If the cycling’s not too fundamental a part of it, Madrid is great for a long weekend. They do have a municipal bike hire scheme – eBikes no less – although I’ve not tried it. TBH I’m not sure how keen I’d be on riding round town here during the week, cyclists are a fairly new weekday phenomenon and Spanish driving is pretty aggressive. There are also places you can hire bikes out of town if you fancy hitting the local mountains, either mtb or road.

Does it have to be abroad ? Wife and I have just had a cracking weekend in Liverpool.

I spent 5 months in Seville, I think you’ll end up going back.

Girona?

When I visited Seville I flew to Malaga and then got the train, which is very straight forward and easy. Most UK airports/airlines fly to Malaga.

Bruges and Antwerp are also nice and easy to access by train or ferry.

I think due to flights we’re now down to choosing between Budapest, Dubrovnik and Krakow.

Although it may be a bit cold for cycling in November.

But, for a dark horse suggestion, how about Lviv, Ukraine?

It does not take the Euro, but the exchange between the pound and the hryvny will make you feel like a millionaire. The city is GORGEOUS and filled with fabulous restaurants, bars, and other cultural attractions. It will certainly keep you busy for a day or three.

OK, now I want to go to Budapest.

I went to Tallin recently – highly recommend it. Interesting, friendly, reasonable costs

From Manchester, fly to Bilbao, 45 minute airport bus to San Sebastian.

Stockholm was nice in September.
New York in November was bright & sunny but cold.
Venice in October was rainy & cold

Swindon. Best take your 160 sled though….

Prague ?
Exceptionally beautiful in the winter, cold, frosty, quiet. Much better than the summer when it’s hot, overcrowded and full of stag do’s.

From Manchester, fly to Bilbao, 45 minute airport bus to San Sebastian.

Or just stay in Bilbao, which has nicer people and isn’t quite as up its own **** as San Sebastian 🙂

Visited Seville at Easter. Had a great 4 days there. Enough time for seeing the sights and chilled out strolling around, tapas etc.
Also really liked Innsbruck and Salzburg, which we spent some time in as add-ons to alpine walking holidays.

Reassured by the Lisbon recommendations – visiting in March.

I know Budapest really well, I spend the “wall came down” period out there, bit scary at the time.

All I will say now is “it ain’t like it used to be” the people then were scared but lovely, now they’re Italian and loaded. It gets crowded in the summer, go springtime when it’s still bloody cold.

If you get the chance go to Lake Balaton too.

Lisbon – been twice recommended no issues but I do get offered drugs everywhere I go so can see some of flaperon points but we are going back.

We did Vienna and Krakow last sept and both places are great…Vienna is expensive beautiful and very opera loving, in fact had more hassle off the ticket sellers for the state opera than drug dealers in Lisbon.

Krakow great city cheap great places to visit and interesting,

London is a really good call, I did a few days working there in October and actually used Boris bikes ….Good fun

Edinburgh? Again great city

Berlin is going to be cold but a city folk rave about but we found it meh

San Sebastian is great ….

I really liked Bilbao. Been back twice now. Very down to earth but got excellent food, friendly people and some excellent things to do, not least the Guggenheim. Oh and you can fly direct from Manchester.

Been going to Krakow several times a year with work for around 10 years – lovely city, lovely people, highly recommended. Better in Spring / Summer in my opinion though.

Last year I spent quite a lot of time in Utrecht, a sort of smaller nicer version of Amsterdam. Great city for a ‘short break’

Barcelona – awesome place
Seville -brilliant tucker& if you don’t mind travelling for an hour, there is an amazing hammam at Jerez .

Baños Árabes Jerez · Hammam Andalusí

Or just stay in Bilbao, which has nicer people and isn’t quite as up its own **** as San Sebastian

I’m not sure I’d recommend cycling in Bilbao mind (loads of places nearby, but not in the city itself).

In Bilbao there are bike paths along the river to Portogalete (it’s the Compostelle route on the left bank and a variant on the right bank) then the most impressive bike path I’ve seen to Playa de la Arena. There’s a viaduct over a major junction that must be 200m long.

The other half & I both loved Wroclaw when we visited in September. Lovely place, cheap as chips and Ryanair do reasonably priced flights. Seemed very bike friendly too.