Hotel Palome Arinsal

Today was my last full day in Andorra. There wasn't a huge amount to do. It wasn't snowing, but the wind was so fierce that it seemed like a sand storm made out of snow. I had a great time watching a group of cows grazing in snow up to their stomachs. Other than that I had a walk around town and spent about an hour at a ...

... that I am.<br><br> After I met up with my host and had some lunch, I decided to go for a walk and take some pictures. Andorra is certainly a beautiful place. The valleys are small enough that you can see all the details in the hills, and this makes for great scenery. It also makes for great walking, as you don't have to go too far before you are at the top of a huge hill and have a great view all around you.<br><br> The city has a good bit of old ...

... village et quand on est arrivé, il avait le marché du matin. On a acheter du vin à environ 1 euro le litre (vin de pays) et du bon fromage bleu pour le déjeuner.<br><br>On avait pas le droit de prendre des photos dans la grotte pour pas faire de la pollution lumineuse (il y avait déja des ptites pousses de plante pres des lanternes...ils veulent pas en rajouté non plus). Aussi il faut pas déranger les chauve souris...pauve cocottes...<br>

... What it does mean, we're not quite sure of yet. Still dealing with the shock and going over a few different options. All while kicking myself for not realizing this sooner. Only one thing is for certain - I'm not going to let this spoil our trip, and we're going to have to get cycling! (o.k., two things). <br>

... Piggies!<br><br>The wiener pigs are incredibly cute. They see you coming with the food and follow along with all sorts of little grunts and squeals. If you stop, they stop. If you make a sound, they make a sound. But as with all pigs, they love to eat. <br><br>Feeding the wieners entails getting into the enclosure, walking along, and then pouring the feed in a nice long line to they can all eat without too much shoving and fighting. But all ...

... the weekend and they&#8217;re ready for pickup and processing. Brian had always been interested in butchering meat, so here was an opportunity to learn a bit. <br><br>The drive back from the abattoir was more difficult than I&#8217;d expected. Sitting beside 4, ½ pig carcasses was less than comfortable. +6 degree weather outside we still drove with the windows down and the A/C on trying to get the temperature down to 2 or 3 ...

... person above is literally in your hands. <br><br> All in all it was a fabulous day! Did 4 climbs in total ranging through the 5a, 5b, and 5c levels of difficulty. I wanted to try a 5, but the day went by too quickly. There was one climb that Brain was sweating out for quite awhile, but in the end his determination conquered it. Rock climbing is the perfect blend of challenge and rest in beautiful mountain settings. I may be hooked&#8230;<br><br>

A side trip with the truck enabled us to get to areas we couldn&#8217;t normally access. Not that we would even attempt it on bicycles - vehicles are bad enough. Windy roads where motion sickness is a given, &#8216;oh ****&#8217; handles are coming loose from repetitive strain, and a straight section of road lasts about 20m. <br><br>Our goal was a little damned in lake almost on the ...

... and dinner, other days we were forced to go for a couple of drinkies to fill in the time.... One evening we took the half hour bus ride to the capital - Andorra La Vella. We were surprised how big the town seemed, but it was really just full of booze, ciggarette and perfume shops which was a bit dull. The first night out we went on was the obligatory 'bar crawl' organised by the reps - it started off really quite tame and we thought it ...

... of skiing. There was on particular incident at the beginning of the week, where Nikki took off down the slope and I was to follow, just before kicking off, the bunny club came wizzing past me, the little *****, skiing past me with no stocks and showing off. I'll show them, as I took off down the hill and headed straight into the trees and a pile of snow face first! During class, our instructor took an oath, that if he ...