GETTING THERE

et you can’t wait to lie flat out on that beach,” offered the cheery fellow at the Meet and Greet reception, as we dropped off our car at Manchester Airport before racing to catch our flight to Gran Canaria.

What to say in response? Of course I couldn’t wait. Especially as the rain was

FLIGHTS with Jet2 (jet2.com) cost around £97 from Stansted and from around £117 from Manchester.

Prestige Holidays (prestigeholidays.co.uk) has packages for a range of hotels offering cycle-friendly experiences including The Cordial Mogan Playa Hotel, which hires racing, mountain and e-bikes as well as creating DIY cycle routes and offering guided tours. slanting down outside, the sky a forbidding gun-metal grey. Though not as dark, it must be said, as the cloud passing over my husband’s face.

“Oh, I won’t be lying on the beach,” he replied, shaking his head as if to dispel such a contaminating thought.

Well, why would he? I mean there we were, escaping the winter gloom for a week in the Canaries where the daytime temperature was averaging a rather toasty 24C. But here’s the thing. My husband isn’t just another holiday maker. He is also a fanatical — and I mean, fanatical — cyclist.

And while the prospect of leaping off the hamster wheel and onto a lilo couldn’t have been more appealing to me, he had already found places there to rent a bike.

Considering the growing popularity of cycling in the UK, holidaying with a spouse who itches to get in the saddle when all you want to do is relax, is starting to become an occupational relationship hazard.

But this is where Gran Canaria scores. For the active, there are endless places to bike like a lunatic, along with hiking routes. For the rest of us, plenty