Well Ive received complaints that I havent blogged for a while and seen as I have been so busy I have started this now but it probably wont get brought up to date until..?! Well at least Im trying and that has been said before!
We are back at Marjal Costa Blanca yet again. We took off at the beginning of december to inspect sites for the Caravan Club. We have 28 sites in Spain and Portugal to inspect so we thought we would get the northern ones done first before the weather turned too bad. Oh the great theory..those bloody yanks sending their artic blasts to northern Spain! Each time I venture out somewhere new or different in Spain I just fall in love all over again with this amazing fabulous country. So a week last wednesday we left Marjal where it was a very pleasant 20 degrees and sunny and we went for a 5 hour drive to Madrid Camping El Escorial. Wet and damp but not too bad. The net day we thought we would visit another site nearby called Monte Holiday. No point in taking the van..ooo what a wise decision! It was raining.." no maybe its just low cloud as it is a bit mountainous" a little further. " Im sure that there is snow mixed in with this rain. The temperature guage must be worong. It says 0 degrees!" We keep on driving. within 10 miles we are met with snow ploughs and the road is white over! OMG I couldnt see a thing. Had it not been snowing I think it would have been beautiful! Thank god for the best driving course that I did in my last job. I certainly needed all my advanced driving skills to get us down but we did it!
I love Monte Holiday even though the mountains were white and it was cold but we were given a very warm welcome. They have just installed some super deluxe pitches there and they had views to die for that I hate to say it made Scotland and the Moors etc look flat!We found one lonely British Unit up there
The views would have been great!
Camping El Escorial
Depressing or what?! It reminded me of camping in england! On to El Astral
We were the only unit on there! There must have been 400 empty pitches and you guessed it.... a motorhomer parked right on top of us! They did the usual trick of revving engines, getting on and off bloody blocks and banging about at 7.30 am! Did he think we were wild camping?! It is a secure campsite! I certainly felt safe unrtil mr french motorhomer came on top of me ooh l las I should be so lucky!
On to camping Haro. Theres somethig about this site that I do like. Well I like all of them that I saw but Carlos s welcome on the bar really does help! " You are not going into the Pyranees? Are you really mad?!" Well it needs inspecting so off we went / The sat nav said something like 5 hours to do 200 miles or so....stupid sat nav. No stupid us! Off we went up mountain sides. There was a terrible gusty wind and great care had to be taken. The bends got worse and I was having to sound my horn on this single track up a mountainside. We eventually found the campsite Pena Montesena. I can only say that the welcome couldnt have been warmer-but I couldnt say that about the weather. We were the only people on site but the swimming pool, the shop,the bar and restaurant were all open! Boy did we get good service-they even lit a log fire for us so that we could eat our pizza in the restaurant
Thwe food and the wine were delicious. We then went and snuggled up in the caravan and were really grateful for the central heating. We got up in the morning and I couldnt work out what was the matter with the front window...
It was frozen solid! It had been minus 6! Look at that snow on the mountains!
The views were well worth the rough journey up there.
When people tell me that they have seen Spain as they have spent a week in Benidorm or wherever I get mad! Spain is green! Spain is amazingly beautiful. All in all I would really recomment this site but dont go in winter unless you want to visit Andora or go skiing! or there again like us and have suicidal tendancies!
We stopped one night at the lovely Vilanova Park and then made it down to camping Javea and Kiko Park... How different can campsites get>?/
Yes it was all change again with the weather about 20 degrees again! Oh I did re visit an old favourite of mine. I still love Javea and they have spent lots of money on the new toilet blocks
The wonderful little bar.restaurant was providing menu del dia that was porkstew and potatoes for 4 euros! Well it would have been rude not to and vino 1 euro a glass! Oh Im not supposed to be checking out the vino.its the campsites! Well we visited 17 in total. Hard,hard work but great fun and really interesting. I can honestly say that there was not a bad campsite. I dont have a favourite as they are all so different/ One thing that is important to me and I can say of them all is that they were spotlessly clean. This was in half of Spain we still have the other half to do and its different again! How I love the different faces of Spain. Its like several worlds merged into one country.
So here we are back at Marjal Costa Blanca where its been quite busy. I dont know whats going on or more to the point whats not going on. Roger and I have been busy planning the New Years Eve bash again by the pool. Without putting a poster up I already have 90 tickets reserved so if you want to come....come to pitch C03! We are aslo planning a British weekend , the last weekend in January..come on lets show the Dutch that we can do markets and party too! Im not saying thatait got too much for Roger but..
its a good job this wasnt a video with sound!
Judy and John couldnt believe how quick we got our big awning up and didnt trust us so thought it was a good ideato keep the cycling helmets on to be on the safe side! Thanks Pals but who looks the pudding?!
Ahh well Im nearly up to date. Its a good job that it does rain sometimes in Spain or I would never get this done!Weve been some great places and met great people. This retirement game is well untruly alright..oh just a minute I was working! I hope you have fun too! http://www.campingelescorial.com/en/
http://camping.monteholiday.com/en/http://camping.monteholiday.com/en/
www.vilanovapark.com/?lang=EN
