Camino De Santiago and other places

Hola Espana

We crossed into Spain at a little known border crossing of Bemposta, a single track road on the dam crossing the river. The road right up to the border had been so quiet, we saw a car every 20 or so miles and that was it, staying off the main roads brought us through lots of tiny villages and mile after mile of green farmland. A very different Portugal than we have seen before, and for sure one we would visit again.

After crossing our last ‘barragem’ then our first Spanish must see on the list would be a ‘presa’. This one being the Almendra Dam, to me a big expanse of water, to Iain something of a huge engineering feet. We had been able to see the dam from our overnight spot in Bemposta, at least 45 minutes drive away. It is to be fair an impressive sight. Driving over the 2.5 km over the dam wall  there are a couple of good size viewing places from where we could see back over to Portugal.

Almendra Dam

For me, best part of the morning was the realisation that the flock of birds above us were a volt of Griffin Vultures – yup indeedy, a group of massive birds flying over a hydro electric dam are called a ‘volt’ (Wikipedia says so, therefore it’s true). We stood with a couple from a Portuguese moho for at least 20 minutes trying to get a decent vulture photo  – this was my best effort, zoomed many times.

We took the minor roads up top Zamora, skirted around it and went North. No particular reason other than to travel across Spain below the coast but above the mountains. As our intended stopping place was closed we drove a little further and ended up at the teeny village of Aguilar De Campos in  Castile and Leon. One of very many villages that time seems to have forgot in the province. They mainly consist of a castle, flowing down from which are numerous cave-houses and the chimneys of same; a massive church with bricked up windows and 75% of the village houses in dire need of repair and in most cases completely roofless. Despite that there are always groups of elderly men wandering around the streets passing away the day, the female counter-parts usually found on benches in the shade watching the world, and the odd motorhome, pass by.

Aguila De Campos cave-houses

Castile and Leon is part of Spanish central plateau – known as the Meseta. Although its very flat it lies between 2200 and 3280 ft, mile after mile of gently rolling fields with the odd hillock. We seem to drive forever without seeing anyone. The odd car or van does pass every so often but it is incredibly peaceful driving on these roads. Some of the roads were so straight we could count three or four villages ahead, just the massive church and a few buildings repeated into the distance.

The Meseta

At Palencia we were greeted by Cristo Del Otero, appearing to direct the traffic off the motorway and into town. He has been in situ since 1931, and does look a bit past his best, I guess most of us would standing next to a motorway for 80 odd years. He is 21 metres (69 ft) high and stands on top of a chapel, which in turn stands on a knoll. On a hot, sunny day there was not a soul nearby. No-one walking up to it, parked at the bottom taking photos – seemed he is a bit forgotten even by the Palencians.

Needing a lunch stop we pulled into one of the multitude of castle villages on the route, Astudillo. Yes again there was a castle, wine caves, caves-houses, we walked over the grass mounds with chimneys sticking out – bit like the hobbits. The streets were cobbled and the front doors of the houses were the thickness of the walls. Places of incredible history and beauty and not another soul in sight. Just us and the odd rabid dog that attaches itself to you in the hope of food, we found it amazing that tourists aren’t flocking to these places and that the locals aren’t savvy enough to make a Euro by charging you to get in or selling ice-creams and fridge magnets.

Astudillo

By sheer force of luck we stumbled onto the Camino De Santiago. Having seen the symbol a few times on road signs we finally clicked to what it was and that we were on it. Our campsite for the next couple of nights was also on it, literally. Castrojeriz is a bit of a diamond, we understand similar to most villages and towns along the route just larger. There are several churches, two monastery and one convent ruin, a live convent, a castle high on the hill and a stack of cave houses dug into the hills above the town.

Castrojerez

Camino De Santiago sign posting 

Pilgrims having been passing through the town for over 1000 years on the 500 mile pilgrimage. You would struggle to get lost anywhere on route as signs abound at every path and junction. We did our bit, albeit by bike, as some do. We cycled 20’ish miles along the pilgrims path and were surprised at seeing 23 walkers in just under an hour, all bar two were individuals and ranged from teenagers to peoples of our generation. The path weaves in and out of villages with most pilgrims / walkers stopping in small hostels on route where they use their pilgrims passports to record their stop and eat and sleep for very low prices. As we drove on over the next few days we saw hundreds of pilgrims along the route, and we were told this is the quietest time as July and August are the peak months.

The Pilgrims Path – Camino De Santiago

 Hontanas on the Camino De Santiago

Just off route is the convent Santa Clara, aka  ‘cake convent’. You go into a reception type area and there is a wooden shelf that rotates. You ring a bell and a nun shouts a “Hola”, you ask for cake and the revolving shelf turns and your box of cakes appears – you put your money in its place and it disappears off on the next turn. At no time do you see the nuns, its a brilliant little idea – and in all honesty the cakes were top class sponges filled with fresh cream – worth every Euro and one of our favourite experiences in Spain :).

Our route out of Spain crossed Rioja. It has been said that I don’t have great taste in wine, my absolute favourite is a good cheap Rioja so that said it was essential for us to drive through the Rioja region. So many vineyards, so little time! Every turn has a winery selling by the bottle or cask, offering tasting sessions or just tours of their museums.

Glorious Rioja

In the heart of the region is the small town of Elciego.  A superbly restored historic centre is surrounded by more winery that you could visit on a full weekend.

Whilst that is a good enough attraction to warrant the visit the first thing that hits you as arrive in town is the Hotel Marques De Riscal, which looks as if giant sized reels of steel ribbon have escaped from the front and back of the building.

Designed by Frank Gehry, who also designed the Guggenheim in Bilbao it is no shrinking violet, causing us and many others to head up to the entrance to see it up close and take photos. A very charming, very large, Spaniard blocked the way , telling us no entry unless you are staying. I begged a photo, no way Jose said your man on the gate. I and many other disgruntled tourists trundled off. They do allow you into a very grand and expensive “tourist area” posh term for shop selling tatt, very expensive to be fair but tatt none the less. If we can’t take a photo of your hotel we aren’t buying your junk is our motto so we left.

Never to be defeated, we took the van up the vineyard roads, possibly not that suitable for a motorhome but needs must. A few km later, we turned into a small track and hey presto a great view of the hotel and as many photos as we wanted. From there we ventured back to the town and walked around the old buildings. Being Saturday afternoon and 22 degrees the Spaniards were out in force, enjoying a glass of wine and wearing enough clothes to warrant a winters day in Wales.

We continued through Rioja, stopping off for a weekend’s rest (all this travelling gets tiring!) in Estella, where we did nothing much other than sit and watch the grass grow. Rather than take the quick route up to the border at Irun we went over the mountains, a rather long and tortuous journey without too many rewards – well until we reached the summit at Lizzaraga. It wasn’t so much what we could see as what we couldn’t well above the cloud line we had an incredible view over the clouds with just the mountain tops peeking out – stunning.

 

Adios Espana and the Osborne bulls

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Portugal – the boondocks

We can always tell when are back on the road less travelled (for us), we find so many things to take photos of, hence this post is going to be somewhat overloaded with images.

Somewhere we had planned to visit a couple of times but never seen was up the Portuguese / Spanish border at Minas Sao Domingos, a deserted open pit mine which closed in 1966. Since then it has become a popular tourist destination as many of the old mine buildings and the open cast pit are very much in evidence. There is an English graveyard that contains the graves of mine managers and their families who originated from Cornwall. The old pit houses looked well cared for and appear inhabited although there weren’t many people about other than motorhomers.

Minas Sao Domingos

On our way out of Sao Domingos we re-traced our route back to Mertola. A spectacular sight from the approach road, set on a rocky spur overlooking the Rio Guadiana. We spied a road sign for a viewpoint, up a fairly uneven and rocky track, we thought it would be a km or so, more than 7 km later we reached the viewpoint – it was worth it for the photos, not so sure the van enjoyed the experienced quite as much. When we arrived in the town we climbed the cobbled hills  up to the small castle, from which you can view the many white houses and a picturesque church that was once a mosque.

Mertola

We were going to stop off for a night at the Camperstop in the village, but we met a Brit guy there who was full of telling us how he had been living in his massive Hymer moho, in what was a car-park, for the last 3 weeks and was staying at least another two as it was free.  For us the reason that so many places are putting up height barriers so we moved on and had a stop off Castro Verde instead – not much there but what there is – well kept, a surprising good little municipal campsite, more surprising in that of the 40’ish vans on site over half were Finnish, seemed to be the hip place for the Finn’s to be meeting up. We stayed a few days to do the boring stuff, washing, cleaning, shopping and left with a fresher odour in our wake.

Destination Odivelas Barragem but on route the gorgeous little town of Alvito made us re-consider. We parked up for a lunch stop and a few cars pulled in next to us with folk sporting cameras with lenses like telescopes. It seemed we were on route for the Alentejo Volta cycle race, part of the European tour. Never ones to miss some free entertainment we decided to stick around and watch the race pass (in less than 40 seconds) and stopover on the local barragem at Alvito, followed the next day by a short hop and a stopover at the Pego Do Alta barragem. Portugal has over 300 barragems (reservoir / dams) every few miles a sign points to one, some are magnificent but it does becomes after a while – seem one, seen most of them – due to this we decided no more and aim for the coast again for a while.

Alvito town square

The Alentejo Volta 

To avoid Lisbon or not – yes lets. We took a stretch of tollroad – highway robbers were out at €9 for less than 20 miles. Due to this we took the next exit and the long and winding, and more winding road to Mafra. We probably didn’t save much as a 35 minute toll road journey took 2 hours on non-toll roads – but then again sometimes it’s all about feeling you have won :).

The first sights of Mafra Palace remove any thoughts of tolls, times or distance. It is a colossal building with a limestone facade over 200 metres long with towers at each end, set right in the heart of the town.  It took from 1717 to 1755 to build (the King had promised to build his wife a convent if she gave him offspring – he paid out and then some) and has been both a monastery and a palace.

Lucky for motorhomers there are parking spaces right alongside and opposite these stand the army guards for the barracks at the rear of the palace – safest place we have ever parked yet! Surprisingly there were just a handful of tourist around

Mafra Palace

We were both so impressed with Mafra we decided to backtrack towards Lisbon and see the two of the “Seven Wonders of Portugal” Sintra and Pena Palace. What a bloody nightmare. We being we, don’t park as far away as possible and walk in. Nope we drive in as far as we can, and we see the error of our ways as roads shrink in width and buildings close on our wing mirrors. Luck strikes and we see a signpost pointing away from the medieval lanes but as we turn to it a helpful little GNR fella shakes his head and points us left – great we are now climbing little cobbled lanes that the small family car in front looks rather big on, if I stuck my hand out of the window I could have rung doorbells as we passed.

We achieve the height of Pena palace entrance – and a dead end, so turn around and start nightmare all over again back down the hill, this time with traffic still coming up and having to pull into passing places where they can. Iain spotted a sign for Lisbon, we took it to escape Sintra, left the city and high-tailed back up the coast to Mafra. Lesson learned for the umpteenth time – do not attempt to take motorhomes into medieval towns (but it will happen again).

Agreeing that all the historical culture was well over-rated instead we visited Buddha Eden, the largest oriental garden in Europe. Possibly one of the best places we have been recently, €4 each, free parking and a  over 35 hectares of gardens created as a reaction to the destruction of the Buddhas of Banyan. There are oodles of Buddhas – ranging from a few feet to some over 21 metres high and 700 startling blue terracotta life-size soldiers, and when that all gets overwhelming there are Modern, African and Contemporary sculpture gardens containing over 200 sculptures set around 1000 palms.

It is a surreal place, at bit of the Far East in Portugal, with some Africa thrown in. We absolutely loved it, taken for what it is you cannot fail to be impressed by the sheer number of sculptures, Buddhas etc.  And if that doesn’t tickle your fancy it is part of a vineyard and they sell their own wine at very decent prices.

Next stop, Obidos, wiser this time finding a small German owned Camperstop a few miles out of the village where the kindly owner was happy to ferry us around on a taxi service for a few Euro, instead of us driving up lanes more suited to a pony and trap.

The town itself is jaw dropping, completely surrounded by a crenellated wall, the historic centre is a labyrinth of cobblestoned streets, alleyways and steps. The whitewashed houses have splashes of yellow and blue painted edgings and flowers spilling out of every possible window and to top it off there is a pretty spectacular castle at the top.

The main street is full of tourist shops, the tour buses come in, for an hour its manic, then they go and its bliss. We read that many people feel its too touristy so miss it out visiting – a top tip from us – don’t miss it, – no matter how many people are there it is beautiful and worth the effort to see it.

Every shop sells shots of the local cherry liqueur from tables outside on the street. These are poured into small chocolate cases, you drink the liqueur then eat the cup – Iain was in liqueur / chocolate heaven.

The other main attraction in the area is Peniche, set on a headland and surrounded by sea. It is still very much a working town which mixes with several campsites and a good deal of watersports but doesn’t have any of the charm of the inland villages.  More to our liking was the surfers haunt of Baleal, a few miles along the coast. White sand, a few bars and cafes and a minimum of 50 surfers in the sea at anyone time. The actual island is reached over a causeway, we didn’t attempt it – the tide was coming on and I could picture the headlines as we floated away!

Iain improving his surfing at Peniche

At this point the plans fells by the wayside, they had been to visit the canals of Aveiro and then Porto and head North to Vigo. But we happened across a website detailing the Ecopista Do Dao. Basically a 49 km cycle path on a old railway line, tarmac all the way running from Viseu to just outside Coimbro.  We took the Atlantic coast road up, much quieter than the Algarve, still plenty of people around but not as many high-rise hotels and we found camping costs half of those in the South.

It would be remiss to not mention the weather – the further North we went the hotter it was. We left Obidbos and it was 25 / 80 degrees – by the time we reached Combrao it was up to 28 / 85 degrees. Hate to say it, but it was too hot! We even went in the sea (briefly and paddling) at Pedra De Ouro, for the Atlantic in March is was warm enough. I wasn’t as impressed when a massive wave caught me unawares paddling and I got soaked head to toe :(.

We skirted around Coimbro city as we have visited before and took a detour to a former monastery at Lorvao instead.  We went in and asked if we were allowed to look around, the amazingly kind gentleman offered us a personal tour for €1 each. We spent the next 50 minutes seeing and hearing a very detailed description of every artifact, we could probably produce our own guide-books as there is really very little we don’t know about the place!

Home for the weekend was one of the best places we have every stayed -Terra de Iguanas. Many places offer a bread service, where your rolls are delivered for a few cents daily. Here they gave us a bag of 6 rolls each morning for free, proper home brewed coffee, wifi, showers,  etc. etc. €10 a night!  Add to that our wonderful hosts offered a service to take our bikes up to the start of the cycle path at Viseu so we could pedal back.

So we spend my 54th birthday cycling the 54 km from Viseu back to the campsite, it was a bit breezy but other than that a perfect ride. All along the track the old stations are in the process of being converted to cafes or other municipal buildings, we even came across a train and carriages at one stop.

Its nearly time to start the long trek North so today we ambled up through Northern Portugal. We stayed off the main roads and took minor roads through the Serra De Estrela mountains, hardly any traffic on the roads and loads of places to just stop and look at the incredible scenery. We ended our day at the teeny town of Meda,  there is a clocktower on a rocky outcrop at the highest point of the town, from there the view stretched out across to the Spanish border, impossible to capture on camera, one of the most mind-blowing views we have ever seen.

