Day 11 León to Pola de Lena, 54 miles

After stuffing ourselves at the all you can eat buffet breakfast we set off on our epic climb.  We stopped in a little town  with the most eccentric and lovely cafe for coffee The first 38 miles was gradually climbing through a beautiful valley up to Puerto de Pajares, the mountain pass that takes you over the Cantabrian mountains into Asturias up at 1378m - higher than Ben Nevis!! Hard to believe, we put our gillet son for the descent and oh boy, I was glad I had proper working brakes. The first bit was really steep - 17%, 15% and 13% but gradually I got used to it and stopped to take pictures, after all I had spent all day climbing up the mountain. We stopped for a cold drink at a cafe at 1100m altitude where we met some other English cycle tourers photo is by them.   In the last 16km we descended 1000m!  What a fabulous day. Our bikes did us proud today.