Category: Spain (Page 4 of 16)

The Last Post & Port

2 July 2019 / Juliet Stratton / 0 Comments

Steaming from Barcelona to Zaragoza to Bilbao – South to North – Literally!!

We spent 5 days chilling at Vilanova Park, a site we have been to before, just outside Barcelona, we caught up on shopping at our favourite supemarkets, Alcampo and Mercadona! Such small pleasures please us!!

We filled up with cheap fuel; bought several bottles of decent Spanish wine to take back to the UK; caught up with our washing and generally spent the morning doing chores then afternoons around the pool. The temperature was still hot, 35c and our air con in the trailer was playing up, the fan works but was only throwing out warm air so we had to rely on cooling the trailer by closing blinds, cooking outside and a big fan that we have keeping us cool at night.

Inside the trailer!
The busy pool at Vilanova

We have only ever been to Vilanova Park outside holiday season (October and March or April) and we so surprised to see such a difference, thousands of people everywhere, kids in the pool (Irish and French school holidays started mid June), iced cream and take away bars open and daytime and evening activities, through to a kids disco at 7.30pm and adult entertainment until midnight! Still very few staff, rushed off their feet. It was lovely to be recognised by one or two waiters!

Early Sunday morning we left Vilanova and drove 3 hours up to Zaragoza, a huge city in the middle of a desert like flat pain, often called The Windy City. On arrival, the temperature had crept up and reached 43c, with a boiling hot wind that made everything hot to touch, our outdoor plastic chairs, the crockery in the cupboards, and even our lounge seats were hot to sit on! We sat in the pool for a while, dried off quickly in the hot air, then had cold showers. Luckily the wind disappeared overnight and when we left Zaragoza in the morning the temperature was a cooler 26c!

Outside temperature when driving to Zaragoza
Tea break in a steaming hot car park
A Spanish Bull, Fort & Church on one hill!
Passing Navarette, where we stopped for a week 2 years ago.

Monday we took a slow drive up to Bilbao, stopping a few times for a break. We went from sea level to Zaragoza at 350m, to Rioja at 600m and back down to sea level at Bilbao!

The landscape changed from grey flat plains in Aragon (Zaragoza) to hilly wind farms through to lush green valleys in the Rioja area, surrounded by an impressive bank of cloud. This is why Rioja produces such brilliant wine, a flat plain with surrounding mountains, the warmth of sunshine and just enough moisture to produce grapes. We then went through the rocky mountain range, beautifully craggy and stunning but much cooler than we have been used to.

Another tea break! In the shade.
Mountain views
Zaragoza plains
Crossing the Meridian line
The rich Rioja landscape

We stopped at some services about 40 miles short of Bilbao and decided to try a bit of wild camping for the night, in the car park! Surrounded by lorries, we woke to 16c and fog!! First time we have ever done that, probably won’t do it again, far too noisy. We soon headed off to Bilbao Port where the temperature crept back up to 24c once we had got over the mountains.

Night time stop.
Woken to fog!

We were one of the last onto the ferry, and spent a lovely calm 24 hours heading back to England and no doubt, much cooler temperatures!

Waiting to board the final leg at Bilbao
One of the last to board.

And finally, to cap it off…….

So in the past week we have gone up and up and up to sweltering record temperatures then down to more sensible ones; up and down in altitude as well as fuel and beer prices! We had cabin numbered 8123 from Rome to Barcelona and 8321 from Bilbao to Portsmouth! We have travelled about 2000 kms on three ferries and driven only a third of the journey! We have been stopped by Customs to inspect the interior of the trailer and also waved on without any inspection at other borders. Overall a very interesting journey back to the UK.

This will be our last post until the end of August when we head back to Spain!

Travel from Split to Spain

29 June 2019 / Juliet Stratton / 2 Comments

We left Split mid afternoon on a Sunday and arrivef at the port, some 5kms away, first in the queue! After all the freight lorries were boarded we headed on, a fairly small ferry boat compared to others, for an overnight trip to Ancona in Italy. We left at 7pm and arrived at 7am, just as the city was warming up.

Leaving Camping Stobrec, Split.
First in line to board!
David reversing into his spot on the boat to Ancona
In place!
Split.
Journey No 1 underway, cheers!
Arriving in Ancona as the sun rose.

On Monday we drove 300 kms across Italy from Ancona on the Adriatic coast to the Mediterranean coast, heading to Rome’s port of Civitavicchia, 50kms north of Rome. We had not slept well on the previous crossing and as the sun was soaring up high, we stopped every 3/4 hour at a service area, had a pee and a drink or lunch, and tried to get half an hour’s nap in the cool of the airconditioned truck! Mid afternoon, the temperature outside had reached 40c!

Service station stop, so hot!!
Next boat, to Spain.
Ready to load….
Now in place.
Second part of the journey, ready to go.

We drove past some beautiful old cities crossing Italy, in particular Narni and Orte (stock pictures below), traditional hill top towns, split by gorges and rivers.