The view from Meda

Algarve

This year we were ready, our Peage was pre-paid in the UK, no fear of the motorway. Why then as we crossed the border did the lane instructing “foreigners” to pull over and register for tolls strike fear into us?  Piffle, we didn’t follow instructions keeping every limb crossed our pre-pay €40 was in operation (we will know when we get home and find a big fine if we have done it wrong).

Instead of heading straight along the Algarve we went inland and followed the border up to Alcoutim. On a clear Sunday morning we stood in Portugal looking over the Guadiana River to the Spanish village of Sanlucar De Guadiana. As Portugal is an hour behind Spain its fairly interesting when the village clocks chime – each one within shouting distance of each other over the river – the one in Spain chimes one one bell for 1 o’clock whilst in Portugal they ring out the full 12 o’clock. We took a walk down the cobbled streets into the  modest little village square and from there down to the riverfront to look over at the mirror image village and castle in Spain.

Sanlucar De Guadiana

We stayed at Odeleite on  a camperstop (N 37 19 54 W 7 28 06) good views down to the Barragem, an ace little coffee house in the teeny village of Alcaria – the only negative for us was Portuguese owner man decided we could share electric with the French couple next door, and plugged us into their supply by joining our cables to their on their van!. In theory fine, in practice we had less than 2 amp so just having our fridge on when they boiled a kettle meant we continually tripped out the electric. We gave up and disconnected and saved ourselves €4 which we spent in Alberto’s village cafe on a couple of milky Sidal coffees.

Loving the inland we took the scenic route west through the countryside and then down Moncarapacho. Where the hell did all these motorhomes comes from??? Route 66, last time we visited 3 vans on the site – this time 70+., they offered to find us a pitch, run electric over roads etc. We declined sure we knew of plenty of other sites. Next stop, Caravans-Algarve, uhh sorry full up. A new campsite has opened in the village, takes 60 vans – well it now takes 70+ as its full and they are also parking in the arrival area queuing up to 3 days for a pitch. Plan B, head for the beach Olhao and Fuseta – reliably good for a spaces on massive sites that take over 300 vans, not a one!!!

We are told the police are moving on Free Campers off the beaches and therefore the sites are all now much busier, add to that Morocco is not that preferred destination that it was for many of the French and its motorhome chaos in some places. We were surprised just how many new campsites, aires and motorhome parking sites have sprung up, there must be hundreds upon hundred of new pitches – however didn’t help us as the ones within a 30 miles radius of us were rammed full.

Seeing our bottoms with the area we decided to head to Lagos, knowing we would easily get on the site massive 5 star site at Espiche we left the crowded sites behind. Just over an hour later we arrive at Tursicampo Espiche, to be told they have 3 spaces (and the 3 were rubbish). We paid up, booked on, put our shoes on and went to the restaurant for a meal to celebrate Iain’s birthday.

On the upside, Portugal is showing some serious sunshine, change of pitch and lets bake. Factor 15 on and still reddnning gloriously. After a week done the attractions of Luz and Lagos as been to both a few times and nothing new. We needed a site near Albufeira for the arrival of the Bates. I found a reasonably new one and emailed the owner to check if they had space. Knowing things were tight on lots of site I went for the impressive email that is translated into their native language. Bit of Google translate and boom – press send. An hour later a response saying they will find us a space, oh and well done with the email translation – really well done into Spanish – when the site is Portuguese and the owner is Dutch anyway!!

Moving onto said site, all we could say was “wow” Mikki’s Place to Stay is gaining both fame and notoriety in Portugal. Mikki is a ceramic artist and has a studio slap bang in the middle of the site, together with a tres chic little hippy bar and cafe. The man in charge is Arno, who has built one of the best sites ever, a massive swim hole, as someone else put it – an oasis in the middle of the sand and dust of the Algarve.

The Bates arrived and brought even bluer skies with them, plus a stock of Tetley Tea Bags for Iain. Binty kindly cooked paella for us at Chez Posh Knob villa they were staying at, we thinks they were a tad concerned with our jalopy being parked in the complex as some will have thought we were Free Campers using the car-park as a handy overnight!

Over the many, many times we have driven up and down the N125 we have never gone into the village of Alcantarilha, mainly because the road diverts you around the edge but also because the mecca of motorhomes, Aldi, is on said ring road. To make up for missed visits we walked into the village – worth it? totally. Very small, a little run down maybe, not very touristy. The side streets were cobbled, the church was built in 1586, we went in for sit. It was beyond our comprehension this place for 450 years old. At the top of the village another church, for us the pièce de résistance a “bones” church. The ossos was built using the bones and skulls taken from local cemeteries – it’s not our first ossos and probably wont be our last.

The other place we always intend to call in at is Loule, we should have done so before. It’s fantastic and the Bate / Baxter day trip enjoyed it immensely. The indoor market is half fresh fish market, the remainder holds stalls of local crafts, wines and foods. A slight damper was Loule had the average rainfall of Snowdonia in about 2 hours. Rather than grow webbed feet we moved on to Vilamoura, same amount of rain so we took cover for lunch in the Old Navy on the marina, where Emyr offered (was forced??) to buy lunch for one and all. No matter how long we are away its always a massive treat to see friends and family from home – the Bates cover both.

Back down the coast, again, to Moncarapacho to wait for the next visitors, Alex and Alistair. Much better prepared this time with a few new sites, the first had opened 2 weeks previously and just a couple of Brits on, we were in and on before lunch. We walked down to the village, despite it being Sunday there were a fair few people around but nothing had changed, and that’s all for the good. (N 37.08030 W 7.71031), highlight of any trip to the Algarve for me, the Moncarapacho pottery shop, some of the best ceramics we have found anywhere, made locally and at really good prices.

We will be here for at least 8 days, whilst the campsite was good I felt we were a bit isolated for such a long stop. A quick reccy at Quelfes and we found another new small site, O Sol de Quinta, the gates were open and there scene was a bit devastating , torrential rain over the last 4 hours had brought torrents on water down from the hills, the drains and land couldn’t cope and water has flooded through the owners house and over the campsite. Iain parked us on the higher ground and sorted out our electric etc, I took to my bucket and helped the French campers start clearing up the rubbish. A little later the owner knocked on our door and handed over a bag full of home-made cakes in thanks for the assistance with flood clear up, then the next day a French couple came over with half a gateaux they had left over – seems we look like we need cake deliveries and we accept without question.

We spent the week trying to outwit that old adversary of ours, the Algarve cycle path. Possibly the most well hidden path in the history of cycling – when you do find it there is nowhere better to ride. Then suddenly it disappears meaning you need to cycle on the main road, or carry your bike over rivers, fords and railway lines. We managed to find a complete route from Olhao to Tavira and a few minor routes off, each time all roads led to Fuseta and a great little beach cafe so we called it a draw between us and the path.

 Fuseta coffee stop

The end of the week and Baxters Number 1 and 2 arrived. We forgot to order sunshine so it was cardigans and hoodies on and some exploring at the Ria Formosa national parque and salt pans, Alex testing our his telescopic snake hook (kid you not), and some trying out the possibles for ham and cheese at various cafes. We made a second trip to Loule, this time in blazing sunshine, everyone was getting ready for carnival, the streets were being decorated and they had ordered proper sunshine, a relief for us as we were feeling slightly guilty that the good weather might not show.

The finale of the visit – dinner at Antonio’s in Moncarapacho, food was incredible, wine as I like it, Spanish and tasting of grapes and the fig grappa was something that you could possibly run a tractor on. Suddenly 2 days had disappeared and time for flights home for some – and time to explore the hinterlands of Portugal for us.

Dinner at Antonio’s

Spain West and Rocio 2017

Cut a long and boring story short – drive a long way to campervan shop at Malaga, find campervan shop closed down, still no water cap. Slightly fed up as we aren’t too keen on the area anyway, its just a bit too busy for us – decide to leave the coast.

My extensive Google research (which didn’t included checking shops are still in business) also had another potential water cap supplier near Seville and as we wanted to visit El Rocio it was a perfect excuse to take A45 up and up, just a few miles and we were well away from the metropolis and mile after mile of olive groves lined the roadsides. Hardly a car on the road for hours, then suddenly three cars in a ditch, a lorry on it’s side and another car parked on the outside lane! Not sure how on earther they had all managed to be in the same place at the same time but everyone was milling around on the road waiting for the police so there weren’t any serious injuries.

We had visited Humilladero a few years ago and remembered there was another small site a few miles away on the side of the gigantic lake so we agreed to give this one a go even though we read a few reviews that said it was too good. Five minutes up the road and Laguna Fuente De Piedra loomed ahead, as did the little eponymous village next to the lake. The campsite, Rosa De Los Vientos (N37 7 44.4 / W 4 43 59.4) was at the end of the village, looking very rural and as if it has been there a long, long,long time. A kindly chap let us in and told us to park where we wanted, as no one else was staying we had all the choice we could want. Nothing there for us not to like, old, a bit worn and seemingly seen a few better days – bit like us then  :).

From the campsite we walked down through the groves to the Laguna and the visitor centre, which although open all year was for some reason closed the day we were there. A walk around the village showed a reasonably lively place, few shops, but many bars so easy to see where the locals priorities were on the food versus entertainment.

Another couple of hour up the road and we found Campervan heros, Hidalgo caravans yard, shop and aire (N 37 19 43  W 5 48 20) was in our sights. We pulled in, parked up and were told its fine to stay in the guarded parking overnight for just €4.50. Cheap as chips will do us, Iain went into the parts shop and found a watercap with key – hurray that’s another €17 gone, and whilst we are there our bike rack needs a stronger bar, €20 – right so a €4.50 stop just cost us €41??? That said, it’s a life saver place where they carry out repairs in their workshop and stick pretty much any parts and accessories you could think of. I did feel the need to be honest with Iain – this company has a shop less than a mile from the one that didn’t exist in Malaga – oops should have mentioned that when we were then!!

As we were stopping we had a quick look on internet and the town of Alcala De Guadaira looked worth a visit. I checked it out thoroughly and assured Iain it was less than 3 km walk to the centre, see the stunning castle, coffee and 3km back. What could be better and easier. A good couple of hours later, at least 5km and no sign of any castle, just lots and lots of houses. We gave up and trudged back, our only success being a 10 km walk. I double checked my information, ah it was an 8km walk to the castle, no wonder we didn’t find it. On the flip-side, sun was out, skies were blue, tans were improving and we visited somewhere we wouldn’t have seen otherwise – so all was good.

El Rocio – always on our lists, always the last time we will go. Couldn’t resist so yet again we checked into La Aldea, on Sunday morning and walked the 10 minutes into ‘cowboy’ town. We have seen a few fiestas there before but this one was certainly bigger than our previous experiences, hundreds of people around, many of whom were posing on their horses strutting around outside the church whilst the parades wait to enter church. We tried to go into the church, not a chance – sardines would not be as tightly packed.

For me, one of the attractions is always the tacky shops selling religious paraphernalia. I cannot resist a bit of tatt, this time a very swish bracelet that in some way is related to the Virgin Mary, who cares €3 well spent, the sun beating down and fireworks cracking in the air no where better to be on a Sunday morning.

The other main draw here is the Donana National Park, the large National Park in Spain and home to some of the best bird spotting anywhere. There is a visitor centre on the edge of the village, we walked down and spent a couple of hours treading the board-walk.  Our ‘tick’ list had hoopoes, storks, glossy ibis and even purple swamphens with 10 minutes of arriving. Obviously, we (well I) love a bit of spotting, Iain will trudge along and actually is the better spotter, if not the better identifier. Not being content with a  morning here we rode the bikes the 10 km down to the next visitor centre the following morning and sat amongst the azure magpies eating our picnic – it feels like being in the desert in Africa, fascinating place and so worth visiting I cannot praise it highly enough.

As we have battery bikes now (lazy we know before anyone else tell us – but so much fun we  🙂 ) we tackled the ride down to Matacalanas  on the coast. Down the main road but a good hard shoulder with plenty of room and not too much traffic. Considering its is literally miles from anywhere it was much bigger than we imagined, with more than its fair share of 1970’s eyesore hotels and apartment blocks. Take that away though and the beach still makes it a place worth seeing. Miles of sand, gentle breakers – oh and bizarrely it’s known for having an ancient upside down tower on the sand called Torre la Higuera, a base of one of the seven defense towers built in the 16 century by Philip II – left in the sea for aesthetic purposes only, as the sign nearby says it’s a €200 fine if you jump off it. 

That’s Spain for us, time for a bit of Portugal next :).

Spain North and Costas 2017

Finally into Spain we both felt in dire need of seeing that little yellow fried egg in the sky for a few days so we agreed on a fairly straight line down through Spain to the coast and hopefully some warmth. We found an aire near Pamplona but it looked a bit sad and empty, I had an alternative ready just up the road so we set off for that. As we turned off the main road and started heading East we also noted that ‘just up the road’ was more like 40 km up the road and in the wrong direction.

Never letting something that minor get in the way we continued to the tiny hamlet of Aoiz – and the small Hotel Ekai. Nothing there to say it was a stop so Iain popped into reception where they said we were welcome to park up next to the fields, no charges and also use their wifi. A peaceful night was broken only by the revving engines of a couple of tractors pulling in for breakfast at the hotel, peeking out the windows we were so pleased to see a thick frost yet again, but at least the sun was out and clear skies.

It was only three hours to Zaragoza and the campsite (N 41.63803  W 0.94318) used by the world and his wife on route to the coast. As food and milk stocks were low we got directions to Lidl, easy to find, in fact easy to find at least three times as we drove past looking for a parking space. Each trip around took in most of the city on the one-way system, after an our we gave up, just as we got back to camp we saw a Mercadona! Without a doubt we love Mercadona not least because they sell Tremeco – of which we purchased a few large jars – and spent the afternoon over-dosing on preserved lupin seeds.

Next morning we were away early for the long run down the A23 to the coast. Not sure where everyone else was, hardly any traffic, breathtaking views, plenty of good stopping places – it’s right up there with some of our favourite roads anywhere. The plains of Spain are, in our opinion, vastly under-rated.

Our first option was Monmar Camping at Moncofa Plage (N 39.80855 W 0.12751) – one look and we both nodded it was for us. Big pitches, very quiet, exceptionally clean, a few minutes walk to the pebble beach. What’s not to like, well accept I was a little unsure how much I loved the idea of glass frosted doors on the loos. Working on the basis I could clearly see people wandering in and out of the facilities from inside the cubicle, then my belief is they didn’t have such a good view either!

The town is about 30 minutes walk, on January 5th we headed in for the Three Kings Festival. Due to start at 6pm it finally started at 7pm, a drum band followed by ‘Minions’ throwing sweets, followed by Three Kings on pony and traps – also throwing sweets for young children to scramble over the road collecting and then hoard into bags. The atmosphere was one of family and having a good time, it felt very friendly and safe to be wandering dark side streets in a strange place, not something we would often do back in the UK.

The area is very flat – pancake flat. Good for bikes and even more so as there are bike paths everywhere. Painted a pale pink they mainly take you through citrus groves but many run alongside the main roads too. We cycled out to Marcella – 20km off road to a well worthy of the effort walled village. The Spanish cycling fraternity were out in force, we passed group after group, lycra clad and pedalling hard and fast. We felt a little in the way at time as we ambled along with our batteries on.

