final 12kms. Averaging 4 km/h that would take 3 hrs, time to cream up! But some ingenuity on Andy’s part cut this to around 2 hrs with his new freewheelin/skatebike manoeuvre! See more below (left pic)…

With the sun racing towards the horizon we were getting a little tired and frustrated, what would we do next? Would we actually find accommodation in this popular tourist town? Could the bike be fixed? Would this prematurely signal the end of the trip? If so, how would we get to Sagres, Lagos or Faro, another 150 kms away. No fear though, stay calm. After glancing across the road to the right Andy noticed a few interesting motor-bikes, but more importantly a mountain bike which was being fixed by a rather vocal, eccentric bike mechanic. Scurrying over the the shop, we were in for more luck as the bike which was being fixed was owned by Miguel, a local fluent English speaker who’d just returned from travelling the Far East. Lots in common and 2 hrs later ‘digitallll’ mechanic man ‘Tony’ sanded, tinkered and tailored and the trip was back on, we would not capitulate after all!

Long road to Vila Nova de Milfontes (above right). Fixing Andy’s bike (below), with mechanic Tony, traveller Miguel and chirpy, random dwarf dude. Bottom pic: what the dreaded derailleur hanger looks like before snapping.