KLMNO

Travel

SUNDAY, MAY 29 , 2022. SECTION F

EZ EE

NAVIGATOR

Here’s how to use

ride-hailing services

more effectively on

your next vacation. F2

CALIFORNIA

In a time of uncertainty,

a weekend getaway

to quirky Santa Cruz

is a sure thing. F4

TRENDS

Solo cruising is becoming

increasingly popular.

Could it be the right

choice for you? F5

BY KAREN GARDINER

The birds weren’t supposed to
be there. A length of rope strung
along the island’s rocky ground
clearly demarcated a pathway,
the boundary separating tens of
thousands of gannets from my
group of eight humans. If anyone
had explained this to the gannets,
though, they weren’t letting on.
Four sat stubbornly on the path-
way I wanted to move along, their
icy-blue eyes pitiless and their
long, white necks stretched
toward me, threatening with
their scissor-like bills. I remem-
bered the advice from our guide,
Maggie, not to linger, lest they
fixate on our legs. Too late. I
stepped onto the path and a bill
spiked my calf.
I was on Bass Rock, the tiny
Scottish island from which the
northern gannet gets its scientific
name, Morus bassanus. While I
winced at the stab of pain in my
leg as I rushed across the path, I
tried to focus on a greater sense of
humility. I was an outsider in a
world belonging utterly to gan-
SEE BASS ROCK ON F3

Scotland’s

Bass Rock

belongs to

the birds

BY DINA MISHEV

I didn’t think physics and the laws of gravity

allowed this, but it is possible to go 3 mph — slower

than a motivated pedestrian — on a bicycle without

falling over. Had someone told me this before I

started riding up the nearby mountain, Rocacorba,

a classic and amazingly steep road bike ride near

the northern Spanish city of Girona, I would not

have believed them. But, grinding my way up the

mountain, both my Garmin GPS watch and cycling

computer mounted on my rental bike’s handlebars

— I’m so incredulous, I have to check both — agree

that my riding speed is, in fact, apace with a

sleepwalking snail.

My trajectory up the road, which ascends

approximately 2,600 vertical feet over about seven

miles, is far from straight. To keep myself from

tipping over, I’m constantly adjusting my steering

and body position, which results in a path that

“wobbly” barely begins to describe. About four

miles into the climb, shortly after the road goes

from steep to stupidly steep, I think toppling over

onto the pitted pavement might be less painful than

grinding up it.

Even in the granniest of granny gears, it’s

impossible for me to pedal smoothly up pitches

with grades approaching, and sometimes exceed-

ing, 13 percent. I feel sharp, stabby pains in both

knees. Road rash seems preferable.

In early April, on the first day of a week-long

cycling vacation, there is no particular reason

beyond curiosity that I decide to ride from Girona

to Rocacorba via Lake Banyoles, the cattail-ringed

lake that was the site of the rowing events during

the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.

I’m curious about Rocacorba, because it is easily

SEE GIRONA ON F6

Cycling up, down

and around Girona

The northern Spanish city has become a hot spot f or recreational riders

PHOTOS BY DINA MISHEV FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted travel domestically and around the world. You will find the latest developments at washingtonpost.com/coronavirus/

TOP: Cyclists ride along a field of blooming canola, which, for about a month every spring, light up the Spanish landscape with

their neon-yellow hue. ABOVE: The Passeig de la Muralla offers views of Girona and its surrounding mountains.