Touring Spain on an inappropriate bike
You don’t need a tourer to go touring. Suzuki’s SV650 devours a 2000-mile Spanish trek
SIX DAYS AGO I packed my 1999 Yamaha R6 and some riding gear into a steel crate in Swindon and waved it all goodbye in preparation for my first European trackday in the south of Spain. But instead of taking the short flight to Cartegena to meet with my bike at the track (like a normal person) I opted to get the ferry to Santander and ride my SV test bike on the most scenic of routes. A solo trip that would take the best part of two weeks to complete on what is definitely not a long-distance touring bike.
But now, halfway through the journey, I’m sitting slumped next to the SV, a disgusting sweaty mess, at the Circuit de Cartegena. I’ve just done a quick fuel fun to the nearby town and have a few minutes before my next track session to reflect on what has already been an epic ride.
It’s winter, so most of Spain is closed – and it’s brilliant. I’ve ridden for hours at a time without seeing a soul. The scenery has changed so much in the space of 700 miles. The SV’S been through forests and valleys, across barren plains, behind castle walls, into ramshackle villages and over twisty mountain passes.
Admittedly, I made a few rookie mistakes along the way. I was caught out by the ruthless efficiency of Santander’s border control,
and had to ride through town half-dressed after they hurried me on my way. I was cursing the SV’S awful headlight in the fog atop the first of many mountain passes... until I realised I’d left my ferry boarding pass taped over the headlight. But, you live and learn – and as I sit beside the track at Cartegena, it’s hard to imagine how this trip could get better. But it will. In two short days, my motorcycling mind will be blown.
Editor and font-of-asphalt-knowledge Simon had programmed a series of routes into the sat nav on my handlebars. The more I follow it, the better the riding gets. Every day there’s a surprise set of bends that trumps the last one, so when it starts raining on my last day on track, I pack the R6 away and jump on the SV to attack the Spanish roads. The rain doesn’t let up all day, but a wander around the town of Calpe and an early night is fine by me.
The rain stopped overnight and the sun’s out, so an early start seems like a good idea. I’m taking the CV-755 out of Calpe and heading north towards Mantilla on a seven-hour series of twisty mountain roads. After the best part of 48 hours of solid rain, everything is soaking and there’s a low, thick fog across the top (best) bit of the 755. But soon the sun burns the fog away as I’m getting higher and higher on another narrow, sinuous mountain pass.
There’s a short section with inches of snow on either side of the road, but it disappears as I lose altitude. After miles of swooping through back-to-back bends, I’m admiring the view as I casually roll along the CM-3201 into the town of Alcala del Jucar. This view itself is worth the ride, but on the other side of this small town is easily the best road of the whole journey. The second you exit the town, the 3201 starts relentlessly climbing higher and higher, each corner totally different to the last, with dry-stone walls on one side and the most amazing view back over the village on the other.
Finally, a not-too-dangerous place to stop appears and I park up to gaze back down from the top, which shows the most intricate ribbon of tarmac flowing beneath
“As I get higher, the sun burns the fog away”