Moist bizarre spot of the day, a young Spanish lad “guarding a dead goat”. Assume it was road-kill, he had carried it off the main road to a side road and rung for ‘Goat kill Assistance’ as we passed a truck stopped, two older blokes got out and threw dead goat into the back and were away in nano seconds – seems the art of getting first dibs of road kill is well practiced here. We stopped for our picnic, settled on a wall and opened the rucksack to discover the picnic was still in the van! My distress was far greater than Iain’s, we shared a banana and then headed back to camp.

Iain developed a liking for Thermal Baths when we were in Hungary, so he was muchly impressed to discover there were some at Fortuna. To add to his pleasure I duly researched and found a campsite that was not only open but had said thermal waters pumping directly onto their site. With Iain doing giddy kipper impressions we set off inland to find said baths. Has to be said the 3 hour drive was worth it, into the mountains, hardly any traffic and mile after mile of olive groves, red earth and spectacular views.

We arrived in the hamlet of the thermal baths and campsite, all quiet as is the case in Spanish hamlets, just a wizened old man puffing on a ciggie sat on his door step, turn the corner to the campsite entrance – BOOM – more German motorhomes than you probably see at a Hymer convention. The campsite was heaving, motorhomes everywhere, then we walked up to see the thermal swimming pool – rammed with Germans (most of whom had natty swimming caps on). We enquired at reception who told us the campsite was full – but we could park on a bit of carpark for €15 but the thermal swimming pool would be included.

Forget that, our plan never included sharing a pool with a few hundred others. I had an alternative plan, there was another campsite a few km up the road, we would go there and then walk back to the municipal Spa in the middle of the village, pay a few Euro and spend a day taking the thermal waters without our German bretheren.

We drove to the campsite, were allocated our plot and settled in. We soon realised that actually it was just us in a motorhome, everyone else lived in statics. The English owner told us people turned up for a few days, then decided to stay, bought a static and rent the pitch for many years. We just nodded knowing that was going to be the case and he would get 2 nights maximum out of us. We took a walk into the municipal spa – to find a sign explaining it had been closed for 2 weeks as from that morning for maintenance!!!!

We returned to camp to sit in the sun and moan about our bad timing, a short while later a mamouth British motorhome turns up and stops next to us. The couple keep making gestures at us, so I walk over and say hi. The guy tells me if we move our chairs he can fit his motorhome onto our pitch. I tell him nope, its our pitch we paid for it. He and wife grumble a bit then squeeze their motorhome into a space with about 3 inches around the edge of their van outside their static.

To cap a pleasurable waste of a 3 hour drive Iain heads for the shower, and heads straight back as their isn’t any hot water. The English site owner is around so we tell him and he sets off to have a look. After a good hour of clanging around with the gas tanks, spanners and taps he admits he has not idea why there isn’t hot water and says no one has used the showers for ages. He did offer to not charge us for our stay but it was so cheap there we paid up anyway.

Being slightly inland was suiting us and I had another Camperstop penciled in at Totana, about 45 minutes down the road. Iain had been studying the maps and wasliking the look at the coast at La Manga, are you sure? yes he is sure, I am somewhat amazed as I couldn’t imagine why he wants to go but he doesn’t often get a choice so La Manga it was – 2 hours later we hit the metropolis. Camspite a ginormous 950 pitches, we ask if any spaces – just a few!! Iain fancied the area as the map shows an awesome spit of land forming an inland lake – not so good to look at when its covered with high-rise hotels and no way we wanted to cycle it.

Instead back to the hills McGregor, 4 hours on we are at Totana which would have taken 45 minutes  first thing. Bikes off and we followed the canal path for around 12 miles, incredible views down to the coast – and a gale force wind which a times attempted to side swipe us off our bikes. Another Brit on the site had told us we wouldn’t make it to the end of the canal in the wind, an obvious challenge to us so we had no choice but to do just that and then to make a point cycle a few miles in the opposite direction too.

Back to coast and down through the Cabo de Gata to Maz Azul at Balerma.- 2 year old site, very busy but looks fine in the middle of plastic jungles mile after mile after dpressing mile. However we eat salads and they need to make a living so we squint our eyes enough to stop looking at it. On stopping we find water cap is missing. Iain firstly blames me for not securing, then moves on tot hinking another camper pinched it last stop – unlikely as most of the vans cost upwards of £65k am not sure they sneak out in the night and pich €14 plastic caps.

More importantly, there is a whacking great trampoline at the entrance to the site and not a soul on it – would be rude not to surely :).

We spent a good for days, cycling to the marina, looking at buying a boat – we still think of getting a boat and sailing off into the sunset, we appreciate we don’t have the skills or talent so probably safer to keep this as a pipe dream to enjoy whenever we are at marina- rather than involve the lifeboats of several small countries on a daily basis.

We had made our own water cap, a very inventive use of a folding water bottle tap, tapped up to enable it to be jammed in gap. It looked stupid but was doing the trick stopping any creepy crawlies make there way in for a bath night.

Motril 

Time to move on, we followed the coast but found too many people, too many cars and nothing to see but mile after mile of hotels. Motril was less busy, possibly as the beach is a few miles out of town and maybe because the sun had done a disappearing act for 24 hours. We didn’t find much there other than a ferry terminal which we assumed to be heading for Africa due to the people waiting for the next departure. Yet again we discussed the merits of travelling to Africa, Iain vetoed me yet again so we packed up and were back on the road – Malaga was plugged into the Sat Nav to find a water cap and then inland.

Motril promenade and the only 2 tourists around

 

 

Home time

Monday morning, just arrived at Santander docks and sat on the quay waiting for the ferry – 24 hours of sea ahead, can’t wait, praying for calm seas please.

Slight problem this morning – arrived at ferry terminal to find it gone – literally, where the gate and the quayside were had been demolished. Then followed a frantic tour of the city one way system to try and find a new ferry terminal. After two trips around we found it, got parked up and had a couple of hours around the city. Somewhat of a culture shock after 3 months of villages and sleepy towns to suddenly be in the middle of noise, traffic, bustle and people everywhere was a real wake up call.

Each time we go away someone asks the “fuel consumption” question, and I have not a clue. So in the spirit of recording useless data and statistics here are a few kept over the last 3 months.

Miles driven to date : 2706
Total fuel bought. : 92 gallons
Fuel usage : 29.5 miles p/gallon
Total nights away : 80
Average miles driven per day : 33
Weetabix eaten : 240
7 kg Calor gas bottles used : 1
Dutch campsites in Portugal : 7
Total views of our Blog : 6897
Average fuel cost per litre €1.40

Worst bit – day 1 and discovering no electric plug so no electric for 3 months – (women will understand this means no hair straightening i.e. disaster).

Top 5 best bits
1) Finding the electric cable plug on day 2 rates fairly highly:) (See worst bit).

2) Visits from Sian and Al and the 116’ers were very special.

3) Places – Fatima, extreme in many ways but wouldn’t have missed it – closely followed by Convento De Cristo and the Ria Formosa.

4) Octopus and bread porridge – because it sounds so terrible but tastes so good.

5) Iain when he got caught in a freak wave (you had to be there but trust me it was side splittingly funny).

There endeth our Blog for another trip – we had the proverbial ball as always, met some lovely people, saw amazing places and made many wonderful memories.

Thank you Bus driver for making it all possible, you are a star x.

Tomorrow we start saving for the next adventure:)

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The Spanish Serengeti

After 2 days driving we have now arrived on the northern coast of Spain. We stopped overnight yesterday at Salamanca, along with a convoy of 20 Dutch caravans, as they were up and away with the lark we followed suit. Incredible drive up, very few cars on the roads, loads of sunshine, skies full of red kites and the snow capped mountains in the distance. We were in Santander late afternoon so went out to find our campsite in Somo and settle in for the evening.

Ok so less a campsite more a ‘spot the piece of ground not covered in tarpaulin’. To be fair calling it a 5 star dump would be generous. Iain popped into reception to be told its €32 a night! No way Jose we are off to find somewhere else. Problem being no other sites open with 30 miles. We parked up on the beach and had tea whilst we thought of what to do next.

Plan B is to go for an aire and we find one on Sat Nav 10 miles away in a National Park. We think its a bit of a clearing in a forest – not ideal but as its getting late we will brave it for a night.

Up through little lanes, looking bleak then we turn a corner and its like we have arrived in a glorious little bit of Spanish mayhem. Tiny old fashioned village, stone church in the middle, several pubs and bars, tacky shops galore and 5 or 6 motorhomes parked by the lake. There are Spanish family picnics galore – groaning tables of food with 4 generations all speaking very loudly at once. We are liking this a lot – lovely place, great atmosphere oh and its not €32 its free:)

A quick walk to the pub for a drink once we are parked up and it gets really weird – there is a field in front of us full of elephants. No we have only had one drink each honest – these are big, real live elephants, about 30 of them. And in the next field there are camels. We are not sure where we have landed – but we are liking it lots:)

Obviously this place is well known in motorhome circles as they are turning up every 10 minutes. Looks like a lively night as the local picnics look set to go on long into the night. Tomorrow we investigate the Serengeti.

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Estrela Da Serra on route to Spain

After Fatima we headed out to the coast for a last look at the Atlantic.  We drove straight across to San Pedro de Muel then followed the coast north. Mile after mile of pine forest and sand dunes. There were a few beach resorts but they looked fairly new (well about 40 years old) and not a soul around. Now that could have been due to the pouring rain? As always we didn’t let it deter us and sampled a coffee in a 1960’s beach bar, then moved onto the carpark and cooked lunch in the van, to the amusement of the few workmen trying to shift the tons on sand blown onto the roads.  Our campsite was at Coimbrao, just inland from the coast. Just for a change it wasn’t Dutch owned – this time it was German! A lovely big field site which was actually the owners back garden.  In a little village that time seems to have forgotten but still manages to support 3 or 4 cafes and two small supermarkets.

Yesterday we bit the bullet and made a proper move towards home. The sun was back out and it was fairly warm so we decided to head for the hills. From the coast we passed through Coimbra and drove past one of the oldest universities in Europe.  From there the roads were very quiet as headed into the Serra Da Estrela – the highest mountain range in Portugal.  A very different Portugal than we had seen so far, the houses looked almost Swiss to us and there seemed to be more locals around in the villages. We stopped for lunch in buffet bar – €5 for as much food as you could probably ever want. It was a bit of a “spot the tourists” job – everyone muffled up in coats and hats, in we come in shorts and t.shirts, these people need to get over to Wales and see what cold weather is – 15 degrees is not in any way chilly.

We arrived last night in the tiny village of Nabainhos, and a lovely campsite called Quinta De Cegonas.  In case anyone is wondering – yes its Dutch owned:) We are on a terrace overlooking the village and the valley. We went into the village Melo for a look around, half the houses are derelict and the other half fairly recently renovated. Lots and lots of what we call proper Portuguese ladies about  (tiny women, all in black with woolly shawls and gappy smiles) and a real friendly feel with every person in the streets we saw speaking and saying hello. For the mountains it is much warmer than we anticipated but very windy too.

Tomorrow morning we head for the border and over to Spain – time to search out a Mercadona and stock up the van with essentials such as olives, sardine paste and red wine to take home.

Fatima, bells and rosary

Another early away today – destination Fatima. Sav Nav doing its job well until we found a brand new motorway and she got a little confused as she thought we were driving over fields. Iain doing fine until suddenly motorway ends, Sat Nav is in melt down and road signs show everywhere but Fatima! A bit of quick finger in the air and a good guess and we are back on the right road, passing two Pilgrims walking to Rome on our way!

We had heard there was a good aire in Fatima in one of the carparks – understatement of the decade. We have a bay twice the width and length of the van, water, drainage and a concrete picnic table/bench. Add to that we are 100 yards from the Basilica and have a wonderful view of the tower from our window and I am not sure we could pay for a better parking spot – and this is free! There are 20-30 other vans here with more arriving hourly, its a busy little carpark for sure.

Fatima itself – so not what we expected. The plaza is the size of a couple of Wembley football stadiums with the Basilica at one end and Ingreja Santissima Trindade at the other. Despite the size the place has a calm and reflective mood, we lit candles for those no longer with us and sat in at one of the open air masses for a few prayers then just wandered around. We were surprised to see people crossing the plaza to the Basilica on their knees, we read it was an act of penance and is a daily occurrence as people arrive on bloodied knees at the edge of town. It wasn’t as busy as we expected though so no queuing to see anything.

Underneath the plaza we found there were several more chapels and rows of confessionals, above each door showed the languages that priest could take confession in – at least 20 languages at a quick count.

If inside was amazing, outside in town was weird to extremes. Hundreds and hundred of religious shops, literally. You could buy a keyring for €1 or a bronze Madonna for €2000, plates showing Jesus in flashing lights and everything in between. Shops that were just stalls, shops that were department stores – even the hotels and coffee shops were selling statues and crosses. Did we resist? haha no, we look like we are heading to a rosary convention, I couldn’t stop myself.

Not sure I have ever been anywhere like this before. I think it is somewhere that needs to be seen to be understood, for sure it is inspiring. Whether you believe or not everywhere you go you see images of the 3 shepherd children who look so innocent and tales of the final vision which was witnessed by 70,000 – then you realise this wasn’t back in biblical days it was during WWI so fairly recent – it is a very thought provoking place.

So the good of being right next to the Basilica is going to be tested as the bells are rung – loudly – every 15 minutes, could be a long – but tuneful – night.

Convento De Cristo

On the move again today, thick fog when we got up but by 10 o’clock it had lifted and sun was peeping about. We took a slow drive up in the general north west direction, avoiding motorways we used the back-roads through the villages. All very scenic and lovely – then we arrived in Abrantes. A bit of a shock to the system, nothing wrong with it but one of the first industrial type towns we have come across in 3 months. The river Tejo cuts the town in half, lots of recreational facilities along the river but the whole built up area didn’t appeal so we moved on and stopped for lunch on the Barragem do Castelo Do Bode. The road crosses over the dam so we had a cheeky lunch stop right on the dam with views down reservoir.

We decided on Tomar as a destination, and rolled up at a very lovely little campsite called Pelinos 77. The couple who run it are….yes Dutch. Its a lovely place, tiered pitches and a flat area at the bottom where we are parked up. The showers are open sided to the elements – luckily for us there isn’t any real wind around so its warm as toast. There is an incredible little bar at the top of the site, must get a photo, quaint as can be and looks like it should be in Holland. On the notice board are lots of great little sayings – and you get to take away “a smile”.

Ok so we arrived and parked up, at which stage I mentioned to Iain we needed bread and supermarket was 5km backthe way we had come! Ooops. So off we went, at which stage it seemed stupid to me not to try and slip in a trip to the Convento De Cristo. We thought being Sunday it would be mad busy but worth a shot if we could find somewhere in the town to park. So we followed signs to the convent and amazingly found ourselves in a car-park at the entrance to the convent – just us and one other British camper-van, maybe all the other tourists thought it would be busy too. The grounds of the castle and convent were free, to go inside the convent was free until 2pm – after which it was €6 each, nope we didn’t understand what that was about but we paid up as too much of an opportunity to miss seeing this.

