Wow back at Marjal. I dodnt know if you can really be jet lagged by car but thats how it feels! It was nice to finally be back in my caravan last night all tucked up with my British TV going-even if there wasnt much worth watching! Im not a TV fan but its funny how you miss it when its not there.
Last wednesday we decided to go and head off and get some inspections done/ Many parts of Spain had yellow weather warnings for snow so we decided to leave the catavan in Alicante and just book into hotels when we needed to. At this time of year a good hotel is only 50 euros maximum but with the pound taking an unexpected surge it made things even cheaper. Dont I just love the Greeks at the moment?! Oh thats another issue but 1.34 to the pound!! Yes Mr Greek I love you!
Off we went to Las Lomas at Granada. How I love this site. I have been many times before. The owner is super and the site has the most azazing restaurant. The road to las lomas even on a summers day is not easy or for the inexperienced as it is up a mountain side with hairpin bends just to keep you on your toes but the site is well worth the effort. The music was playing. We had made good time/ I remember saying to Dave " I dont remember some of these bends" a little further "Does nt that sign mean " snow chains required?!" We quickly learnt that in my complacency I had taken the wrong road and was in the middle of a ski resort! A quick reverse on packed snow down a mountain side..err not the smartest move I have ever undertaken but we did it. Coming down the mountain to get on the right road then led us to a sudden emergency stop! ...
and that was half way down! How many times have I said to people "Dont follow your sat navs. Read whats in the book!" Note to self " Practice what you preach!" Anyhow great fun. Its mad though in one car journey,leaving sunshine and arriving at that and more snow was forecast! So Las Lomas is absolutely beautiful and suprisingly not that cold. Off to Cabapino. Not one of my favourites, personally but lots of Brits on there enjoying themselves and a quick night halt in Malaga before going to the beautiful Bella Vista campsite. I havent been there since it opened about two years ago so it was really interesting for me to go back. It looked beautiful but it was packed..with blooming Brits! Not quite how my last visit had been!
The location of this site is great with a bus stop outside with daily service to Gibraltar but the one thing that I realyy love..is the toilet blocks! Just leave me there! I could camp in them! If there was an award for the best toilet blocks in any campsite in europe. this would be the clear winner! Wet rooms! Under floor heating, piped music, more like a 5 star hotel! Great to see it doing so well.
Off to Camping Rosaleda and Roche. Both are lovely sites but tbe owners at Roche are soooo friendly and both sites are family owned yet so different. One is definately catering for International Campers wheras the other is very spanish but equally as lovely for different reasons. So onward we went, heading towards Portugal but one quirky place that we had to stop at was camping La Aldea at El Rocio. If you havent visited this area you really MUST. Its just so mad! There are no roads, no streets, its cowboy country! Even the campsite with all its modern faciliteis doesnt have roads. Its compressed sand and there are horses just everywhere! You cant help feel that you are in the middle of a western film and just waiting for John Wayne to pop around the corner
Err excuse me.." Who has the right of way?!" and that sand got deep!
View of El Rocio Amazing! Am I really stillin Spain?!!Not for much longer.....
The Portuguese Border was close by and theur toll system is errrr different and not very hospitable. Firstly a large sign "All foreigners must stop here!" Ok only foreigners must register their debit card to their car number for the electric tagging system and then you drive along and the cameras clock your car number and take the money off your card automatically. In theory a great idea but Dave had to sit there with pen and paper and write down every few minutes how much Id spent..85c...1.95 etc etc and believe me there are loads of them on the A22 that goes the entire length of the Algarve< The other strange thing about Portugal is that they based the catergory tolls on the height of the car! Even though our Ssang Yong is reasonably eco friendly we were always paying the higher rate. Another useful bit of info is that they dont allow Ssang Yongs to be imported so the looks we got were quite intimidating but there again it could just have been my standard of driving!
