Heading out of our base in Xalo following the now familiar CV-750, through Alcalali and then turning northwards onto the CV-715 towards Orba, we were planning to follow a route we'd already done a couple of times, the lovely 'Pego/Secret Valley loop' as we've come to think of it. However, after easily negotiating the rolling roads between Xalo and the outskirts of Pego it suddenly dawned on us that all of the cars we could see parked along the side of the road might have something to do with a cycle race notice we'd spotted a week beforehand. It did, the 5th stage of the Volta La Marina series. Interestingly, it appear an earlier race in the series, from Xalo, was won by none other than Alistair Brownlee, British Olympic gold medallist! Who knew we were cycling in such prestigious pedal strokes.
Anyway, unable to follow our planned route up and over to La Vall d'Ebo, we carried on through Pego instead, taking the CV-700 out of town for a few kilometres before turning right onto the CV-728 to negotiate the short climb to the 170 m Port de Sorell.Descening into El Rafal d'Almunia, we then followed the CV-729 to Beniarbeig and then the CV-732 through Pedreguer and onwards to Gata de Gorgos, getting stopped en route to watch the peloton of the Volta La Marina sweep through ahead of us. The roads were good and pretty much flat.
At Gata de Gorgos we then picked up the CV-748 to negotiate a beautiful, steadily climbing valley all the way back to Xalo to complete a 60-km loop. The roads had neither been completely flat, or too steep at any point. There'd been a little climbing, but not too much. It was just a nicely pleasant, rolling loop.
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