The original convent was built in the 12th century for the Knights Templar. It is without doubt one of the most stunning and amazing places we have been lucky enough to visit. We expected a fair size convent, nothing prepared us for the huge building we were in. There were 8 different cloisters, all built over 500 years ago. The monks dormitories were on corridors so long we could hardly see one end to the other. Being Portugal (with a wonderful lack of health & safety overload) you were allowed to go pretty much anywhere; up on the roof (oh yes I was on another roof), down crumbly steps into basements and standing in cloisters where it did look that a few tons of gargoyles could come down on your head at any stage. We took a ton of photos, only a few below as its hard to capture the sheer scale and beauty of a building like this on a camera.

We are now sat in the “Dutch bar” making use of the free wifi, drinking coffee and being totally impressed at the idea of having a bar in your garden – it has to be the way ahead.

 

A meeting with Cirl Bunting

Not as sunny this morning, so we made a quick decision on moving North, packed and away by 9 o’clock.   Our aim was to reach Portalegre today, no real reason other than it is on route and not too far away, it is fairly close to the Spanish border but we aren’t planning to go back into Spain – from here we will head out to coast at Coimbra (my map planning is very zig zag at the moment)

The roads were even quieter than normal, maybe the Saturday effect.  After a slow drive we were here before lunchtime.  Our site is lovely – and we are on another Dutch owned site. It’s a fairly large site, space for 30 campers but very spread out between cork and olive trees. they also have several small villas and a large quinta house to rent.  There seems to be a lot of people around, many are on a walking holidayfor the next 10 days.

Strange but since we have been in Portugal we have now stayed on 5 different sites owned by Dutch couples  (and we have details of at least another 3 or 4 on our route).  We have also stayed on a site owned by Norwegians and one owned by an English couple. We have never found any small sites owned by the Portuguese, only the massive sites around the coasts that are owned by big national companies.

We are just back from a walk to the nearest town,  Castelo De Vide. Took us 3 hours there and back, the walk was all on cobbled paths that have never seen a motorised vehicle and we only passed 2 houses all the way. In the middle of nowhere we came across the well in the photo – there was a small shed of an old house further up the hill so guess it would have been their water supply.

Main reason for the walk was a bit of bird spotting – in just under an hour we saw 22 types of bird – and Cirl Bunting was a first spot for us.  the weather forecast for today was bad, lots of rain – the good news was the forecast was wrong, we had rain for about 5 minutes other than that its been fairly warm and a little overcast.

A week today we need to be back at Santander in Spain for the ferry home on Monday.  We are hoping to see a fair bit of Northern Portugal in the next week on route, tomorrow we go West and see what we find

Today we did mostly….

sitting in the sun….….followed a bit later by mostly some more of this with a bottle of wine and a tub of olives

 

Estremoz – marble galore

Having been told that Estremoz  was a  prolific producer of marble and the second largest exporter in the world we decided it was worth  a visit today. Whilst waiting for the bus one of our Dutch camper neighbours appeared and kindly offered us a lift into the town, about 12km away.

When we arrived in the enormous town square the first thing that hits you is indeed the amount of marble. It’s used everywhere, the doorsteps, pavements, kerbstones  and even the actual the cobble stone pavements are made out of marble.  On the edge of the town we walked to see the marble quarry – gigantic lumps of marble everywhere and the quarry itself 80 metres deep.

The town itself is divided into three, at the top of the hill are the medieval walls and within them are oldest parts of town; a medieval castle, church, city hall and chapel. The old town is 425 metres high on the hill, on top of this you can climb the 27 metres to the top of the tower – oh yes, yet again I climbed and stood on the roof. There were incredible views for miles over the Alentejo countryside ( I didnt stay up there long but did take a few photos).

The next part of the town is below the medieval part, a couple of hundred years old and has its own wall 17th century walls. Within this area are some beautiful churches and convents all around the edge of one of the biggest town squares we have ever visited.

The newest part of the town is outside the walls.  Pictures tell it better then I can…..

50 Anos – me and Delta

Both Delta Coffee and I are celebrating our big 50  maybe that’s where the addiction to Delta coffee has come from?

Us birthday peoples

We are now roughly 100 miles further North from Ourique.  We are mid way between Evora and Estremoz at an absolute gem of a site, Camping Alenjento, run by a Dutch man (we have lists of campsite in Portugal all run by the Dutch for some reason). Anyway, its perfect – great showers, loo seats, electric and wifi. At €8 a night its a total bargain and a good base for the next few days.

Well the 12th dawned wet and cloudy – who cares – its my big 50 birthday and we are going out for the day to celebrate. Destination Evora – mode of transport, the local bus. We checked times and bus leaves at 7.55am, so set alarms for 7am. For some bizarre reason alarms go off at 6am (ooops). Anyway, means we are ready early and catch bus no problems from outside campsite. After about 20 minutes bus arrives in town at a square, beautiful old church etc. So we are about to get off – but Iain thinks it may not actually be the town we are going to. Correct – that man – it wasn’t, our stop was another 10 miles away!

After nearly an hour on the bus (its not more than 20 miles) we arrived in Evora, first stop the much talked about gypsy market. Massive, loads of stalls – nearly all of which sell knickers, socks or table clothes. There were a few selling secondhand shoes, one or two selling other bits and bobs but vast majority socks and knickers, so we gave that a miss.

Evora itself, so worth the effort of going there. The old town has everything from a Roman temple, a palace, a cathedral and so much more. Cobbled streets, so tiny you could hardly drive up them (didn’t stop the locals using them for special stage practices). The main attraction was the roman temple which dates from the 2nd century, fairly amazing and even more so in that access isn’t in anyway restricted, no fences, no ropes just stroll right up to it. From there we went into the cathedral, another stunning place and for some strange reason our entry ticket allowed us on the roof! For the love of Jesus what the hell are they doing letting me on a roof?? There is no safety rail, its extremely high, it’s wet and very slippy – I was somewhat nervous (understatement) but hey I have a fear of heights so what better thing to do on your birthday?

From there is was feet on the ground stuff, more churches than you could shake a stick at – we sat through half a mid morning mass in the The Igreja de São Francisco, the high light of which was an incredible solo sung by a lady from the congregation. Next door  and my strange addiction to human bones was once more indulged with a visit to the Capela Dos Ossos – another chapel made from human skulls and bones. Every wall and ceiling covered in thousands. The motto over the door in latin translates to “we bones await your bones”!

Lunch stop for today was pizza, not at all a local dish but very, very good. Chilli con carne pizza with nachos on top is the way ahead for pizza, made nicer by a half bottle of cheap vinho tinto.

Chilli con carne pizza 🙂

We had an amble around the shops after lunch, the sun came out, we found the bus terminal and then headed home. All in all a very lovely birthday day out, made even more special with lots of birthday text, emails and cards. My 50th banner is up in the van proclaiming my half a century (thanks Ros).  We are settled in for the night, no bars nearby so will make do with some good cheap local red wine in the van.

Rambling on the edge

This morning we woke to clearer skies,  Iain suggested we go out walking and as its not a suggestion he has on a regular basis we were up and out before he could change his mind. The campsite owner printed us off a map of a 5km circular local walk along the goat tracks and back along the river.

Iain has just said if I am writing blog all I need to put is “went for a walk – got wet”.

However, I cannot be that precise and I don’t think it really tells the story…..

We left campsite, walked for 20 minutes – heavens opened. No it didn’t rain, it hurled hailstones down for 3-4 minutes – it was akin to being pelted with ice by a sub machine gun. We couldn’t have been wetter if we had sat fully dressed in a bath of water.  So as we were well and truly drenched nothing for it then to continue. The route went up through the Alentejo hills which really are worth the walk just to see the forests of cork trees. Once you get high enough the views would be spectacular – if you could take your eyes of the thunder and lightening storm a mile or so above your head (second soaking of the day).

We managed to lose the route once, took a slight detour  but joined the footpath back near the river. Once we got to the river our problems were back – the river is a good 5 ft higher than normal, therefore the footpath is now under water.  Oh no of course we didn’t turn back – that would be sensible, we will take the goat path literally and try and climb our way along the granite rocky outcrops.  Sounds easy enough? it wasn’t, it was a nightmare. Sheer drops down 15ft to a fast flowing river and we are balancing on shinny slits of granite with a good slurping of mud pouring down the hill  800 odd metres later we made it on to terra firma.

Two hours later we get back to camp, wet, cold, miserable – and just in time to watch the sun come out and sky turn blue ready to dry out our soaking clothes and walking shoes.

On the plus side – its not raining now, its warm and surely there cannot be much rain left in the sky? fingers crossed, tomorrow we head for the Unesco World Heritage Site of Evora.

Surfing through the rain !

Over the last few days we have continued with our beach explorations. Its much less busy up on this coast than on the Algarve, and that cannot be due to the weather – both here and the Algarve have had some really bad storms over the last couple of days. Every morning we have storms with torrential rain, then after lunch its blue skies and sunshine. Still really warm though as per the sign outside the chemist yesterday.

 

After Aljezur we headed to Arrifana beach a few miles back down the coast. Not so much a beach, more one of the most awesome views we have seen. From the top of the cliff a little road wound down to a tiny harbour with little white cottages all clinging to the side of an incredibly steep cliff. The village had probably less than 100 houses, but had at least 7 or 8 bars and cafes.  Really impressive views over the cliffs and beautiful beaches with hardly a soul on them.

Cliffs at Arrifana

Arrifana

No idea just loved his hat!

From there we headed along the coast to Monte Clerico beach. The road – if you want to call it so, was mostly a sand track. It seemed to go on for miles to nowhere, down a steep hill and we came across the village. What you see in the photos is it – not much there but what there was could not have been improved on, a handful of houses and beach bungalows, a ford over the river and of course the statutory gorgeous beach. Pretty much miles from anywhere, it was one of the top places we have visited so far.

Monte Clerico

For lunch we pulled in at Odeceixe several miles up the coast. Another town that time forgot, a couple of shops, more bars then you could count and very little going on except elderly Portuguese gentlemen sitting on benches whiling the day away. According to the tourist blurb its one best surfing destinations in Europe – we didn’t see a single surfer – typical. This may have been due to out inability to get to the actual beach as campervans were not allowed, the best we could do was park on the top of the cliffs and peer over the edges.

Overnighted at a Campervan stop on the beach at Carvalhal beach. Several vans parked up but the most peaceful little beach stop. No traffic during the night – then around midnight the teeming rain storms were back – it sounded like a flock of seagulls tap dancing on the roof.  By the morning half the beach had disappeared as the river had cut a wedge straight through the middle. This didn’t deter our neighbour, a Portuguese lad in his twenties who was out first thing with a spear off to catch breakfast in 10 ft waves on the rocks for him and his girlfriend and small baby, we stuck to weetabix, seemed safer than allowing Iain to have a spear in deep water.

 

Up and away in the morning to continue the explorations, came inland via Odemira then took the scenic route up the coast. Would have been scenic if it wasn’t covered in low cloud and fog. We didn’t see more than 3 cars in 40 minutes, possibly due to the worst road surfaces we have come across and the poorest visibility (my choice of route not the Sat Navs so I take the blame for that one). We pulled into Odemira town, looked at the weather, looked at each other, shook our heads and carried on. Whilst we are sure its a lovely place it didn’t look good enough to get soaked for.

By lunchtime we had arrived at Porto Covo an absolute gem of a village a few miles below Sines, and hey presto the sunshine had arrived with us. The towns / houses seem very different to the Algarve up here, very small and square white houses.  There was a traffic free street through the middle of the village which lead straight down to the sea. The campsite was right in the middle of the village. Iain went in to check prices – we could have the March (cheap) rate if we stayed 2 nights – if we only stayed 1 night we paid the July (highest rate)? So as it was March we don’t really get that at all. Less than 50 yards outside the campsite was an aire with water and it was free. So yes we stayed there and so did another 15 or so vans – whilst the campsite remained empty.

OK a holiday highlight – a surfer girl in a hippy bus gave us the peace sign yesterday – and yes we both gave the  sign back, we are so the ‘oldest dudes ‘around here :), I just must get Iain some beads and flares and we will be getting invited to all the surf parties!

Back to reality and this morning – yes it rained, and rained and then it went mad and chucked it down.  A fairly drab drive inland to be honest. We stopped off at Ourique for a wander round the town and to pick up some shopping, got fed up getting wet and left.  From there it was a spit and a jump to the Quinta campsite we are staying on for the weekend. A few miles down from the town, its a lovely site owned by Dutch couple, it has big pitches, big showers, and big loads of hot water for showers :). Yet again the sun appeared just after lunch so we headed out for a walk and some bird spotting, Great Spotted Woodpecker landed right outside the van when we got back.

The forecast continues for sunshine and showers for at least a week,  so we plan to do a fair few miles over the next week taking in the sights in the South. We will have the weekend here and catch up with a few bits of housework then its back on the road and clock up some proper mileage.

Dora parked up at Serro De Bica

Aljezur – surf dude & hippy heaven

That’s it – we have left the Algarve behind and headed inwards and upwards to explore more of Portugal.  Quick stop off this morning at the Hypermarket for a major stockup (yes there are supermarkets inland but we seem to panic if more than 5 miles from a Continente store).  We used the A22 toll road to try and burn off as much of our pre-payment as we could – alas we only got up to €12 so the Portuguese government now owe us €28 – pretty sure we have zero hope of recovering that anytime in the next 10 years.

Anyway, headed up through the San Vincente  Natural Parque , the drive up is literally “Up” we climbed right into the windmills and as it was warm there was a fabulous smell of pine and eucalyptus all the way from the trees on the roadside.

We stopped at Aljezur, a town of two halves – one side of the river is the old town and the other the “new” town, as the “new” town dates back to the 18th century not sure just how old the old one can be.  Both towns are fairly small – really villages. In the old town we walked up to the remains of the Moorish castle, a long walk on wet cobbles but would be worth it for the amazing view when we got to the top? Wrong! just as we got to the top we had a torrential downpour, couldn’t really see much at all.  From there we headed back down to the river to find a Delta coffee bar (yes the Delta theme is still running daily).

The town is like something out of the hippy era. Lots of aging surfers and hippy type folk wandering around, shops selling surf boards and incense and a general feeling of large quantities of calming substances being used over the years.  The area is known for the amount of ‘sweet potatoes’ grown here, they even have a sweet potato fair in the autumn – surely something we should come back for in the future?  We are liking this coast, much less hustle and bustle and much more laid back.

We went down to the beach but to be honest it was a bit too windy and slightly raining so we just cooked lunch and watched the sea out of the window rather than going for a walk. The beaches are just as stunning as down on the Algarve but there isn’t the development of the south. Without all the hotels right on the beaches it is so much quieter, really seems a much slower pace of life and all the better for it.

The Atlantic ocean

Aljezur Moorish castle

The rain in Portugal falls mainly on us

We left Armacao de Pera on Sunday morning, we didn’t really have a destination but the general direction or San Bartolomeu de Messines seemed good as inland for a change. Not sure what we expected but it is quite dower looking little town, not much to see and the only places open being the Chinese markets (Poundland with clothes to us) . On the plus side though a 5 van aire with water etc – and totally free on the edge of town. So plan is to stay there for the night but as its only lunchtime to have a drive around a few of the places we haven’t visited yet.