All the tolls though which amounted to less than 20 euros were well worth it when I got to the lovely Turiscampo campsite. What a lovely friendly place. Not only the owner there is lovely but there are several regular winter campers that I know and it was great to meet up with them again. The restaurant there is no longer franchised and Agnes the owner has taken it under her wing. By all accounts its wow/ I just wish I had longer to stay but more to see
Orbitur Guincho. This is a great little site with direct access on to the beach yet close enough to get into Lisbon. Once you have crossed that terrible bridge into Lisbon where there is always traffic jams its well worth it..Last stop in Poertugal Sao Pedro de Moel. This is just south of Porto. The weather was beautiful. Apparantly Portugal has had one of the mildest winters for years and was actually quite a bit milder than Spain! All I can say is that the two winters that I stayed there it was like blooming england with the rain! I jsut love the Portuguese People. Apparantly its the only European Countrty that we havent been to war with. I can understand why/ It would be impossible to have an argument with them even if you tried! They are so welcoming and polite. I just love them. I can understand most of the language when its written down but when they speak it..its like blooming Russian! Thank god they all speak really good english. We stayed in a hotel that we had stayed in before. As we had stayed before they instantly upgraded us! Now this is a fab view
It is a lovely little sleepy Potuguese seaside town. My breakfast in that restaurant was to die for! We ate out the previous night along the front in this gorgeous quaint restaurant that was built into the side of the cliffs
We were the only people in there and a three course meal with a bottle of nice wine 39 euros. The food whatever it was and the service was just fantastic. Not to mention as normal- their friendliness. I still cant get my head aroubd that in less than 24 hours we had been stuck in snow, seen the lovely Med at the Costa del Sol, stuck in sand at El Roccio and here we now were in a different Country overlooking the Atalantic with a totally different coastline. It just confirms to me that we really do live on the best continent in the world.
Ok turn the car around and head south. Absolutely nothing on the motorways. Park the car on speed control at 75mph and just point it. It wasnt that long before we were back in Spain again. We were tired and decided to stay the night in a Motorway Hotel in the middle of nowhere. We had a lovely room and a lovely meal. We were the only Brits in there or so we thought..in the morning not only was there a Britsih car parked next to ours but Yorkies too! We get everywhere! More driving to La Campina near Seville and Cordoba. We have only stayed there once and they are new to the caravan club. I hadnt even stopped the engine to my car which is different from the last visit and someone was yelling my name and running towards me with arms open. It was Matilda the owner! What a welcome. She was so happy and thankful for all the lovely campers we have sent her way. It really has turned their busuness around. They are a young enthusiastic couple who simply cant do enough for you. The site is in a great location overlooking the olive groves and is very quiet but yet convenient to Cordoba and Seville. Matilda insisted that we have a cup of coffee with her and Ricky. She then brought out Foxs Chocolate Biscuits! I was almost speechless..well shocked...! "You see what nice campers you send us. They even gave us biscuits!" That really is lovely for a couple that clearly are going to make their business work. Speaking to campers on the site they were equally impressed too!
The bar is just so..Spanish!
Another campsite that I wasnt so keen on was to follow..well Matida had set the bar very high and then another overnight stop in a motorway Hotel in the middle of nowhere again. Well that was hillarious. Not a word of english spoken and I dont think they had ever seen a Brit before. A lovely room and we went for our evening meal that I had already paid for..but what the hell was half the stuff on the menu? The waitress who s english was worse than my spanish had gone to great lengths to use google translate and print me out my menu. I dont know why she bothered it might as well have remained in spanish but I didnt want to offend her all the trouble she had gone to and it certainly was initiative and hospitality! We waited for our meal and suddenly there was a rush of people...all Guardia Civil. 10 of them all at once.. was it a raid? No meal break! They sat there with all their guns hanging from them taking selfies on their phones, drinking beer and eating with all the Nissan Pathfinder cars parked outside! What tickled us even more was one guy had the worst squint that I had seen in years..and they had given him a gun?! He was also the one drinking the beer. Dave said "he probably drinks so that he can see straight!" Can you imagine him aiming for a target?! If I had been criminally inclined with all the cars parked up outside then was the time to do a burglary!
I just love this whacky Continent!
Monday saw us safely back at Marjal Costa Blanca and ohh let the work begin for the great Britsih weekend that we have planned but first let me get over the paperwork for this lot! How lucky are we? Its not a get rich quick scheme. It is hard work but really rewarding going to see things that interest you and visiting people that are campsite owners that I now call friends. I think thats nearly all of Spain and Portugal inspected..who knows where to next?!!
http://www.campinglaaldea.com/en.html
www.turiscampo.com/en
www.caravanclub.co.uk/overseas-holidays/sites/spain/la-campina
