Andorra

Wolfi's original idea was that we would just drive through Andorra, because it's so tiny country. I had never been there and got really interested of it after reading some pages in internet. Very peculiar little country with long history and interesting political status. So I wanted to spend few days there and look around a bit...

The drive from Toulouse to Andorra was one of the worst legs on our trip, at least for me! The whole 160km we had heavy rain and extremely bad side wind and in the end we came to a winter wonderland!

When we arrived to our hotel Wolfi dared to say that it wasn't so bad... I almost strangulated him, because I barely survived alive!!! The last few kilometers before Andorra on the mountain road were very bad for me: the wind was heavily trying to slide me of the road and I had to use all my powers to stay up and few times I slided so badly, that I was just few centimeters from the edge of the road! Not fun at all :( We didn't have to drive in snow, but the streets were still pretty slippery. It was only +8C degrees in the last half of the leg. Check out the video in the next post...

In front of the hotel I also got stuck in a pile of soft snow, but luckily there was a very nice man who gave me a push :) Haven't had such experience before with my Suzi!

The snowy view from our window. This is actually France, the border river runs just in front of these buildings.

The heavy wind bent even some street signs down!

Andorra is all about tourists and shopping, that's why it was great to be there off season! In Pas de La Casa we just had a small problem: where to find food? All we could see was shops full of alcohol, tobacco and perfumes! So we had to ask help from an Info-place and the guy working there instantly knew who we were! "Are you the Finns with the motorbikes?" Well, we must have been quite a scene when we arrived. The only motorists in snow and doing about three circles around the town before finding our hotel... :D
We got instructions to a grocery shop and on the first visit the guy there was a bit amazed about our veggie bags, but on the next day he was heavily talking about the differences in plastic bag usage between northern and southern Europeans... Obviously he had done some thinking in the night :D

Tax free paradise.

The next day everything was totally different! No signs of heavy wind, snow or coldness anymore.  So we had a nice hike on the hills and enjoyed some sun :)

Pas de La Casa.

On the second day we had a small ride around the country. Gorgeous mountains with snowy tips, beautiful forests and extremely fun curvy roads, and amazingly hot in sun!

We had a delicious, although a bit unhealthy, lunch in the only veg-friendly place we found from Happy Cow. Tot en Pita is a pita/falafel-place and we had yummy vegan falafels with huge amount of hummus! The portions are enormous and I had to take some of mine with. No chance I could've eaten it all at once! The service was also very nice and helpful, so we can warmly recommend the place :)

Huge falafels with hummus and some salad.

The parking lots for 'Motos' are not made for big bikes or sidecars!!!

btw. On our three night stay in Andorra, girls didn't pee or poo there a single time... :D

~ Ilta