Cycle touring Spain South to North (Santander ferry)

[humankeith]

I'm looking to do a two week tour next year. My idea is to fly to the south of Spain, and then cycle up to Santander to take the ferry to Plymouth. Dates wise, I was thinking May or June as it should be warm but not too warm?

Has anyone done this and have any tips, blogs to read, or recommended routes? I'll be taking my Genesis Croix de Fer, and my preferred routes are as rural as can be and 'gravel' roads. I live in Devon and have come to like hills and 'views'. I'd also like to visit some interesting towns to wander around of an evening and eat local food..

I'd like to camp for most of the trip to keep costs down, and because I quite enjoy it. Is there a recommended source of campsites that ou recommend I check out?

Thank you for any recommendations or tips!

[Navrig]

Try this guy's blog:

http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/?o=1mr

[bikepacker]

There is a book called: A Trans-Iberian Challenge by Reg Andlaw and it documents his ride over the same ground but the other way round to your intended route. Maybe worth finding a copy and having a read.

[jacobean]

Accommodation in Spain off the beaten track is very cheap. And the price difference between a cheap hotel or pension and a camping pitch is not that great. I know you said you like camping but you might find yourself doing significant detours to find a campsite in some parts of interior Spain. Anyway, the website Pitchup seems to give a very comprehensive coverage of Spanish sites.

For Southern Spain, I would even say June is too hot. May might be a more suitable month. South of Madrid and daytime temps can easily reach 40 degrees even in June.

[MartinBrice]

The number of campsites I've seen in Spain can be counted on the fingers of one hand and I've ridden Gib-Madrid-France, Seville-Santiago, Santander-Leon-Santiago, and Seville northwards for a week, plus walked France-Santiago twice, out to Finisterre, from Porto-Santiago, and stayed in Minorca, Majorca. Love Spain, been there loads of times. Campsites are as rare as hen's teeth. In the summer it's far too hot to sleep in a tent, in the winter there are no tourists in the north, so camping just isn't what people do there, and sites you might find are likely to cater to caravans and motor homes.
A pension is about €20 or €30 a room and can easily be booked using Booking.Com, plus you won't have to carry camping kit and Google Translate can cope with just about any situation you're likely to find yourself in.

[MartinBrice]

And using PitchUp, which seems a clever site, asking for one night in August for one person with a tent shows 96 campsites across the entirety of Spain. That's very very few places to kip in an immense country.
Wild camping is illegal in Spain: be aware that they are (rightly) totally paranoid about the possibility of someone starting a fire. And while it's not difficult to sneak into a wooded area at darkness and put up a small tent if you are a walker and away by dawn, it's a very different kettle of fish if you're lugging a heavily loaded bike with panniers and camping kit etc.

[ossie]

Is there a recommended source of campsites that ou recommend I check out?

Thank you for any recommendations or tips!

You can look at Archies Camping. Very well utilised on the forum. I've used them for over a decade, they do various apps for android etc and you can download to Garmin as POI's/

http://www.archiescampings.eu/

A quick look shows a decent spread in Spain but would need some semi serious planning I'd suggest, rather than France where you can decide at 3pm and head towards your site of choice. That said the consensus for mainland Spain (I've only done the North ) is to consider local accommodation/ pensions as suggested in the posts above.

[horizon]

I have cycle-camped from Alicante to Granada and found a campsite every night doing low mileage days. I cycle-camped from Malaga to Motril (same) and from Santander to Valencia (same bar one or two nights). I’ve driven across Spain (Santander to Motril, Hendaye via Salamanca, Granada to Santander) and again camped every night.

So the sites are there but despite what I have written, they are few and far between and you can forget about getting your pegs in the ground. You might also have to argue not to pay for a whole pitch – it would certainly cost you more than a hostal (guesthouse).

I’ve tended recently to travel to Spain in the winter (plane and bus) so have naturally chosen hotels and pensions. Would I camp again in the summer by bike? Yes, if I had a specific route in mind (especially the coast) and was willing to do the research. But otherwise booking.com is a no-brainer.

It’s a shame as I prefer to camp and the heat doesn’t bother me and I like to sit outside and cook in the evening. But as someone wrote upthread, Spain isn’t like France when it comes to campsites.

[tmudd]

I cycled south from Madrid to Aguilas in February of last year (and onwards to Barcelona). As others have commented there are few campsites, the one I did stay on in this section around the Sierra de Segura was overpriced IMO and not set up for campers, but there were plenty of cheap b&bs, casas rurales etc. Following off road directions was a risky business and a few times I got sent down unpassable roads, however I found in general cars were courteous and safe. I discovered only afterwards that it is illegal to cycle without a helmet on extra-urban roads in Spain; I was not stopped. Compared with the coast I found cycling the inland areas to be pleasant though not suited for bashing out big mileage every day.

There is a great, very cheap youth hostel in Calarreone near Aguilas which at the fime was under 10EUR per night but which is not taking bookings at present.

[gregoryoftours]

I've cycled around Santander-picos in North Spain and around the Sierra Nevada/Andalucia in the South. I always managed to find places to wild camp without issue except for one day in the Picos when I stayed pitched until about 1pm within sight of a busy footpath in the national park! Got politely moved on by some rangers. Most of the wild camping was in really great spots, and also stayed in several very nice campsites. There is a municipal campsite near the lighthouse at Santander. I was in the South in march, and Picos in September.

[humankeith]

Thank you all for your comments. After exploring a bit on booking.com it does look like there is plenty of accommodation - a good reason to lighten the load!