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01/11/2026

France & Spain 2026

01/11/2026

I am currently in the final stages of preparing for the next trip, (Asia coming up) and I’ve just realised that i never really closed out the France/Spain trip. After finishing the TET Sections, the VINCE and ACT Pyrenees, it was a bit of an anticlimax really, but might be interesting to some. I will post a short summary reel in a few minutes.

As you know I spent a long weekend in Bilbao with Mrs Hobo who flew out to meet me. It was our wedding anniversary and so the boat was pushed out. I arrived at the very posh hotel on a filthy motorbike, with dust covered soft luggage wearing rain drenched outer riding gear that had not been washed in 3000km. The doorman thought I was a delivery boy. When they realised I was actually staying, the bell boy, who had to offer to take my filthy gear was visibly relieved and truly grateful when i suggested he probably shouldn’t get his pristine white shirt dirty and I would carry it myself. After emptying my wallet and maxing out the credit card, Mrs Hobo headed back. I set off on the ride back to Dieppe. At some point in every trip I reach a very definite “go home” mode. It happens after the exciting part is over and my brain just focusses on getting back to the UK for a Pie and a Pint… I was at that point, but not in the headspace for a mind numbing motorway blast to cover big miles. Looking at the map I reckoned keeping off motorways and dual carriagways, whilst avoiding performance certificates from the Gendarmerie, and maintaining sensory perception on the glutinous maximus it would be probably 2 1/2 days. I thus had a very leisurely ride through the Basque country and up in to France reaching Poitiers for the first night. Looking at the map again and still avoiding the Tolls and dual carriageways I figured leaving early I could get to Dieppe in time to catch the evening ferry. Another leisurely but focussed ride saw me pull in to Dieppe Port early afternoon just as the afternoon ferry was pulling out. Loads of time for the evening. Except there had been an engine failure. Catching the next ferry meant finding a hotel and being back at the ferry terminal at 4:00am. Euggh. I only ever see 4:00am after a good night out with my mates. I do not get up for it. The alternative was ride another 300km and take a ferry from Calais. Being in go home mode I went for this and duly road to Calais. Boarding the ferry I realised that I had now added another 100km to my journey home from the port. I got home in the rain and the dark having covered just shy of 1000km. Event free and no big deal, but neither I nor my glutenous maximus are in a hurry to repeat that that on the 701 Enduro bike….

18/09/2026

The final day of the ACT. We head up gravel trial for about 30 km and then more twisty tarmac. Ready for a coffee the cafe we see is across the river so we decide to head on to the next one. The restaurants bars and cafes in all the places we next pass through are shut. We eventually rise up a pasture repeat with Donkeys and horses, that Hugo tells me are destined to become saussison, and over the border to France. About 80 km after deciding we need to stop we finally do... Coffee time is well past so we have lunch. It turns out to be the worst panini ever. The final day is turning out to be a challenge. The roads are great, but after 14 days non stop and pretty intense riding we are knackered. We are also a lot further north and both the temperature and the cloud descend as we draw closer to our destination. Despite the Belgian assassination squads best attempt to take us out, we make it to the end of the ACT Pyrenees. Only about 1000 miles to go... First a b**r and good nights kip! Hugo will head off for family stuff in the morning. I will stay in a posh hotel Bilbao with Mrs Hobo for a couple of days to top up energy levels......and brownie points..... before heading home....

17/09/2026

Managed to put together some clips to show the varied riding on the ACT Pyrenees these past few days.

16/09/2026

Penultimate day. After the best breakfast in a fortnight we head up the road, feed the bikes breakfast too, and set off. In different directions. I downloaded the ACT gpx earlier in the year and Hugo has the latest version, This bypasses significant chunks of the main N260 road with backroads and trails. So I re ride the 8km of fast hairpins I've just ridden before realising I was alone, and join Hugo on a newly resurfaced back road. After seeing his back wheel step out about a foot, I realise that although this looks like tarmac it is actually a non adhered layer of small gravel on top of special non stick tar. It is considerably less grippy than normal gravel trails . Both our brains struggle treating what looks like perfectly good knee down tarmac, like a wet slippery gravel trail. Once again, throughout the day, we twist and turn through fantastic scenery and get in to parts of the mountains that are truly stunning. Hence all the mountain pics. And they are only a small selection. The ACT version 9 detours are great but do add up to make this a long day with a sting in the tail. There is a petty gnarly section over the top from Jaca towards Hecho. ( It would be very tough in the wet) Hugo's bike overheats a couple of times and we are glad to finally join a road. Except it turns out to be freshly scattered with the same special non stick gravel as this morning! This lasts for nearly 30km on what would otherwise be a fantastic., nadgery, twisty road. We are both bushed by the time we get to our freshly refurbished hotel. When I say fresh and refurbished , it probably was in about 1972.....

