Basajaun

Day 1. Opening day was a beauty. Since things were going too easily, epic mode switched itself on twenty miles in: on a singletrack section in hike-a-bike mode — on foot, bike in hand — I felt something strange underfoot, looked down, and the sole of my shoe was literally hanging by a thread. I put it in my pocket, tried to remount and pedal on the other one, and a few minutes later found myself pushing the pedal with half a bare foot — one of those unnecessary reflexology sessions. Too much road, too much triathlon: the poor Scott mountain bike shoes had been forgotten in a corner, and their day had long since come and gone. It was a Sunday, almost everything was shut, and we had to find a fix off-route. It was only seventy-five miles to the Decathlon in Pamplona, with a good few rock-strewn descents still in the way. I seem to be a magnet for this kind of stunt. I went into suffer-to-the-end mode, and Inça saved it by reminding me I could mount the soles on the pedals and ride on top of them however I could. Descents taken with respect, a slip here and there, but it worked. Snail’s pace and a game of patience for most of the day, plus a twelve-mile detour to the Decathlon, where I retired the Scotts and walked out with the only 46s in the store that didn’t pinch: a pair of Giros. Handsome things, too — sorry, it had to be said. Gorgeous scenery, a great deal of loose rock, and the full-suspension bike on 38 mm tires doing the job. There was no sense chasing the loss too hard: we shut up shop at eleven at night on a flower bed with a tree for a roof, next to an old building, to wake early and claw it back.

Day 2. Out in the cool, warmed up immediately by a serious climb asking for less clothing. A fine crossing with the Camiño and, once up high, animals everywhere, adapted to their context — over-muscled horses, goats and cows everywhere. Then a lot of bike-in-hand: somebody had the genius idea of sending us more than an hour through bramble wrapped in mist, at a rate of progress that is glacial to anyone used to the road, with neither the distance nor the elevation giving you any way to guess how long the thing would take. The terrain you chose is the boss. The descent to the Irabia reservoir, the climb and the top of Abodi, and dozens of text messages welcoming me to France over the course of the hours. End of day rough again — this time the porch of a church in Zuazu, to take the edge off the damp. As for a shower, don’t even ask. But I did brush my teeth.

Day 3. Away a little earlier, in time for a solid scrub of the legs to catch the sunrise beside a wind farm. An incredible descent and good rolling down to a small Indiana Jones gorge that would show up on the set again later. A hard climb to Gallipienzo and Ujué, always on gravel and loose rock — tarmac would have been too easy. It was mid-morning and already hot enough to dehydrate in, and we still had no idea what the main course, the Bardenas Reales, was going to be. When we left the last café before it, in Mélida, the owner asked only whether we were stupid. Maybe a little.

Three bottles plus a trail bladder, and it very nearly wasn’t enough.

The landscape was surreal, another planet. Heat that wrapped all the way around you, and one long, cracking climb at over 14 percent inside that frying pan. I ended up handing over water and helping another rider through a serious case of heatstroke — not an easy thing to watch. Then off at a run in search of more water, and a late afternoon along irrigation canals, capped with another climb to a wind farm. Same as on the NorthCape, after two nights in the open it was time to go bourgeois. And we tried. But the only room available inside thirty miles was too good to be true — five minutes later the owner called to cancel. At midnight, a plot twist: the back of the church turned out to be windy and drawing the wrong crowd, and with the whole camp already set up, one last attempt came good. Pack it all away, back on the bikes: the first hotel night of the trip was fifteen minutes down the road. And yes! A shower!

Day 4. In the morning, for the first time, a lot of complaints from the body. A string of bike paths took us to gorges and then to hot, dry climbs one after another. It got ugly for a while, a good stretch with no water, but the little towns kept saving us with fountains and cafés. Some of the passes were up at 4,600 feet (1,400 m), always dropping and climbing again, with the engine still registering the Bardenas from the day before. A hand patching a flat on the descent, and a bocadillo of egg and chorizo worth weeping over. Ice cream at every stop and declarations of love to cold water fountains. To close it out, a preview of the beast we’d be attacking before dawn the next day — and a village mid-festival in a way only that part of the world manages. The day died, but only after another nine miles of climbing in the dark up to the Monastery of Valvanera.

Day 5. A cold start out of the monastery, on a gradient where stopping meant not getting going again. More than seven miles of climbing up to 6,530 feet (1,990 m), complete with a thunderstorm and rain capes coming out while it was still dark, and two more flats before the top — a memorable ascent, the queen climb of the whole thing. After that came nearly thirty miles of descending, a set of technical trails and a lot of hike-a-bike, all the way to exhaustion, especially in the hot hours. But the miles ticking down toward the end made every bit of it worth it. Riding back into Vitoria was emotional, with everything that had happened in those five days still refusing to fit inside my head.

The Basajaun was proof that the body had come back to a place it could dream about RAAM from — not in theory, but across five straight days of gravel, heat and self-support, alongside someone who had already shared the Portugal Divide and the NorthCape with me.