A Day Of Exploring

With no team directors yet on-site, the BMC Racing Team
mechanics called the shots for Sunday morning's training ride.
Calella, Spain – Another sunny day Sunday in Spain on the eve of the Volta a Catalunya. Sometimes I forget what country I'm in – and particularly at this hotel, everyone speaks good English.

A few highlights:

- I could not watch the Creighton University NCAA Tournament men's basketball game (nor the women's, for that matter.). It was geo-restricted. So I was left to watch the CBS "Game Tracker" feature, which was actually pretty nice. Creighton trailed pretty much the whole game, got a lot of shots blocked, shot poorly and ended up losing to North Carolina.

- Dr. Scott Major and I went on a nice evening walk after the team meeting. It was one of the few times I've had time to really get out and explore a place. The weather was nice and we saw a hospital, a church and the street vendor area by the beach.

- Dr. Major was kind enough to take my photo on the beach today. Nice for a new Facebook profile photo.

- I picked up a surprise for Veronica when Dr. Major and I were out. It turns out if you walk farther away from the beach, the lower the prices get on all the same items that all the stores carry.

- Sadly, the McDonalds restaurant by the beach was closed. A lot of places are closed until April 1, the merchants who were open told us.

- The food has been good and the hotel wifi is great when the riders aren't around. Sadly, my Tether.com is not working. I need to work on fixing that Monday.

I'll let the photos tell the story of the rest of my day.

I did a double take when I saw this ("First National Bank") shirt.

It's warm here (60s) but apparently not beach weather.

Check out the mini flat fix-it kit, featuring an Elite bottle,
Continental tire and Park tool mini-pump. Nice.

There's a nice walkway and bike path along the beach.

View of the beach-side shops. Pretty bare this time of year.

Dr. Scott Major is hurdling a temporary pop-up street
blocker. It allows the street to be automatically opened
or closed. When it's closed, the pop-up device lights up red.

How often do you see a pay phone these days – much
less two of them next to each other?

This is brilliant. Curbside recycling bins. I see them
a lot here in Europe. Like motion-activated lights in
hotel hallways, the Euros are sometimes way ahead of us.

Can you tell which hotels are open and which are not?