On board, we had dinner in the restaurant, a lay in the next morning (our inside cabin was dark and cool), coffee and croisant for brunch, lunch in the cafe, a few hours reading in the sun on the decks, all very civilised! We had a lovely calm 20 hour crossing from Rome to Barcelona, arriving just an hour late; we were one of the first in the freight section to offload so we hit the roundabout at the junction of the bottom of La Rambla and the port at 7.30pm, peak traffic time! David was very calm and navigated round with the other lorries, and we arrived in Vilanova just after 8pm, in time to pitch up easily, have dinner and a few drinks before a good night’s sleep!

We have had 5 days at Vilanova Park, caught up on our sleep, washing, shopping and chilling, we have had a few afternoons by the pool just reading and watching the world go by. We have been invaded by Irish, French and Spanish families, it seems school holidays start at the end of June for these kids, so we are pleased to be moving on.

Sunday we head inland for a night’s stop in Zaragosa, which is just about half way though our north coast bound journey, then Monday we head up to Bilbao for a ferry crossing on Tuesday morning, landing in the UK on Wednesday. It has been so hot here in Spain this past week, our air con is not working brilliantly, so we are hoping the weather is a little cooler in the UK in July!

Spain to France to Italy

13 April 2019 / Juliet Stratton / 0 Comments

SPAIN

SWe had a few days in a site just between Figueres and Capmany about 10 miles from the border with France. The site was spacious with lots of large pitches and very quiet, surrounded by vineyards and oak forests, at night the site was very dark, plenty of bats and owls about. We had a few windy days here, even though we were protected by the tall trees…..we were rocking, so to speak!

Capmany is a tiny village but well known in this area for being home to not one, not two, but three winemakers and distributors! A small castle type building houses accommodation, a pub and a shop are all that are here, the area is surrounded by oak and cork trees, as well as the odd vine and olive tree. We also found almond trees in flower, such a beautiful scent.

Snow capped roads crossing the border into France.

The site was also a few miles away from the motorway and the town of La Jonquera, which cannot really be described as a town. There is a small traditional village a mile away with the same name but the main attraction here was the massive supermarkets and tobacconists, perfect for motorhomers and lorry drivers stocking up on bulk alcohol, tobacco, clothes, electronic goods and traditional Spanish products. We could not get over the size of the bottles available in the supermarkets, 1, 1.5, 2 and 3 litre bottles of every possible alcoholic drink you could think of and several you may never have heard of!

A 3 litre bottle of Jack Daniels for €79 !!! That’s one hell of a hangover bottle!!!

People, mainly French speaking, had trollies full of huge sacks of meat, vegetables and everyday household products, the staff on the tills spoke French first then Spanish then English so obviously a popular day trip destination from France.

Port Bou, a village on the French/Spanish border, view from the Church at the top of town.

The journey from Spain into France was an easy one but Narbonne to Lake Garda was 1,655kms, broken up into jumps of 360, 300 and 280kms, always stopping halfway for a refreshment break. We find it quite funny looking at the lorry driver’s expressions as we pull up alongside their 18 wheelers!! Along the way, we also passed several snow capped mountains, experienced sun and rain, saw blue skies and grey clouds, green fields, grey industrial areas and brown rocky hillsides.

FRANCE

FIn France we returned to a site we have been before just off the motorway at Narbonne called La Nautique where we had a few surprise visitors from Bonterra – our lovely Dutch friends Kees and Reik stopped overnight on their way back to the Netherlands, and our even lovelier Dutch/Hungarian friends Chris and Mary stopped en-route to their overnight stay, stopping long enough for a bite and a drink and a quick walk around the site before continuing their journey.

From left, David, Kees, Reik, Mary, Chris and me xx

We moved onto Frejus for just one night, despite emailing the site weeks in advance, when we arrived on Sunday morning there were no staff on reception at all! Apparently they do not man the reception desk at weekends until the end of April! A kindly German man let us in and in the morning we paid and moved on.

We tried a new site in Antibes, called La Vieille Ferme (The Old Farm) which turned out to be lovely, housing several RVs and permanent home to a Welsh couple from Tredegar, we felt at home!!

A traditional hill top village alongside the road.

We explored Antibes marina the first day and was star struck when we saw the world’s largest Superyacht, called Dilbar. It dominated the skyline due to its huge size and gold colour. We established it is owned by a Russian billionaire, is only 3 years old, 156 metres long, houses 40 passengers and 80 crew and has not one but TWO helipads and an indoor swimming pool on its top deck! It only cost a cool $600 million US Dollars!!!! We spotted a people carrier on the 4^th deck, gold in colour of course, to perfectly match the yacht!!

Spotted in the Marina car park.
Antibes Fort.

Antibes is an attractive place, comprising the old seafront village and a more modern smart area behind the old town on the Cote D’Azure. Here the sea is soooo blue, blue is not a good enough description, try azure, turquoise, deep aquamarine, cobalt, navy or indigo and all shades in between. The old town has lots of medieval stone walls, a fort and beautiful tall buildings looking out to sea. We had several lovely hours wandering around admiring the beauty, sadly we did not spot any celebrities….

ITALY

The drive from Antibes in France to Asti in Italy took just over 4 hours, boy do the Italians know how to charge on the tolls! We paid €85.90 from Narbonne to Frejus and another €136 from the French/Italian border to just outside Asti. And all because we have 8 wheels on our vehicle and are over 2.3m high!!

