Mallorca_May_2014

Majorca Club Holiday...May 2014..

During May a contingent of club members visited the Island of Majorca. The trip was organised through Audrey (Majorca Wheels). The visits tend to be May and October. You book your own flight and Audrey looks after the accommodation and taxi from the airport to the resort of Can Picafort, the hotel is the Janeiro, which is an ideal cycling base providing first class buffet style food and bike storage. The hotel also boasts 2 swimming pools, fitness and sauna centre.

Some members prefer to take their own bikes but for not a lot more hire facilities are readily available and in my case preferable as I feel a triple chainset makes life easier on the longer climbs in the heat of the day... On arrival a welcome party is arranged for newcomers, but this is not essential to attend as most members have been before and are familiar with the surroundings, as such there are no organised rides, these tend to be divided into ability and distance, which leaves people to pick and choose what they feel like, no pressure then, unless you are one of Steve Ginty's gang in which case you will be press ganged into a long day in the saddle, he takes no prisoners and he's not the club 24 hour champion for nothing!

The first day on the road we covered 96 miles and didn't get back till 6.30pm, Kevin Chicken(that's his real name!) didn't know what he had let himself in for, he was on his knees!! Mind you the rest of us were pretty Knackered too!. The following days followed a similar pattern, until Sunday, when Joe Croughan, Kev and myself decided to have an easy day to Formentor... We had a number of punctures which I suppose is to be expected, what we didn't bargain for was Joe's rear mech getting tangled up in the back wheel ripping off the hangar with it, without further ado Joe donned his blue gloves and used Pete's chain splitter, removed the mech, shortened the chain and off we went....which meant the last 2 days he had to hire a bike

After 5 days it was decided the dreaded Sa Colabra would be tackled, the problem is that it is a fair distance away and en route the Luc Monastry climb has to be tackled. Some of the photos taken by Simon might show Kev in the picture, but true to his name he 'chickened' out of the big one, as did Joe, he didn't fancy it on the hire bike.

That was another long day and we didn't get the lunch stop in Pollensa until 4pm, Mark by this time was as usual 'starving', Steve suggested it wasn't worth stopping, but he was overruled.

I have to say our group of 9 rode well together, no arguments, no hissyfits and as a result enjoyed some excellent cycling on generally good roads with good sunny weather... There was a discussion as to returning next May, but suggestions are being made about returning to Mons for the annual audax (watch this space).

I could add more to this report, but feel this is sufficient, the photographs are provided by our own expert Simon (Kirwan)and stats by Will (White)

For any member not having visited the Island it is well worth the trip and excellent value.

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Colin Baldwin. El Presidente

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