So next stop was Loule, which we expected to be a bit like Messine – not at all. A beautiful city with wide streets, stunning buildings and plenty of old moorish churches and castles. Being Sunday everything was shut so we ambled through and will go back for a full visit when its open later in the week.

Its only a couple of miles from Loule to Quarteira on the coast, so aimed for there with a plan of a circle trip back up to Messines. As we drove in we found an aire just on the edge of town. Its a massive car park, fenced in with 70 odd campervans – its €2 a night so we opted to stay rather then drive back inland. There is electric, it seems to involve running cables from a telegraph pole in the middle of the aire – it means if you want it you have to cluster around the poles for a cable. We have opted for using our battery and lots of space.

Today we woke up to rain -real torrential rain but 20 degrees too, an odd concept when used to Welsh wet and cold going together. We headed to the Albuferia shopping complex with the plan of staying in the dry. Nope, rubbish plan as all the balconies around the shops are open – we got absolutely drenched.

At lunchtime we headed to Vilamoura and parked on the pier whilst we made lunch. Only us down there, possibly the high seas and gale force winds had kept most sensible people away? We drove around to the marina and parked up to have a walk around as its advertised everywhere we go as ‘the’ place to go. At a quick count there must be a couple of hundred million pounds worth of yachts moored up – some seriously impressive sized boats. There were several dead expensive shops, just as many tat shops and tons of cafes and bars catering to the golfing fraternity was about the sum of it. The buildings around the marina reminded us of 1960’s high-rise flats in the UK, the hotels were massive and not built with any consideration of being aesthetically pleasing. Would guess in the summer it is a buzzing place but on a damp afternoon it reminded us of Gibraltar – a bit dull, a bit old and in need of a pot of paint or two.

Rain has eased off so has the wind, now waiting the arrival of the thunder and lightening forecast for this evening.

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Feliz St Dewi’s Dia

All quiet here on the Algarve front, our day has consisted of mostly sitting, sitting oh and a bit more sitting in the sunshine :).

Yesterday we did what seems to be our first day anywhere habit and walked the length of the promenade which took us nearly 4 hours there and back. Armacao De Pera is very different to most places we have been to down here, fairly high rise with lots a new apartment blocks everywhere, many of which are empty and loads are only part built. The beach is lovely though and stretches for miles either side and has an old fashioned fishing quay right in the middle. Its one of those places that will be “nice when its finished”.

We had lunch out – Iain had a ‘delicacies of the sea’ baguette – translated to fish sticks, boiled egg and salad cream in a roll, could be the Portuguese equivalent of the Fish Finger Butty?, odd but strangely tasty too :).

Campsite is good – showers are a trial though. You have to push a button for hot water at one end of the block then make a run for your chosen shower, you get 7 minutes of hot water but at a trickle. If your water runs out you need to dash out and start the timer again. The pitches are the biggest we have seen anywhere, we could get our house on ours and still have room for parking.

Its gone very warm and we are finding it tough to motivate ourselves to do too much – plan seems to be to talk about doing things but then actually do nothing, well they say its all in the planning:). We are starting to look at a route North over 10 days and probably go straight up through Portugal and see more of the countryside. That gives us at least 2 more weeks on the Algarve so we will have a trip back down to the Ria Formosa and maybe hop over into Spain for a week.

As its St David’s Day Iain hung out a massive Welsh flag (its the Welsh cross though so everyone thinks we are Swedish as it looks like their flag).

As I write this Iain is having a look at the guy next doors 3 wheeler moped! He is sure he ‘needs’ one – I am nowhere near even considering it (less Hells Angels – more Compo on wheels me thinks). Now praying he doesn’t let him test drive it – better go check the insurance documents are handy just in case.

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No fishing here

Starting off with our photos from Marinha beach. We havent had an internet connection for a few days so we couldn’t post these at the time but it was a really spectacular little beach.

Arcos Marinha

Marinha beach

We are flitting around a bit right now – weather is great – but the forecast is to get very cool for the rest of the week. We were heading out to the Costa Vicentina on the Atlantic coast but changed plan as its got to be a wee bit warmer on the south coast. Checking the weather for tomorrow – Rhyl is forecast to be 11 degrees – we have 10 degrees !!!!

Portimao aire

Anyway, we left Portimao this morning. The campsite / aire was different to what we usually use but none the worse for it. However at 2am this morning when the ferry from Madeira arrived in the dock next door with horns blasting – it did put the fear of god into me as to what was going on. No facilities or electric, not even a dustbin on site but it was cheaper to park for 24 hours then for 2 hours in Rocha – so we aren’t complaining. Yesterday morning we walked along the beach as far as we could into Praia da Rocha then came back along the promenade. Looked a good resort, a mix of 4 and 5 star hotels and apartments and even though it has a different name it is part of Portimao. The beach went on right around the coast to Lagos and it dotted with the sandstone arches and cliffs that you see in all the postcards. In the afternoon we walked into Portiamo marina and old town, the town is ok but not much to see as its the banking district. The harbour and marina goes on for miles. Plenty of fish restaurants and boat trips but other than that just cobbled paths alongside the estuary. By the end of the day we had walked over 11 miles – so happy but totally exhausted campers were asleep well early last night.

Praia da Rocha from the point

Praia da rocha town

This morning we agreed we smell (too much information?) – well we haven’t had a shower for 2 days so it must be time to move on and find a hot shower. We drove through the little fishing town of Ferragudo which has some beautiful churches and harbour buildings, there was a campsite but looked a bit bleak so we carried on along the coast roads to the next resort.

We had been to Praia Da Carvoeiro a few days earlier, this time parked up and went for a wander around the town and beach. The beach there is tiny and the town runs up both sides of the hill, really busy little place. Everywhere was open and buzzing with tourists, probably the most people we have seen at any resort, alas nowhere to stay. Result though spotting Sullys Bar – our youngest grandson has a bar named after him in Portugal :).

Sullys Bar

Carvoeiro beach

So onwards to Armacao de Pera where we are now pitched up. Smallish town with a fair mix of what appears to be tourist shops and local housing and shops. The campsite is yards from the beach so at least we can get on the sands in our coats tomorrow:) The site itself has seen better days, the bar and restausrant look ok though and as long as the shower is hot its fine with us. We have a ton of washing to do too and they have machines so its all working for us here.

Tomorrow we will explore a bit further around us and maybe get the bikes down as the blessed bike path runs right past the campsite entrance! Oh and before I forget, in order to catch a fish Iain will need to get his fishing rod out and stand near the sea – neither of which he has done, so no he hasn’t caught tea (he popped in Aldi instead).

Aire time at Portimao

Back to just us – lovely friends are all back home now. Packed up and out of Camping Albufeira first thing, sad to see everyone go but looking forward to moving around a bit and checking out more of the beaches as its really warm today 🙂

So we continued with our beach explorations along the coast. We walked along the cliffs on the ‘Seven Hanging Valleys’ path which has incredible views down over the coastline. We went as far as the Arcos de Marinha (the arches in the cliffs) and down to a few of the beaches, then back for lunch on top of the cliffs. After lunch we continued on all the way down to Praia de Bengali – a bit pointless as you can’t park and its one hell of a hill, Praia de Carvoeira was buzzing with tourists, lots of bars and shops, looks like a new resort (well newish in the last 30 years).

Tonight we are staying in Portimao! Yes as the Bate family leave we arrived. We weren’t too impressed as we came into town, seems very built up and a bit dowdy. As you head down to the beaches it really improves. We went and had a look at Praia de Roche (nice but a bit too touristy after the quieter areas) but the beaches themselves look just as good as in the villages.

We are now at the harbour in Portimao, staying on the Aire here. In non campervan terms that’s a very large carpark with approx 200-300 other motorhomes. There is a small mobile bar/cafe and a gatehouse. No fancy facilities and its a bargain for €2.50 per night. The beach at Praia de Rocha is 50 yards away and Portimao marina 20 yards. Just walked out to the end of the harbour and back through the marina now settling down for an early night.

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Iain does swimming

A bit of overcast weather – not booked and not wanted. Due to this unforseen weather we have had to change a few plans. Thursday we took on the challenge of ‘how many people can eat lunch in a 6 metre Baxterbus?’. The answer is quite unbelievably and quite comfortably 8! Luckily the ladies had brought a picnic with them as not sure we could have cooked in there too – but I reckon we have set a good record, and may contact Guinness with the photo evidence.

Dull weather has not deterred nights out. Have tried a different restaurant each night, ending up back at the Rock Bar as Ped has a pocketful of BOGOF tickets to get through. Last night the Portuguese police riot squad turned up in force – we didn’t think we were that noisy? No they were after quietening down a stag party and did so rather well with a show of guns and batons.

How many people can you fit in a camper??? lots

Today, Iain and I aimed for some beaches as the sun was back. Found a few crackers, the best of which was Marinha. Not only for its sheer beauty but also to see Iain sitting on the sand admiring the 10 ft waves crashing in – and then a freak wave straight up the beach and Iain was in 6 inches of water. I laughed till my sides hurt, sadly Iain no longer has a pair of shoes but it was worth the cost for the comedy.

 

Picnic time 🙂

Also went to Praia Senhora de Rocha. A tiny church on a cliff edge with the sea each side. Loads of surfers in the water in some pretty massive waves. It reminded my of the church in Mama Mia – expected to see Meryl Streep singing at the end!

This afternoon we went to Silves, met up with the Bate duo for lunch in the sunshine followed by a hike up the hill to the castle. Eating outside is lovely but I was a bit concerned that if one of the enormous storks flying overhead went for my Toasty it was a goner!

Soon got Rick and Kerry into our habit of each hill walked up  needs to be followed by a coffee and cake stop as a reward (they didn’t need talking into it). The rest of the party showed more dedication and watched the rugby with a few drinks in town and we are off to find them to see if we are celebrating a win or commiserating for a loss.

Silves coffee break

 

Beach visit

Ooops someone got wet

Two become eight

Our days and nights of peace and solitude have been well and truly shattered – hurrah the 116’ers have arrived and we are all now in Albufeira.

As we were passing Faro airport yesterday we popped in on the off chance of seeing them land. Spoke to a very kind policeman who let us park up right outside the arrivals hall. We walked in 30 minutes before their flight was due – only to see them heading out at the other end of arrivals! Managed to attract their attention and had a quick catch up over coffee outside in a cafe before everyone headed off to get booked and settled in.

We are at Camping Albufeira – a massive campsite (over 800 pitches) on the outskirts of town. Its fairly busy and only 20 minutes walk into town so suits us for a week.

Last night we went out for a meal in old town Albufeira. Took the advice of Uncle Jimmy from last year and had the Cataplana (fish stew, thanks for the tip – it was incredibly good) and a few really awful cocktails that were complete with sparklers and 3 ft straws. Iain in a bit of heaven with people to talk to other than me – think his ears are enjoying the rest of me having someone else to talk to aswell 🙂

 

Iain & Rick break many Blackberry’s

Glowing from the sun and cocktails

Just glowing!

Fairly quiet in Albufeira so far, a few brave souls in the sea yesterday, Mez is aiming to join them at some stage this week. Other than that the plans are – no plans, will just enjoy seeing our lovely friends for the next 5 days.

Visit to Silves

Picnic time 🙂

Strolling on the beach

 

We are now all biked out

As today will probably be the last time we get the bikes out for a while we decided to go for an hour this morning first thing.

Headed down to Olhao and started looking for the elusive bike route – nope, couldn’t find it as usual. So not to be deterred we decided Faro didn’t look too far away lets cycle there. We took the back streets and sand roads for about 5 miles, hard going. Eventually the tracks brought us out onto the main N125 road, the hard shoulder was a decent width so we headed along that quite easily. After passing the sign that said we were in Faro the shoulder narrowed and it wasn’t too much fun so we decided to head back the way we had come – literally spitting distance from Faro but hey another time.

When we got back to Olhao it was time for coffee and cake stop whilst we debated which way to go back to camp. The offer of me buying lunch convinced Iain to ride to the next town of Fuseta, have lunch, then take the easier road back up to Moncarapacho. So suitably refreshed we started the hunt for the bike path again. Stopped and asked in a garage – no idea, asked at a campsite – even less idea. We headed down into some villages and just took the tracks that seemed closer to the coast, saw a lady in her garden and did a bit of the hand gesture and mouthing “bike path” and she point left – so left we went – 2 miles later – we found it – at last and so worth the effort, beautiful surface alongside the lagoons all the way into Fuseta.

The Algarve bike path runs from coast to coast – we keeping seeing literature that says many people complete the whole route – god knows how as it literally disappears for miles for no reason and you just have to ride round looking for where it starts again. Anyway, not cutting a long story short (as I never do) the hour out this morning turned into more like 6 hours and 30 miles.

 

Barrill beach and beyond

Woke up to an overcast sky this morning, so stuck with plan A and headed out on the bikes. For a change we were organised, knew the route, packed a picnic lunch, bought drinks and wore enough clothes –  destination of San Luzia – known as “Capital De Polvo”  (The Octopus Capital).

First stop was a pastry shop in town to pick up a couple of Pasteleria De Nata to keep himself happy on the outing, then straight down to the Ria Formosa and found the cycle track we wanted. Fairly cool day but loads of cyclists about, the path is probably at its best around Fuseta and well used by local cycling clubs and tourists. We headed East and and when we got to Luz Tavira came off the track and went down towards the coast.

We were going to see the famous Barril beach. At 18 km long its one of the longest islands of the Ria Formosa. To get there we had to cross a pontoon bridge over the lagoon (somewhat unstable) and then a mile or so ride to the sea (if we hadn’t had the bikes we could have taken a miniature train ride).  The point you arrive at on the beach is a former Tuna station. All the buildings are still there and are converted into several cafes and bars. We had the obligatory coffee stop and then a quick wander on the beach, miles of sand and very few people – bliss.

Walked over the sands to the Anchor Cemetery, just a few yards up the beach. It’s on the edge of the sand dunes and consists of hundreds of huge rusting anchors. These were used by the local fishing fleet to anchor the nets to the seabeds and when the industry collapsed the anchors were brought to the cemetery as a lasting memorial to the tuna fishing industry in the area.

We traced our paths back to the road and headed into Santa Luzia hoping to see the fishing fleet landing the hundreds of octopus they catch. Plenty of boats in but not too much action. Iain walked down the jetty and saw a fisherman hanging the octopus up to dry before the tentacles are cut off for cooking. By now it was getting chilly so we stopped for our picnic on a bench on the waterfront, eaten fairly sharpish before turning round and heading home.

An uneventful ride back which was broken briefly for some bird spotting at Fuseta (Flamingos, Avocet, Black winged stilt to name but a few, its spotters paradise down there). Round trip of 28 cycling miles – and no disasters, yes we feel a bit smug for a change 🙂

Final update of the weather for the day – its cooler, its cloudier and we haven’t seen the sun 😦  Fingers crossed it changes back to fried eggs by Wednesday.

Anchor Cemetery – Barrill Beach

Stop off at Barrill Beach

Salt mountain at Ria Formosa

Much ado about doing nothing

We have been all out working on the suntans again for the last 2 days, I think I now have enough colour to prevent the “you aren’t very brown” comments on Wednesday:)

This morning we both walked into town for a bit of shopping. Our essential shopping for a week seems to cost half as much here than at home, it isn’t just because prices are that much cheaper, just we buy much less and make do with whatever we have in the fridge. Every fourth day we have a “leftover pasta bake” the contents are a little odd at times but add some chilli’s and garlic and all tastes fine to us. Having limited space for storage also helps, as we can’t store too much so we shop every other day and try out as many local brands as we can, Dutch and German foods are also plentiful in the likes of Aldi and very cheap – we struggle slightly with cooking instructions not being shown in English but we do find almost anything will cook in 20 minutes in simmering water – it may not taste how it should be hey its food.

