Vuelta a España

For the past week, while I've been staying with my mother in Toronto, J has been staying with our good friends in Almeria, Spain. He had a very special day today, so I asked him to take over our blip. Here is how he describes his day:

"I spent my day today being a fan boy at the Vuelta a Espana cycling race.  Stage 11 of the race finished about 35 km from where I am staying in Almeria.  I rode to the pretty beach town of San Jose and had a lunch of arroz negro con marescos then rode back towards Almeria to the finish line at  another beach town, Capo de Gato.  

Here is a picture of Kaden Groves' bike throw to win the stage in a mass sprint to the line. I waited for 3 hours in this spot 10 meters from the finish so as to capture the group sprint.

There were a couple of other interesting things that I saw during my long wait.  The road was so hot that the finish line wouldn't stay stuck to the pavement.  Half an hour before the finish it was duct tape to the rescue.

On a sadder note, until this summer Capo de Gato was the only place in Europe with a wild population of flamingos.  Over the summer, a real estate developer drained the salt marsh where the birds nest and feed.  There are no more flamingos in Capo de Gato.  The people of the area have organized a campaign to restore the habitat with the slogan "SOS Salinas."  They distributed signs to the people near the finish line to draw attention to their cause.  One woman holding a sign had an appropriately coloured dress." #SOSSalinas