Tour of the Pyrenees

The Pyrenees on tarmac, eight days out of Castelldefels near Barcelona, taking in a micro-nation, a walled city and one of the best coast roads in Europe on the way home.

Montserrat opens it, a monastery founded roughly a thousand years ago and built into a wall of eroded rock pinnacles above the plain, which is startling to arrive at by road. Two nights follow at Peramola by way of Cardona and La Seu d’Urgell, and then Andorra la Vella, which is a sovereign state of eighty thousand people wedged between France and Spain and reached only by mountain pass.

Carcassonne provides the rest day, crossed into France over the Col de Puymorens. The walled city there is the largest fortified town in Europe, heavily restored in the nineteenth century and none the worse for it. The return to Spain goes through Camprodon across remote and largely traffic-free country, with the Gorges de Galamus on the route, and the last day runs the coast road between Sant Feliu and Lloret de Mar, which is cut into the cliffs and deserves an unhurried morning.

Edelweiss include a choice of BMW motorcycle, seven nights of hotels with some in historic buildings, a guide and a tour book. Flights are separate, and a guided city tour of Barcelona can be added at 350 euros per person with a 65 euro single supplement. Prices are per person for 2026. The Pyrenees are less crowded than the Alps and the passes are longer and emptier, which makes this a strong alternative for a rider who has done the Alpine circuit already.