After the grueling task of walking a mile this morning Iain needed (and believed he deserved) a treat so we stopped off for coffee and cakes and to pick up some bread. Iain has developed an addiction to Pasteleria De Nata– a bit like a custard tart – and he is consuming them at an alarming rate. We read the other day that Portuguese food is exceptionally healthy as no cream, fats etc other than olive oil, apparently the cakes make up for it with on average three times as much sugar per cake as anywhere else on earth. Unhealthy yes – amazingly good – definitely yes.

By the time we had ambled back the sun was blasting so we agreed the plan for the rest of the day may as well be to sit in it. Campsite is now full but as always very peaceful. Our next door neighbours are the Dutch couple we parked next to last year, other than that its all British couples on site and a few British staying in the villa too. The pool is still covered and we are awaiting the cover coming off to take a proper dip. Iain thinks it will be too cold – I think it will be fine but will let him go in first to give him the opportunity of saying ‘ I told you so’ if he is right and save me freezing.

The forecast is to cool down over the next few days so we will get active and go out and do some sightseeing.

Casa Rosa campsite

We aren’t really moving too much

Day three at Casa Rosa and time for an update as we haven’t done so for 3 whole days – at this stage would like to be able to tell you we have been busy visiting cultural attractions, cycling the whole of the Algarve coast to coast route or at least been on a shopping spree. None of which would be true, to be honest we have been sat outside the van enjoying the sun. Hardly moved since Sunday other than a couple of quick trips into the village for bread. My Kindle is working overtime, I couldn’t have carried the amount of books I have got through, been onto Amazon and downloaded a load more this week to keep me stocked up for the next 6 weeks.

This afternoon we decided it really was time to do something so we got the bikes out and cycled down to the coast. As always, we got lost! What should have been a simple ride downhill all the way became and up hill and down dale for 4 miles. Finally got to the main road and we weren’t sure which way to go, of course we chose the wrong way so ended up cycling back on ourselves. We finally made the Ria Formosa and did a few miles along the cycle paths. We saw several White Storks flying low overhead, they still amaze us, gigantic great things with wingspans up to 7ft across. They build the most enormous nests on the top of telegraph poles or chimneys and look like something out of Jurassic park. The locals never even seem to notice them, I can’t see how as I am sure I would be very aware of something that big sat on my roof.

From there we then headed into Fuseta for a coffee and cake stop, and then   found the correct route back and so managed to get to camp without further  navigational errors. Round trip of 22 miles so that has made up a bit for the last 3 days of idleness. We plan to ride more over the next few days as forecast is to be very warm and there are good breezes down on the coast.  Failing that we will revert to Plan B and sit in the sun:)

Hey Macarena

This morning we woke up to the sound of a woodpecker pecking the hell out of a nearby telegraph pole. But that was the only sound – bliss. We have moved on from the massive campsite at Cabanas and we are now about 15 miles inland at Moncarapacho. Complete contrast here with only 6 vans on a little site at the side of a villa, its really like camping in someones garden. The owners are a lovely Norwegian couple whom we stayed with last year, sometimes when we go back to a place it isn’t quite as good as our memories told us – not the case here, just as good if not better. 

It was warm enough to have breakfast outside the van in our pj’s today so we did.  Sian kindly bought us about 3 kilos of oranges yesterday from a road side seller, so we had freshly squeezed juice with our weetabix and decided the diet starts today after eating out for the last 3 days. 

We were extremely energetic this morning and moved all of 5 feet after breakfast to put the chairs into a sunnier spot, then did some catching up with the sunbathing and reading for a few hours. After a quick lunch we decided we should head into town as its the local Mardi Gras Carnival this weekend in most towns and villages.

Moncarapacho is a smallish town, a fair few shops and loads of bars but more like a market town than a touristy town. We thought the carnival would be a few groups of people parading around and a couple of floats, how wrong could we be. We walked in and it was due to start at 2.30pm. Speakers had been attached all over town with wires running all over the place, music was blaring and it seemed like everyone was in costume, even those who had just come to watch. We thought before it all got going we would get a quick coffee, popped into a bar and whilst Iain got the drinks I headed for the loo, narrowly missing have a dart embedded in my head – why put the loo door right next to the dart board?? Well it amused that dart players but I was a little nervous off how to get back out again.

We found a space in the square and settled down for the start, by 3pm nothing was really happening but we could see a big JCB at the bottom of the road with several people in the ‘bucket’. We realised they were lifting people onto the top of the floats from the JCB! Portugal does not do health and safety that is for sure. The floats were amazing but they looked like they were made from plywood. Kids were hanging onto little poles and there were women dancing 20ft on top of some of them with nothing holdiing them on. Each float was pulled by a local on a tractor, each of which was being steered with one hand and holding tightly to his bottle of beer in the other as they merrily drive round the tiny streets. The floats fitted through the streets with literally inches to spare, but no one seemed to bothered and the crowds just stepped back a few paces each time a float was coming to make sure it could get through.

The floats themselves were all covered in thousands of tiny pieces of crepe paper, the costumes ranged from homemade bits and bobs to really elaborate outfits. Behind each one were groups of people dancing, it was fantastic. I guess that’s why they call it a “Carnival Atmosphere” as there was no other way to describe it. I did feel the need to get in with the crowd and have a quick salsa, Iain on the other hand felt it was best I didn’t!! so I was duly banned from showing him up:(. Iain on the other hand was quite entranced with the Brazilian show girls – he was muttering about the lovely float but think the outfits (read – lack of) had more to do with it, so whilst his mind was on other things a group came along doing the Macarena so I managed to get into the swing for a few minutes and even knew the words 🙂 

Photos from today

Great day out at the lagoon in Cabanas, Ihra Tavira beach and then Olhao for ice-creams. Al & Sian have caught the sun – we thinks they could be glowing a little later this evening.

Is Octopus something to eat or look at in an aquarium?

Pataniscas de Polvo com Acorda from the Restaurante Noelia E Jeronimo

A little unsure whether it was a good thing to go for a totally Portuguese meal in what sounded like a Red Indian restaurant??

It translates to – Octopus Fritters with Bread and clam porridge, sounds disgusting – tasted absolutely amazing (lets hope my stomach still says this tomorrow morning).

You can’t go anywhere without seeing someone you know!

Today was ‘treat’ day for Iain. I have had to keep the ‘treat’ secret for 3 weeks – nightmare. Yesterday Iain decides we should move somewhere else!! Noooo not possible and I cannot say why so I had to give him various tiny hints as to we were doing something here today. The hints ranged from wind surfing, balloon flight and anywhere high and dangerous – but the whole thing costing less than €5. So as we left the site this morning he seemed to think he was going on a climbing wall?! He wasn’t too thrilled me thinks but was putting on a brave face as he thought I had arranged it for his birthday.

We walked down to the sea and had a coffee in a cafe (to steady his nerves). My nerves were shot as I knew that a certain eldest son and girlfriend were due to meet us to hand deliver a birthday card and presents. A fraught morning of checking they hand landed at Faro,  driven to Cabanas and knew where to accidently meet us and I had managed to stay fairly calm as I saw them coming along. Iain looked around as they came up to the table and went to say “doesn’t that look like Al” as he spoke he nearly fainted when he realised it was Alistair and Sian 🙂 One of those priceless moments when you aren’t sure his old ticker isn’t going  in to overdrive with the sheer shock and joy of seeing them.

Presents duly delivered and unwrapped and we spent a lovely afternoon having lunch and walk on the beach. Luckily Al and Sian thought to bring out a zimmer frame for the auld fella so he could manage the walk. According to Sian “it isn’t a holiday unless you catch crabs”!??? anyway the two of them duly went and caught some…… Back at camp now whilst they finally settle into their hotel then back out later for some dinner and a spot of celebrating.

Top birthday surprise – Iain thrilled, I am so relieved no more secret text to arrange where we are, dates, times etc (I cannot keep a secret to save my life normally).

The moment of arrival

With his new zimmer

Happy days 🙂

Afternoon on the prom

Full set

East bound by bike

Yesterday we had a day off from cycling, gave the van a clean out and did some washing then headed into Cabanas for a coffee break. Iain found the best cake / coffee shop so we treated ourselves then went for a walk around the village and out through some of the tourist complex’s. Three hours later we got back -some day off.

So today we thought we would head East on the bikes. From the campsite it was down to the village then the path took us out past a massive old fort that has been restored and turned into holiday homes (the doors were kept looked to the fort so we couldn’t get in).  A goodish cycle path up through the villages for a good few miles and we came across Cacela Velha. Tiny little village perched on a hilltop overlooking the Ria Formosa.  There were no more than 20 houses,a church, a graveyard and three cafe / bars. From the old fort on the edge of the hill you could see for miles along the Algarve. We guess it was typical Algarve village – but seemed to us like a little Greek village.

Cacela Velha church and square

From there the cycle path became more proper paths and was looking good. Until we came to the bridge that had literally disappeared. We had spoken to a guy in the cycle shop yesterday and he told us it fell down years ago, but as the river is dry its not worth fixing. So that’s alright then ?! – except you have to cart your bike over the rubble and up the other side. From there we went into Altura. Quite busy with tourists and lots of cyclists around, we headed straight through and found the bike route became part of the N125 main road as you came out of town. We followed for a bit hoping a cycle path would re-appear but it didn’t   We considered whether to risk riding down to the border on this road – and thought better of it, not that much fun with traffic within feet of you on a fast road.

So we headed back into Altura and investigated the beach, miles of sand and a few bars right on the beach. We stopped for a coffee break where Iain ordered himself a slice of toast – and ended up with a ham and cheese toastie (someones translations aren’t doing so well are they?) and then headed in the general direction of camp but detouring to all the beaches on route.

Ria Formosa

Ready for the return

Manta Rota was glorious, rode the bikes along a board-walk right out to the sands. Plenty of motor-homers around and the massive car park on the beach was charging €4 a day for overnight stops – not bad considering they had laid on water and it looked great parking right by the sands.

Next stop was Fabrica beach, tiny little cove with 10-20 houses and a bar. We stopped and had our butties on the sand, then went for a paddle – water was warm, not sure we would have swam – but there was someone out in the water.

Back to camp after a nice 24 miles, slightly browner, slightly fitter and significantly exhausted. Off out for tea at the campsite bar. I had mackerel – slightly off putting having the eyes glare up at me – but to be fair very tasty.

Totally biked out

This morning we decided we have talked enough about bike rides and time to get out for a decent 10-15 miles. Set off from camp at 10 o’clock, sunny but a fair wind blowing so looked like a good day.

Found the bike path (result) and rode along the salt pans to Tavira.  The path then took the main road through town, a little hairy in places, but less than 2 miles and on a sand bike track along side orange groves and through villages. This took us all the way through various salt pans until we got to Fuseta. At this stage we were a little tired (done about 10 miles) so stopped for a coffee on the beach. There was a Gypsy market on by the beach, tons of junk but a lot of antiques too. Absolutely heaving – guess its our equivalent of a Sunday Boot Fair. Fuseta is a busy little town, lots of tourist apartments but it looks a bit rough there were a lot of what I could only describe as drunk tramps hanging around. There is a campsite right on the beach and we had a look, seems ok for a night or two but not sure would want to stay longer as there are much nicer towns close by. Having said that the beach is stunning, as they all are around here.

At this stage we had planned to turn round and ride back, but ever the idiots we decided on a mile or more further on. Bad idea – lost the bike path and rode 4-5 miles to get back to where we had got lost. Then we found the best bit of cycle path imaginable right along the edge of the sea. I convinced Iain it was only a mile or two to Olhao and would buy him lunch when we got there. After about 4 miles we could see Olhao and it was at least as far again. So we decided to cut our losses and head back. So then we find the wind is against us and we have at least 15 miles to get home to camp!

Lets just say it was a fairly quiet ride back – not too many words were spoken as I had taken us just a bit further than someone else had planned to ride – oops. Our only topic of conversation was who had the numbest bum! Just to add to the day Iain was getting a bit low after we left Fuseta and needed something to eat. So of course there was nothing open – brilliant. Our pace was slowing and had visions of needing a tow rope but then hit upon the idea of raiding oranges.  So Iain held the bikes and I slipped into a grove and stole a few, a good hit of sugar and we were ready for the final leg.

Back here at 4 o’clock both totally shattered and I have a face like a sun burnt cherry! Not wanting to go into too much detail but we both have rather sore bottoms after a total of 36 miles. So make amends I cooked a bbq tea outside the van in the sunshine and Iain went and got a couple of beers from the campsite bar to revive himself. So all settled for a very leisurely day tomorrow as not sure we will be able to walk too far.

well deserved coffee

Nope – no fashion sense!

Salt pans as Fuseta

The point we turned for home

Tavira by train

Plan A today was bike to Tavira, fairly windy first thing so quick change to Plan B – train. Station is less than 5 minutes from the campsite so a quick dash over and only a couple of minutes wait – two stops to Tavira €1.80 each – bargain.

Tavira is a really elegant town which doesn’t seem to have been taken over by tourism. There are 20 churches in the town, everywhere you look you see these amazing buildings between the houses. We walked up the hill to the highest point to see the ruins of the castle and two of the churches. As always out here the roads are cobbled and hardly any cars as they couldn’t fit up the tiny roads. The town centre is mostly old houses with tiled fronts, even the semi derelict ones looked lovely with the solids wood doors and window frames. Anyway, it was still quite windy so we headed back to the town square for coffee to warm up before we did our shopping spree.

Spent a couple of good hours wandering around the shops before heading down to the market hall. Enormous old building housing in the region of 100 stalls all selling fruit, vegetables  fish etc and many also selling homemade honey and olives. From there we crossed over the river to the Grand Plaza – a small-ish shopping centre with basically not much to buy. Most of the shops were a bit ‘old lady pinafore’ types, so not quite reaching that status yet I couldn’t find anything much to buy. I did see lovely tapestry rucksack (that sounds old lady doesn’t it?) anyway, loved it and Iain kindly bought it as an early birthday present.

By now we were a bit shattered from walking so decided to go back – never that simple. Problem 1, station was a 50 minute walk back the way we had come; Solution – bus, problem – no idea where bus route is. So Iain’s solution just stand at a nearby bus stop and keep fingers crossed that a bus going our way comes! I did agree to this but decided to walk over road and check bus stop timetable, only to find we were standing on the town circular route so that wasn’t going to get us anywhere. Next plan hike the main road and look for a bus stop. We hobbled along for about half a mile and found a bus stop, literally minutes later the bus for the Spanish border arrived, we knew it wouldn’t go to village we are in but asked driver to chuck us off at nearest point – only about 15 minutes walk down to the camp.

Sat and watched the sun go down with a bottle of wine, a bowl of olives and a barrel of tremaco and now planning what to do tomorrow – whatever it is will include a map and a timetable

Igreja de Santa Maria do Castelo

Tavira main square

My coffee 🙂

Lost on the Salt Pans

Some days are good – others are really good, and today was the latter.

