A subdued flight home to Britain was the prediction from Simon Rose, our guide and the owner of Velo Club Ibiza, the leading bike-touring and hire firm on the Balearic island.
It's usually the case, after partygoers return home after a long weekend or week or two of hard yards on the dance floor.
From wide-eyed to glassy-eyed, the return flight back to Bristol was indeed far more restrained than the raucous booze-fuelled one that had taken us out.
I, too, was slumped in the seat – for very different reasons. It was Ibiza’s roads that we'd been hitting, not its clubs. I’d been interested in coming here since attending a Majorca training camp several years ago, where, also present, was Ibiza DJ Paul Newman – aka Tall Paul.
He’s a man who lives up to the moniker with his stature, but he didn’t let his size get in the way of ripping my legs off up the steep slopes of Sa Calobra, Majorca’s most famous climb.
Paul had talked up the terrain of Ibiza and, if he was getting in this sort of shape there, surely some cracking riding was in store.
Shock and ale
The third largest of the Balearic Islands behind Majorca and Menorca, it sits in the middle in terms of how lumpy its terrain is, with a higher maximum altitude (475m) than Menorca (358m) but some way short of the 1,436m of Majorca’s Puig Major, a mountain – among many others – that explains the gravitational pull that the island exerts on road cyclists around the world.
That 475m, though, along with what I’d heard about how up and down the terrain was, seemed ideal fodder for an opening salvo of the season: testing, yes, just not overly onerous. A refamiliarisation with riding mountain passes, but no shock to the system.
What was a shock to the system it was, however, for three middle-aged cyclists – whose clubbing days weren’t just well behind them but had never really got going to begin with – to be catapulted into Ibiza towards midnight on a Saturday.
We'd also unknowingly booked a hotel in a location not exactly conducive to a peaceful night’s sleep ahead of an early start and 100km in Ibiza’s hills.
Trying to sleep when you can feel bass in your bones is never ideal pre-ride prep.
All of which meant that in the morning I didn’t so much as wake from sleep but open my eyes having had them intermittently closed for six hours.
Who needs coffee to wake up when you’re already so wide-eyed?
Simon delivered the bikes to us – from Basso, an Italian brand more common in Spain and Italy than the UK – and we rolled out of town to begin our day just as many here were calling it a night.
After guiding us safely out onto the start of the country roads, Simon turned and headed back into town, as he had more customer deliveries to make.
He’d join us the next day, leading a ride through the opposite side of the island, in the very lumpy west.
Grand slam
The route was given to us by cycling coach Ben Wilson, who’d helped devise and lead rides at the 2016 Dallaglio Cycle Slam, the flagship fundraising event of former England rugby captain Lawrence Dallaglio’s charity, RugbyWorks.
That year, the event had included several stages in Ibiza.
This wasn’t one of the routes of the event, though, but a point-to-point from our hotel that would take us into the far north-east of the island in Cala San Vicente.
The road north to the village of Santa Gertrudis would, in hindsight, be the flatter riding that we’d encounter during our stay. Despite some altitude gain from our sea-level base, the generous tailwind, smooth tarmac and pent-up energy from the previous 24 hours, it didn’t feel much of an effort.
The absence of other riders, particularly on a Sunday, was obvious. Unlike in neighbouring Majorca, which often has the feel of a UK sportive, such is the prevalence of Brits exploring its mountains, we felt largely alone on two wheels.
We did see one local rider on a time trial bike ease past us heading up to a junction. A triathlete, perhaps?
Simon – who’s from London but has lived in Ibiza for around a decade – would later say there is a healthy road cycling and mountain biking scene in Ibiza, it’s just that, with the nightlife and hospitality industries as successful as they are, Sunday mornings aren’t the prime time for riding that they are back home.
There was also the fact that, one day earlier, the biggest gran fondo in the Balearics, the Majorca 312, had taken place. With only a three-hour ferry ride, or a 40-minute flight, separating the two islands, it’s a popular journey and something Simon does at least once a year.
As the roads ebbed up and down on the way out to the west coast, it was terrain that flattered me, amplifying my true fitness.
We could power into the base of short climbs and be carried over them before my faltering aerobic system, typically under-worked after a cold, arduous winter, got wind of this brazen deceit.
If the roads here were wide and fast, the workmanlike scenery wasn’t exactly much to write home about just yet.
Yet it was huge fun to ride, so while we may not have attempted to capture much on photographer Joe’s camera, it was still a blast.
Scenery became easier on the eye with a turn off the main road at Sant Carles de Peralta, which turned into a lovely little detour down to the coast, complete with coffee stop in a cove.
If our surroundings were more appealing to look at, the steeper inclines were keeping us more honest, with out of-the-saddle efforts now out of necessity rather than shows for the camera.
It was hard to keep our eyes on the road, such were the magnificent Mediterranean views to our side, but it was important that we did, given the fast descent into Cala San Vicente, a picturesque coastal resort and the obvious choice for lunch.
Chipping away
Lunch, taken at The Boat House on the sea front, was a real treat, Joe’s big salad scoring higher in the health stakes than mine and Matt’s fish and chips.
Mind you, a full stomach is a full stomach and we were all feeling anchored by the platefuls we’d polished off as, swiftly back on the bikes, we immediately ascended the big climb of the day out of Cala San Vicente.
It gained close to 300m in just under 8km, a road characterised by a pleasing set of sweeping switchbacks.
The flowing descent over the other side was a just reward for a searing effort, although it only dropped us down to around half the altitude we’d climbed.
We were now well and truly out of the tourist hotspots, exploring a side of the island, in a way – on bikes – that many tourists will never do.
It’s the same story on many island destinations in Europe, such as Majorca, Tenerife and Gran Canaria.
Peel away the reputations as places to party and you’ll find places of abundant natural beauty and terrific terrain to explore by bike.
Simon says it’s an ambition of the government to get that message across: yes, by night, Ibiza is a bucket-list location, but it can also be a place where you can be active during the day, as displayed by the half-marathon that was taking place as we left for our ride.
Motor traffic, busier earlier on, had thinned as we made our passage along the spine of the island, back to the sort of short, sharp climbs that had punctuated the morning.
As the kilometres ticked by, we were precipitously losing our sharpness with each successive rise.
Eventually, we reached the point where the relatively flat opening section of the ride splintered off to begin the hilly anti-clockwise loop.
Now in some baking mid-afternoon sun that none of us had felt for seven months, we were thankful for such an easy finish back into Ibiza Town.
This brilliant ride in the country gradually morphed back into the Ibiza of popular culture, as we weaved our way past the many street-side billboards, not selling the latest Netflix series or blockbuster Marvel film, but the superstar DJs who pack out the clubs on the island every night.
On what is, to the cycling community at least, the lesser-known Balearic island, we’d had a fantastic day. We’ll happily leave the nights to the youth, though.
Local knowledge
Distance: 100km
Elevation: 1,234m
Download the route: Komoot - Big Ride Ibiza
Getting there
Direct flights to Ibiza are available daily across the UK, with our flight from Bristol taking roughly two hours. For a non-flying option, you could take an overnight ferry from Barcelona for around £300 return.
Where to stay
For easy access to restaurants, Ibiza Town is the place to be – just remember to bring your ear plugs. We stayed in the Nautico Ebeso (£80 per night), nicely located on the coast and a short walk to the old town.
Where to eat
During the ride, we had lunch at The Boat House, a popular restaurant in an idyllic spot in Cala San Vicente.
Bike shop
We hired bikes from Simon at Velo Club Ibiza for 30 euro per day each. He operates from a van, so will bring bikes to you.