15/09/2026

Day three is another long day with our hour and 15 to get back to the route before we start. I organise a coffee machine and capsules to get us that first 35km to petrol and breakfast. The coffee machine manages to beat Hugo and swallows his capsule while I am loading my bike. Plugging the machine in gives me an advantage and I manage a shot of caffeine before we leave. The latest version of the ACT map (version 9) cuts out big stretches of the original main road routing and replaces it with some fantastic out of the way back roads and forestry trails than run above and below (gorges) the N260. The day is an excellent balance of all road surfaces and panoramic vistas. The highlight is a trip up a remote valley that just gets better with every turn. I have no superlatives. This section is simply one of the best 30 miles I have ridden. Anywhere. It is also perfectly manageable on a bigger adventure bike. I'm sure that I will be back with others. All in all a bloomin brilliant day and hats off to the team that put this route together.

15/09/2026

Day 2 of the ACT. A section of this route is an old smuggler route into/out of Andorra. It runs up in the mountains high above the main road and bypasses the border posts completely. It is a great track that has some fantastic views. You've got to wonder what their systems do when they scan a vehicle exiting Andorra that as far as their computers are concerned never entered? All I can tell you is no alarms go off and the border guards do not draw their guns! Our hotel is about 35 km away from La Seu d'Urgell. Google reckons an hour and 15. I rekon it is wrong. Turns out to be one of the twistiest tarmac roads I have ever ridden. With fatigue setting in at the end of a very long day. Google turns out to be right.

14/09/2026

Navigation exercise over it's time to start the ACT Pyrenees of course it is a bank holiday weekend here in Catalonia and hotel accommodation is like rocking horse dirt. We finally managed to persuade the hotel we're currently staying in to let us back tonight for more pieces of silver than it's really worth. We are up pronto to undertake the slog to our starting point. After more than 2000km so far, riding only twisties and off road, the 30km motorway section is an unpleasant shock. The ACT route today turns out to be a perfect balance off long ish off road sections and some really good windy tarmac. Those who put the route together did a great job. The 30km there and back to ascend El Moixer at 4700feet was good fun. The view from the top was fantastic with visibility of 30-35 miles despite it being hazy.

13/09/2026

Day 3 the rain has stopped, and we decided to head back to finish the day we started yesterday. It may be dry, but the temperature has plummeted. Our gear is still soaked from yesterday so it is blooming freezing. We know it will get warmer, eventually, and head out into some fantastic scenery again to complete all of the checkpoints we had planned yesterday pretty quickly. We identify a few more that are kind of on the way back to the hotel, and then spend the afternoon eventually managing to find only two of them. The tag on the tree Hugo looks so pleased with, took a bit of finding. Our electronic cold turkey has produced three fantastic morning rides and three very frustrating afternoons. Amazingly, when the scores are totted up back at base we discover that we were reasonably well off the bottom. But we know we can do better next year....... maybe...

12/09/2026

Day 2. It is raining. In fact it is bucketing down. An absolute deluge. 100mm in an hour! Still we head out. Then the lightning starts. We ascend upwards towards the source of the big sparks. As we ascend the rain backs off a little and by the time we reach the first checkpoint we are in patchy cloud in only light rain. My old waterproof shell however seems to have given up. I am actually soaked and the rain has simply run down the jacket behind the guilty alleged waterproof, to the top of my jeans which are now also soaked. The track is rocky but fairly straightforward. At the bottom of the track we are back in the deluge and Hugo has a puncture. He manages to squirl his way a couple of km up the road to a restaurant car park. After a quick coffee, we discover that there is no way his front wheel spindle is coming out with the tools we have. Our checkpoint collection is now over and I head off in yet another absolute monsoon, while Hugo stays dry, to summon the help of an alleged bike mechanic 12km away. He is not in. Hugo calls recovery and in true top gear style I abandon him to his fate and head back to the hotel to dry off and warm up.

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