We were up reasonably early so decided to walk down to the promenade. Picked up a few supplies and then headed off for our daily injection of Delta coffee outside one of the cafes looking over the lagoon. Would guess that there are 8-10 cafes open along the front and all were busy, lots of English voices around and a few Scandinavians  From there we walked over to the fisherman’s pier and along to the end to take some photos looking back over town.  It is still quite a busy little fishing harbour and the catches were just in, fishermen were gutting and throwing the heads to the seagulls – I thought we were going to be pecked to death it was like something out of ‘The Birds’ as they were swooping around us.

Enjoying the morning sun

Cabanas from the pier

Back to camp for lunch and I was a bit unhappy as the pitch isn’t the sunniest we have stayed on. But we managed to fry for an hour in the sun we could find and then decided it was biking time.

There is a bike path that runs from end to end of the Algarve which passes through Cabanas. It is one of the Portuguese best kept secrets – so well kept that no one seems to know where it is! You can find mention of it on the internet but you cannot see the route. We asked around, even the campsite bike hire shop din’t seem to know. So not to be put off we went off and tried a few roads but they all kept ending up in apartment developments. Just as we were giving up hope I saw a bloke on a bike on another road. My deduction was that must mean a bike path? Iain not as sure but agreed to follow and hey presto we see a bike sign painted on the road. Follow that for about 2 miles and it becomes a rough road, then a track, then nothing. So retrace our path a bit and we see what could be a bike path – only problem is it over the other side of a big pile of rocks. We scramble the bikes over and yes – result – we have found the bike path.

So now we are impressed and happily riding along, over a wooden bridge (worst camber ever)across the river and then along nicely paved paths and then we get to a T junction and no signs. Minor domestic as Iain says right and I say left. We go left (it was wrong but hey ho). The path took us through the Salt Pans where they produce the purest salt in Portugal. It covers mile after mile and is amazing to see all the perfect little oblongs of water that look like water fields. We finally reached ‘the end of the road’ literally. Just a hotel and a gorgeous beach. Hardly a soul around and mile after mile of sand, water looked a tad chilly for us though so we will save that for another day. From the beach you can look back over the town of Tavira (our intended destination) so at least we saw it if we didn’t actually go there. Tomorrow Iain is in charge of navigation!

At this stage we decided to head back and save further exploration for tomorrow. Arrival at camp and yes I am still not really happy with the pitch – it is just a bit gloomy even though its sunny. So, star that he is, Iain packs the chairs, tables, awning, windbreak etc and moves pitches two rows, then has to set everything up again! And it was worth it, its so much nicer now, less tree cover so this is us for 8 or 9 days now. To celebrate the move we had tea outside in the sunshine then moved inside as soon as the sun went down as it gets very chilly in the evenings.

The over brown bloke

Beach at the end of the bike ride

Wonkiest cycle bridge ever

Tavira from the Salt Pans

Moving day -east bound to Cabanas

We decided this morning it was time to move on, so we were up at 8 o’clock and a quick breakfast and pack up got up away by 9 o’clock.  We stayed off the toll roads and headed east on the N125 being the ‘old’ main road. Roads are fairly quiet, with the exception of a camper van every 5th vehicle. My arm was starting to ache with all the waving (yes we are wavers 🙂 ).

Did a quick stop off at Aldi for a cheap weekly shop, then you start seeing stuff you don’t see at home and we bought all sorts of things we didn’t know we needed; such as German potato dumplings! Anyway get to the checkout and they only take cards that are from Portuguese banks – hearing the general sigh of the queue behind us I scrabbled in my purse and found some euros- so we escaped the embarrassment of having to put it all back.

From there we headed right along the coast and through Faro – this time straight through without getting lost, dead proud of ourselves. Once we came out the other side its like a different Portugal. Much less touristy than the western Algarve with what seems less development. We came to a stop at a little town called Cabanas de Tavira which is 77 miles from where we started this morning.

Cabanas De Tavira

We are pitched up on Camping Ria Formosa, campsite is only 3 years old, 350 pitches and very few spaces. Managed to slot ourselves in among the Finnish and German’s in a nice little pitch with plenty of sunshine. There is a cafe on site which does “dish of the Day” dinners for €4.50 so that will be our treat this week. From the site its about 5-10 minutes walk into the village. Very old cobbled streets and a lovely promenade along the shore. The beach is on an island across the lagoon from the promenade. You either swim over or get a water taxi (my money is on us getting the water taxi as himself will not be happy with the cold water).

After setting up our gypo camp we finally got the bikes down and went for a quick explore. Plenty of people about down on the promenade, loads of cafes and plenty of lobster red people sat outside them.  Seems to be more of a mix of holiday makers and locals than we have seen in other towns as there were lots of Portuguese about. Its fairly flat around this area and loads of people on bikes around so we plan to explore further afield tomorrow on our bikes.

Water taxi

Cabanas Promenade

60 plus !!! – years and temperature

The man in the sky sent the ordered birthday pressie – a big fat fried egg of sunshine:) In honour of the big birthday I actually got up and did breakfast – usually his job – whilst he sat and opened his cards and pressies.

Despite various plans of fab things to do we settled for sitting in the sun outside the van and toasting.  The van is decorated in “60th birthday” banners (courtesy of Ros – ta) and I have been just a tad unhappy at how many people have had to ask which one of us is celebrating today, cheeky sods, I know the sun is ageing but surely 3 hours of it hasn’t added 10 years to me today?. One of the maintenance guys from the site arrived this afternoon with a bottle of wine and a printed “happy birthday” letter, addressed to Mr Baxter, followed by Dear Madam??  We are not sure if they sussed the birthday from the banners or from our passports as they hold them. We now have a plan to put out the banners on each new site and hang up the cards, see if that brings a complimentary birthday bottle of wine each time:)

Cheers!

We went out for tea in Espiche, the little village next to the campsite. There are a few restaurants tucked away in the alley ways and we decided to try  Adega do  Papagaio, the “Cellar Parrot”.  Only us in there, the owner looked so pleased to have customers and as soon as he brought out the bowls of olives we knew we had chosen the right place.

http://www.adegadopapagaio.com   

For the dinner you get 7 varieties of raw meat and a red hot stone on which you cook them yourself. Sounds weirder than it is, really a bit like your own mini bbq but on a stone rather then a grill, and salad and chips were on an eat as much as you like basis. We followed this up with a rather squidgy piece of almond cake with ice-cream – delicious. We shared a bottle of local red wine to celebrate the occasion – so we stumbled back a short while ago  and now re-warming the feet – its freezing out there tonight.

All in all the birthday boy has had a good day and I believe is about to tuck into his bottle of free wine. Forecast tomorrow – sunshine – yay.

Pre dinner

Lagos

As it was a bit overcast this morning we decided to finally go into Lagos on the bus,  its only 2 miles away and easier than moving Dora and parking.

.

We have been a couple of time before but it has always been raining. Yes indeed as we got off the bus it started raining! Not to be deterred we did a loop of the main town and all the tourist shops. Every shop had sales of up to 70% off. A lot of the stuff was tack, but some good leather shops and quality pottery. Shoe shops galore, alas even with sales way out of our league. There are loads of tiny cobbled streets running up the hills with churches at the top of most. Down on the promenade there are loads of museums and plenty of historic buildings to explore but we had been to most last year and to be honest we were too wet to traipse around them again so decided we need to explore other aspects such as food.

We hunted around for something a bit different. Came across ‘A Merendeira’ which is typical Portuguese food (albeit I think a chain). Bargain of the week – soup, half a loaf of bread with meat baked in, a coke or half a bottle of wine (I had coke / Iain had the wine) a snack thing of shrimps in breadcrumbs and a rice pudding for €5 each. To be honest one between two would have done, but hey we wont need to eat for days so we ploughed our way through. So we now aim to hunt this chain out wherever we are in the Algarve 🙂

Post lunch it rained harder and harder, not impressed. We walked to the marina and went straight to the nearest cafe to dry off. Very bleak there, plenty of super yachts but very few people. We read this is one of the most visited towns on the Algarve and with the hundreds of cafes and bars it would be fabulous on a summers day. From there it was up hill to look out over the old city walls, lovely views down to the beaches and the sun popped out just to show us how great it would be if we made the effort to visit on a sunny day.

So, home on the bus and weather check completed. Another day of rain and then they forecast the sunshine and good temperatures should be back. So our plan is to stay here the weekend and see if its true. We were looking at heading down to Tarifa in Spain and get the ferry over to Morocco for a week but the recent problems in Algeria have put us right off that idea. so will save that for another time.

With the ‘surfing cow’

My lunch 🙂

Sunshine 1 v Weather forecast 0

The forecast out here was pretty rubbish for the week. But as always you can rely on them to get it wrong – woop woop for us – its been pretty glorious for the last 2 days.  To be fair there have been a few torrential down-pours but they clear within minutes and blue skies are back.

Not much to report, been sitting outside the van toasting ourselves so we don’t look so much like Brits Abroad. Iain has a good tan, I am a slightly salmon pink now so it is progressing, slowly. Tomorrow those fried eggs are due back (yes we always believe the forecast when its good!) so we plan to notch up a few more hours perfecting our sitting doing nothing skills.

On the news front my Psychology course results came through and I passed with 85% and a Distinction for the year – so its a double celebration this weekend with that and someone’s big 60 we will be searching out a nice bar and having a couple of drinks or two.

We cooked outside the van today, food tastes so much better cooked in the open air – well the salad doesn’t, but the piri piri chicken did.  We popped into the Intermarche supermarket in Lagos yesterday and stocked up for the week. Prices seem higher this year but we still managed to get a weeks dinners, fruit and beer for €36 which isn’t too bad. Think we may have overdone the fruit buying as we have moved away from a fruit bowl to a small washing basket to keep it in.

This afternoon I walked down to Luz and along the beach. plenty of people in the bars but most of the shops are closed for holidays. The beach is lovely but the village doesn’t really have much to see of interest. Its been swallowed up by tourist apartment complexes and a few high rise blocks that the locals live in. There are a few parts that are pretty but on the whole its not the best of the villages on the west of the Algarve by any means.

Palm trees along the prom

The sea from the promenade

Praia Da Luz beach

Here comes summer..at last

Yes indeedy – that little yellow ball of joy has put in a full appearance today 🙂

Forecast was for rain, again. We got up to a few clouds and within an hour blue skies and sunshine were the order of the day. So Plan A to go sightseeing was quickly replaced with Plan B – sit on chairs in sun and do nothing but bake.

http://www.turiscampo.com/en/

Campsite is filling up with new arrivals seeming to appear every hour. Nearly all Northern  Europeans – mainly from Holland, Germany and GB, but a fair few from Norway and Sweden dotted around too. There are 200 pitches and would guess that 150 are now in use, there are also 100 or so chalets and they are filling up too so it’s a busy site. The facilities here are the best we have seen on any site in Spain or Portugal. The toilet / shower block wouldn’t be out of place in a 5 star hotel and the restaurant and bar are top notch. Very friendly site as everyone wants to chat about where you are from and how long you are here for – a lot of people are on site for 3-4 months to miss the winter at home.

The pool looks wonderful but its not heated and Iain did try it two years ago with the result of his voice rising 5 octaves – so we aren’t going to risk it again. However the Jacuzzi is heated so we aim to limit any swimming to there. The furthest we have moved this morning was a walk to the camp shop for some fresh bread and a stroll to the washing machine when we took some photos of the camp on the way back. Had a late afternoon stroll around the site and down to the main road, admiring the massive coach motorhomes and picking out a pitch for the next time we come (if we come again 🙂 ).

So end of full day of sunshine is upon us – we are somewhat pinker (but yes we did use suntan lotion), an awful lot warmer and both us and the van have dried out from the storms of the weekend.

Tomorrow the plan is flexible – sun means we sit, rain means we head for the tourist sites in Lagos, fingers crossed for the sitting option.

Pool at Turiscampo

Mindful of Binty – suncream on head!

Pitches at Turiscampo

Hello from Me !

Having just participated in Sunday lunch, here at Touriscampo, consisting of a first course of Sushi, Cheesebreads, garlic bread, iberian hams, cheese, fresh prawns, salad (and plenty more, including soup, but no room to fit it in!) ……..A main course of all of, and as much as you can eat of, chicken, pork, goat, fish, lasagne, beef and as much veg & salad, fries, new potatoes, roasties, ………..a sweet of apple pie or any other of about 20 choices, hot or cold. ………. a couple of beers for me and cokes for San – got change out of €35 INCLUDING a €5 tip to the fab staff – Methinks the 2kg lost over the last 2 weeks may have mysteriously reappeared today! (and this is a campsite restaurant – mind you, imho it is THE Best campsite on the Algarve, bar NONE!
Eat your hearts out Mez & Ped – £13 each, INCLUDING the beer – beat THAT !
……….Siesta time methinks, brrrp, phhhht, zzzzz.
Iain

Gales / rain – ah yes that’s why we headed for the Algarve!

The weather here is, to be frank, horrendous!!! – last night we hardly slept for fear the van was going to blown over. There were gale force winds and lashings of rain, it was  like a wet weekend in bleedin’ Blackpool

Today there has been plenty of sunshine in between the gale force gusts of wind and torrential showers – oh to be in the Algarve and escape the Welsh winter:)

I managed a brisk walk into Praia Da Luz and back for some shopping and missed the rain, until literally 5 minutes from the camper and the heavens opened on me. So somewhat soaked and looking like drowned rat I gave up any further plans to step outside today.

The end of Europe today

We only lasted 2 nights at the Chicken Run – decided to move on to somewhere a bit nicer so today we headed for the beaches and the further point South West in mainland Europe.

Weather today has been pretty ok – its been 19 / 68 degrees  so fairly warm but the sun is on and off with a good few showers every so often. But as we are British we didn’t think we should let a bit of rain deter us from the beaches. So socks and sandals on and off we went.

First stop was Burgau a small beach with a wooden restaurant and nothing else, only 1 ‘wild campervan’ lurking in the carpark and not a soul on the beach but us (yes we appreciate everyone else doesn’t go to the beach in the rain).  The sun popped out for 5 minutes and it was beautiful but when it went it was a bit windswept so back to the van and head west.

The bus was ‘ere

Gazing out to sea

Nearly in the Atlantic

From there we moved onto Salema. A tiny village down between the cliffs with a lovely beach and several cafes and bars.  The houses were mainly typical Portuguese whitwashed cottages and there was only a few hotels so seemed quite unspoilt. After we left we found out there was a dinosaurs footprint on the rocks by the cliffs but we will take their word for it as we aren’t going back to check it out. A quick stop for a coffee and as usual whilst we try and practice a bit of the local lingo the local wants to practice our lingo.

We finally headed right to the end of the coast and Sagres, the most south westerly point in mainland Europe. First things that strikes as always is that every available space is covered with motorhomes.  We were told that the previous night there had been some trouble and a load of vans had their tyres slashed – we saw a row of them jacked up waiting for their tyres back – this restores our belief that wild camping in carparks isn’t for us and we will stick to campsites.

Right at the end of Sagres is an old fort built in the 16th century by Henry the Navigator. From the outside its very impressive – but once you go through the entrance there is very little there except wind, wind and more wind. There is an old church that was rebuilt after an earthquake in 1755 and a shop but just bleak landscape other than that. We walked the headland in the fort which took about 40 minutes and even managed to climb into a cannon or two!