An Italian tunnel, with traditional village overhead!

We returned to a site in Asti that we stayed at last year, again the owners welcomed us back before they were officially open. It was so cold at night, a real shock to the system after a warm Spain and hot France, we had to put our heating back on!!! One day we did sit outside in the sun until about 6.30pm!

This was our temperature most evenings, 2C!!!!

We did venture into Asti one evening and found a wonderful Indian restaurant, recently opened, where we had such a lovely meal. David tried a new beer, it did not have any additional effect on his prowess that night!!

We ventured into Turin from Asti, another day, another blog!!!

A Day with Dali

13 April 2019 / Juliet Stratton / 1 Comment

Before leaving Spain, we stopped at a small site in a village called Capmany, between Figueres and La Jonquera, just below the Spanish border with France and just had to visit the Dali Museum whilst we were here. We arrived early and had a fabulous lunch first and then spent the next 3 hours wandering around the museum.

Salvador Dali was born in Figueres in 1904 and in the 1980s purchased a burned out theatre which he renovated and modernised to home his collection of art, figurines, drawings and jewellery as well as the sketches that he drew before creating every masterpiece. He died in his home town in 1989 and is known as a surreralist as well as for some of his quotes:

I don’t do drugs. I am drugs.

Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.

Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.

He really was an odd man, extremely weird and imaginative and obviously had a fantastically bizarre imagination. Hope you enjoy some of his creations.

Delicious lunch of grilled meats, caprese salad, olives and bread.

Outside the museum, some of his artwork is on display.

One of his drawings, look at it long enough to see the different layers.

Inside the old arena, the walls have been decorated with mannequins, creatures and sinks!

The immaculate Cadillac has a mannequin inside, all overgrown with ivy and leaves….but has a naked statue of a burly woman on it’s bonnet!

One of his well known images, called Swans Reflecting Elephants.

Some of the jewellery collection that he created.

This brooch is about 2 inches long, but has a working clock in it.

Rubies, diamonds and pearls in a brooch.

This jewelled item is 2 feet tall and has the most amazing green gem in the middle. I believe it is called “Elephant Spider”.

View of the French Alps during the flight to the UK.

Moving on Up……

21 March 2019 / Juliet Stratton / 0 Comments

After spending a winter in Benicassim (Spain) because Italy, Croatia and Greece were cold and closed up, we have, sadly, had to break away from the Bonterra community and have recommenced our travels. We have had a fabulous four months, in a relaxing situation, made good friends, almost won the quiz (OK, I lied there, wishful thinking) had wonderful social afternoons and evenings but time to move on and up……

In February, we returned to the UK to help Caity move into her own flat in Hampton, Peterborough. After 14 days of cleaning, painting and decorating, shifting furniture and making sure things were up and running, we left happy with the knowledge that the flat was clean and warm, in full working order and Caity had a full fridge of food! A mother’s final job is to make sure her child had food!! Boy, did my hands (and bank balance) ache when I left!!!

Trying to put together a sofa with lots of missing parts – it was returned!!

Caity became a washing machine engineer, learned how to replace a door/ drum rubber! Only took us an hour!

I also had the chance to catch up with my lovely niece Carol, and had cuddles with Jack and Libby, as well as tea and cake 🙂

We moved up to Vilanova just outside Barcelona, our sending off was lovely, all our neighbours came out to see us off on Sunday morning, mid March.

We decided to experiment with an alternative site called Vilanova Playa, down by the beach instead of Vilanova Village, outside the town. As usual, we emailed the site, told them the dimensions of the trailer and how much space we needed and was assured that we would fit…..we had 4 members of staff assuring us they would help us onto a pitch, and so the fun began…….after about half an hour of to-ing and fro-ing, became stuck because the road was narrow, there were too many trees either side of the pitches and he didnt have enough space to swing the cab around fully in front….so he eventually reversed onto a pitch but could go no further. The staff had a bright idea!! Let’s chop some trees down, so you can reverse back onto the pitch behind, turn a little and pull forward onto an exit road, (this was just as David was muttering under his breath “Get me out of here”). Bright idea. Removed the trees, reversed, pulled out, got going and headed up to Vilanova Park where we were allocated a huge pitch on a wide road, no major trees either side and total peace to chill out!! A few glasses of wine were sunk that night!!

Once the overhead cover is removed, we reversed.

Memories of Bonterra Park

Proof that Mary & Chris do dance!
And they win Mulkky tournaments!
Jenny frazzling her brains at the quiz.
Carajillo, a drink Mary introduced us to!

Local dance exhibition
Andrea, queen of Flamenco.
Drummer Chris has several groupies including me and Mary!
The lovely Chris & Mary x
Welsh Dylys and Bob, lovely boy.

Mulkky on the beach, one cloudy Sunday morning.

Keith & Jean showing off the Dancing on Ice skills.

Temporary children; Beau and May, our neighbour Paul & Julia’s children.

We are now heading on up to France, to Narbonne and Frejus, before heading over to Asti again, where we will visit Turin before returning to Lake Garda.