At this stage we decided we needed food so headed back to the van and found a nice parking spot (with 40 other campervans) overlooking Mareta beach.

A quick hop along the coast and we arrived at Capo de sao Vincente lighthouse. Its 75 metres up on the cliffs and is the second most powerful lighthouse in Europe with 2 x 1000w bulbs that can be seen 60 km away. Worth going to say we have been but other than a tourist shop and a gypsy selling capes there isn’t really much to see there as you can’t get into the actual lighthouse.

At this stage tired campers decided to find a home for the night. So we head back along the coast to our favourite campsite on the Algarve – Turiscampo.  It’s in a village called Espiche – just a spit away from Praia Da Luz which is a 5 minute walk away. For those of you with snow – we wont gloat – its just started raining quite hard here right now, forecast is very warm with lots of showers for the next 2 days.  We have booked on for a week but may stay for two. Not too much to do in the village but we can get a bus outside the site into Lagos and some fairly decent bike rides around here so if the wind eases we will get some cycling in.

I am shrinking!

Mareta beach

Someone get me a lighter

Preacher Baxter

Fort Sagres

Coffee stop

Silves and the Chicken Run

Moving day – we are now ensconced at our latest pit stop the “The Rural Chicken Run”. Its in a place called Mexilhoeira Grand which is about 5 miles inland from the coast at Alvor. The site is very rustic to say the least.  Ok to be be honest its more like a camping field / new age traveller site, calling it rustic is just using poetic licence:)

It is a a bit of land at the end of a lane, a few statics and several long stayers in ancient  motorhomes, there is a hardstanding area and next to that a very large expanse of grassed area..  The owners are trying to get a campsite running but its a work in process, to be fair it really could be lovely, but it feels a bit jammed together with everyone on the little piece of hardstanding, maybe in the better weather with parking on the grass it would be  better.  No toilets or showers but we do have electric and water pumped to the van. This definitely isn’t a registered campsite but when we arrived the owners, a lovely British couple, were so welcoming and friendly we decided to stay for a night or two leave so we are here for a bit.  We have both agreed its an experience and we  for a couple of days before moving onto somewhere with a few more creature comforts.

And after all my concerns and doubts about the site the owner just gave us a ton of fruit from her orchards and a juicer so we get freshly squeezed juice for breakfast. Not sure what some of these things are but Iain is going to be busy peeling tomorrow:) So as the sun comes out it doesnt look so bad to be fair, who knows a couple of days of something a bit different good be good.

Free fruit for breakfast

On the way here we stopped off at Silves. Lovely town between the mountains and the coast. So lovely there is a campervan/ motorhome invasion there for the winter. Two massive carparks outside the football ground with approximately 200-300 motorhomes parked up (wild camping as they call it) and living in the carpark. We aren’t talking cheapo vans either, nearly every van was less than a couple of years old and most were the massive coach size. We parked up for a couple of hours to do some exploring.

Silves

The town is full of cafes, markets, shops and loads of small ceramic shops where you can watch the potters at work. There is a beautiful Moorish castle, Castelo de Silves, and cathedral at the top of the hill in the centre of town. Against Iain’s better judgement we hiked up through the cobbled streets. When we got to the top we had to have a rest and coffee and cake to give us the energy to walk around the castle (our excuse and we are sticking to it). The castle was amazing, the walls were mainly preserved and you could walk around the outer edge looking down on the excavations of the old buildings and gardens (those of us with vertigo were very concerned at the lack of hand rails). There were fantastic views for miles from the battlements – you could see right down to the coast and the hundreds of massive hotels. We popped into the municipal market and I impressed Iain by ordering two onions in Portuguese – and the woman understood me perfectly – my fluency is on the way back – today two onions, tomorrow who knows what I can order:)

On the battlements

Silves Cathedral

Breather on the way up

Caught with a cake

Lunch out for the gypo’s

Last night we decided to get the cards out, invented our own version of Rummy (meaning a simple one we both understood). Anyway, I am slightly richer and Iain slightly poorer:).  During the evening the torrential rain started and lasted well into the night but we woke this morning to blue skies again – its a fair bit cooler but ‘pleasant’.

Today as planned we walked into the village of São Marcos da Serra, about 3.5 km from the campsite and mainly on tracks until the last km or so on the main road.  We did a bit of twitching on the way and saw Golden Oriels and Hoopoe at the sides of the lanes. We also saw the typical rabid dogs at every house, several of which were eyeing up our ankles but we managed to avoid injury.

The village is set on a hill and has lovely white lime-washed houses through the narrow and steep  streets, its very typical of the villages in mountains.  There was a market on outside the church – gypsies selling secondhand clothes, socks and an assortment of old coats, so we gave that a miss.

Found a little cafe bar at the top of the hill where I treated us to coffee to recover from the climb. Full of local women chattering away but all very friendly. From there it into the mini-mercado for food. First one was like a fly sanctuary, so we smiled and got out quick. Second one was better and we raided most the fruit they had left and got some fresh bread.

From there it was time for lunch so we decided to have our weekly treat of lunch out.  We had a few recommendations but decided to try out O Cantinho dos Cacadores (Hunters Corner).  Typical main road cafe / bar that does Prato Do Dia – dish of the day- for €8 per head. We had a pile of olives, sardine paste, bread and cheese for starters, then piri piri chicken, chips and salad with a carafe of wine. Surprisingly we declined the puddings as we were a little stuffed! Top food, lovely service from the owner and two fairly giddy campers had to stumble on back to camp once the red wine had gone to their heads.

An afternoon of tan topping up followed as we recovered from the exertion and wine.

Back at camp

Made it !

O Cantinho dos Cacadores (Hunters Corner)

Top of the climb

Post lunch

Walking, getting wet and birding

Still at the campsite in Sao Marco Da Serra, although the original plan was for one night we decided to have at least 5 days here as its very much our type of site.  In the small world syndrome we inhabit we met the couple from Colwyn Bay yesterday (we met them on a different site last year).

Yesterday we did pretty much nothing – sat outside the van all day and didn’t really move at all. Plenty of bird watching without moving from the chair, there are Thekla Lark, Lapwing and Serin all around the site. We sat and watched a Kestrel hunting around the site for a good 20 minutes too. The biggest expenditure of energy was Iain bought a ton of homemade olives from the campsite owner which we happily ploughed our way  through.

This morning was looking sunny but cooler so the plan was for a bit of walking. From the campsite we found a path along the river towards a small hamlet a mile or so away. We followed the river alongside the cork trees, (all the trees have a number on them which we thought was the owner. Apparently once they strip the cork they write the number that refers to  the year so they don’t strip it again for 9-10 years).  From there we guessed we weren’t too far from the new dam at Odelouca so headed into the hills. We followed the tracks up along the side of the river until we got to the top of the ‘mountain’ (possibly a quite steep hill really but it feels better saying mountain when you are puffed out). We couldn’t see the dam but the lake was below us so worth the climb for that alone.

View back towards campsite over Odelouca river

Resting after a long climb

Obviously at that stage it decides to rain, so we have to trek back to camp somewhat wet but as we arrive the sun comes out again. The afternoon spent doing not too much. One of us (not me) slept away the afternoon as his hike had worn him out.

Tomorrow we walk to the nearest town for food suppliers.  In town they produce their own hooch variety of ‘medronho’. Its a bit like a strawberry brandy – we bought it last year and to be honest I thought it was cough medicine.  But when in Rome….so a 3 mile walk will be rewarded with a small glass or two when get there. The area is also famous was wonderful honey so will try and hunt some out to bring home with us.

Our tans are coming along nicely now 🙂

The Baxterbus has arrived in the Algarve – woohoo

Yes indeedy – we woke to light fog and that was it – the bus driver had made his mind up and foot down and south it was.

First town we came to was a walled town of Elvas – my heart skipped a beat when we actually starting driving up the cobbled streets (memories of being wedged in a street in a Spanish village with police in attendance being filmed by locals came flooding back). Luckily this time we avoided the wedged effect.

We kept off the main roads and headed south west through wine country – miles and miles of vineyards and hardly a vehicle on the roads. Stopped off on a little picnic area to cook some lunch – within a minute we were joined by a fleet of enormous Norwegian motor-homes. They must have been on an organised tour as they parked up, got out, spoke a few words, re-grouped then were off again. Our route down took us through Beja and Ourique and pretty much followed the Washington Irving route which is signposted all the way down.

Our aim was a little campsite in the mountains above the Algarve. We got to San Marco de Serra and followed Sat Nav.  First up a smallish lane – ok, then turn right down a mud track – now not so sure, then turn right over a river! No not over a bridge, drive across the river i.e. 2 foot of water. So you wouldn’t  would you? Oh my god Iain actually had a face that said “why not?” We sat on the side of the river for at least 10 minutes debating for pro’s and con’s of this idea. Iain obviously in explorer mode thought we should absolutely go for it. After hearing my scenario of needing rescuing by a tow truck and a very wet camper he agreed maybe we shouldn’t try it. For sure he would have tried it though – nutter.

So with no campsite our option now was head for the coast. After 2 miles back on proper roads I spotted a small printed sign for a campsite. Slam on brakes and reverse back up road and hey ho there is a site a few miles away. We follow signs for a mile and turn off main road – oh god not again its a dirt track, literally. We drive up the track for a mile and there is another sign, then mile after mile of dirt track (think Clocanog forest dirt tracks).  At about 5 miles of this we both think its probably a wind up and not a site there, but carry on as we have come so far. Another mile or so and suddenly a campsite – hurray!!

And what a site, owned by another Dutch couple who have built the house and site in the last few years. We have a fabulous tiered pitch overlooking the site. There is a stunning pool, the owners serve drinks on the terrace for all the campers each evening. Toilets have seats (bonus), hot showers and even a washing machine so we can get some clean clothes. Downsides? Miles back to the main road and we need some fruit and veg. So plan is now stay for at least 2 days, if we still like it then its shops and stock up and back here.

On the weather front – sun has shone, its warm and clouds are few and far between. The Baxter suntans start here:)

Iain with a brew in the “courtesy of Binty” mug

Bom Dia de Campo Maior Portugal

We didn’t head South! – instead we went South West and crossed into Portugal just past Badajoz. Amazing drive on the old roads across country, very few villages, infact hadrly saw a soul anywhere all the way here. Arrived yesterday afternoon in the ‘White Village’ of Camp Maior. Our campsite is 800 metres from the village, small site that is tiered with a pool (yes still no where near warm enough to swim), a bar and olive groves all around. Its run by a lovely Dutch couple and we have one other neighbour being an English couple with a caravan.

No Customs – just a sign

Walked into town this morning for a culture hit. The streets are tiny and cobbled – which doesn’t stop the cars doing a fair speed around them. We walked up the lanes to the castle where there was a fabulous view over the village. At this stage we needed a drink so into a tiny coffee bar where Iain successfully ordered a couple of coffees and we stood with the locals (standing out like sore thumbs in summer wear as the locals were dressed for the Antarctic).

The Dutch guy on site told us about the story of how the town was destroyed 1766 when lightening struck the town arsenal. The bones of the dead were used to create a memorial chapel Capela dos Osso. The walls and vaults are completely covered in human bones and hundreds of skulls, with two complete skeletons hanging from the walls. Really spooky but in a strange way very beautiful too, we have never seen anything quite like it before.

From there we went to the Olive Oil factory for a tour. The girl on reception spoke less English that we speak Portuguese but she wanted to give us a personal tour as there was only us there. To be fair it was really good. Between the three of us we managed to get by with waving of hands, the odd word we guessed the translation of and a lot of nodding, at the end she gave us a tasting of the oils too. All for the bargain price of €1 each – we so love a bargain tour.

We tried without success to find the Delta Coffee factory as they also do tours – but no way we could find it and as the drizzle was setting in we headed back to camp for our own coffee.

So now its a bit drizzly with the sun trying to peep through. Not sure of our plans next (well to be fair I never am he tells me where we are heading for then drives to somewhere else). I think though its further South tomorrow morning and if I can stop him for long enough maybe a look around Evora.

View from castle over the village

Altar at Capela dos Ossos

Skeleton in Capello de Ossos

We have electricity

Result…by chance this morning Iain found the electric cable and foreign plug – hurray we  now we have electric without using a tiddly adapter which looked very unsafe and which probably wouldn’t have worked in rain or damp conditions.

On the downside – we overslept this morning and missed the one bus a day into Salamanca 😦  So plan changed and we will go there on the way back. Instead today we decided to head for Carcares about 3 hours away. Roads are nearly empty and the sun was out. A gorgeous drive through the mountains (saw the snow on the tops but avoided actually getting near enough to feel the cold). All the way down we saw hundreds of Red Kites swooping over the roads – a bit like a scene from The Birds.

We detoured off route to the Alcantara lake. The biggest lake in Iberia – not another soul did we see up there, quite spookily quiet but well worth going. Had our lunch like a couple of gypos on the side of the road then headed to the campsite at Cacares.

Arrived mid afternoon and met a lady from the site last night who is travelling on her own to near Gibraltar, mega kudos for having the nerve to do it on your own. Everyone follows pretty much the same route down so you do tend to see the same people at each site. We are about a mile outside the old town. Campsite is really nice, big swimming pool (too cold), a bar, little restauarant and best of all your own private wet room and loo with each pitch only a couple of steps from the van. And to get back to the theme from last year – so far two sites out of two have had loo seats, bliss 🙂

After a quick coffee and wander around the site we found we have free wifi so that’s it computer on and blogging with photos. Then its tea and a couple of beers in the bar with the other campers.

Tomorrow – destination unknown, possibly El Rocio as its fab for bike riding so maybe have a week there once we know what the weather forecast is going to be like.

Ice forming on the wing mirrors Monday morning – it was cold

Iain at the lake

First Osbourne Bull hoarding of the trip

Me and the bus at Caceres

For anyone heading to Albufeira for a few days – the forecast is 18 degrees and fried eggs for the next 10 days there – fingers crossed it stays that way until Feb 20th!!!  Have changed the Blog count down for the Massif arrival 🙂

Salamanca bound

Fabulous tour of Bilbao docks this morning. Between me and Sat Nav we got us lost in docks twice. Iain keep calm and carried on ignoring us both and finally got us on the motorway. (Minor domestic 1).

The road climbed for miles and hit the sunshine as soon we got on the plains, for about 5 minutes. After that it was thick fog for 5 hours. Well, it wasn’t quite as thick when we remembered to take off our sunglasses. An hour from destination the blue skies and fried egg appeared – sky full of Red Kites and even a couple of Storks, worth the wait.

Straight to campsite in Salamanca , only 25 minutes from motorway – looks a bit of a dump uhh maybe because its the wrong campsite? Someone had put wrong gps in (not me). A quick check and we had literally driven 200 yards past the right campsite half an hour ago. So back we go and find site – ace, couple of British campers and nice and quiet – oh and you see it from the road so how did we miss that?
(Minor domestic 2).

So now just need to plug in electric and get kettle on. Nope, not that simple when we have left the spanish plug for the cable at home (yup not me again). Two minute stress out then we remember we had an adapter on the boat for the hairdryer – it works so panic over. (Minor domestic 3).

Neighbours on site were on same boat as us and tell us a car and caravan turned over just off the ferry this morning – so thanking our lucky stars our traumas have been so minor.

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