Thursday, after spending 4 nights at the small campsite near Malaga…we left the coast (that might have been a BIG mistake) and made our way to the small town of La Puebla de Cazallla. There’s a great free motorhome parking stop there with toilets, electricity, water but no shade… Instead there’s a tiny booth run by a very kind man originally from Benidorm.
Boiling in the sun
He encourages us when we try to use our terrible Spanish and calls Denis the cowboy because of his sunhat. He tells us he likes the Irish. All along the pathway outside his booth are tables under shade umbrellas and he makes a great hot chicken roll! With garlic (I hear the bugs don’t like the smell of garlic…) and strong coffee and freezing cold ice cream. The necessities.
Nearby shady walk
The temperature in the van is 37.9, Denis says there must be something wrong with the thermometer – it couldn’t be that high. I also think there’s something wrong with the thermometer – it couldn’t be that low.
One good thing about the heat I can appreciate – flowers and trees
They say opposites attract and here we are the optimist and the (pessimist) realist. His way of looking at the world could be right and maybe his way would make for a happier experience. Instead of raising my eyes to heaven when he shares one of his optimistic gems maybe it would make me feel better to imagine he is correct… Hmm.
…and unusual plants
In this small Spanish town I am in that uncomfortable hell of itchy bites and hot air. Today would be a fine day to think like an optimist but for some reason (my physical discomfort?) I cannot rise up out of this bad place. I walk in the shade for a little because walking helps but then I think about tomorrow and the next day and when will this heat end?
…and tomatoes in an allotment next to the parking
It seems like my thinking is actually the problem. I listened to a podcast about accepting the present moment and it dawns on me that my thinking is leading me to worrying, leading me to dark, dark places in my mind. Listening to those thoughts are bringing me down. I remind myself that I am here, just here and no matter what is forecast to happen tomorrow it cannot touch me, here.
Less than twenty minutes away from the medieval town of Santillana Del Mar we found our home for the night. It was another old town, not quite as big but just as full of stone houses, walls and roads.
Geese on tour
The town of Cartes provides parking for motorhomes beside the park where geese and ducks ramble freely. There’s also a (17km) greenway for walking and cycling that leads to the coast and a playground with zip wire and table tennis table. All for free and quiet at night.
Colourful Cartes
We arrived just time to have a ramble around the old part of town before dinner. Dinner was salad. At one of the motorway services we had a surprisingly tasty salad. I’m not a great salad eater or maker but I did think I could replicate this one.
Nearby greenway
The ingredients had been sitting in the fridge for a day or two… but were still within date so I offered to assemble my version of Motorway Salad. In case you would also like to replicate a motorway salad, here are the ingredients… bag of salad leaves, mozzarella cheese (the one in the bag of water not grated), ripe avocado, sun-dried tomatoes, tapenade, extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper.
There’s our home for the night
And the method… wash and dry the salad leaves, take the mozzarella cheese out of the bag, drain and lay on a bed of leaves, slice the avocado, dot it and the sun-dried tomatoes around on the leaves, drop dots of tapenade likewise. Sprinkle the olive oil, the balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper over everything. Done and Yum. It also looks great… forgot to take pictures, sorry.
Isn’t this adorable? As well as real geese and ducks they have ornamental chickens
View of the Douro from the van travelling the narrow road…
On Saturday we continued our journey in the direction of Pinhão following the valley of the Douro river. This is a very steep valley with narrow roads. It was also very beautiful but very scary. Did I mention it was very steep? So steep you couldn’t see the river from up there.
The town on the valley is called Pinhão
And busy. Lots of cars behind us, looking like they were ready to pass if only there was room. There were no places wide enough for us to stop and let them pass so we all had to wait. We drove on until we reached the river at the base of the valley, the Douro.
Train tracks and boat wash
This valley is where all the grapes to produce port are grown. And traditionally wooden boats (now repurposed for tourist river trips) took the grapes (or maybe it was the pressed grapes?) to Porto to be proceessed. Much like Champagne, only port with grapes grown in this valley can be called port. Imagine that!
The wooden boats formerly used to carry the grapes to Porto
Anyway we kept going down, down, down to the valley floor. All the time I was hopeful there was a nice wide road back up for later… and it was a bit wider and less busy. If you look at the map of Portugal and find the Douro, you will see the road hugging the river. Every turn, every bend all the way to the town of Peso da Régua, where we took a break for lunch.
Can you see Ruby’s parking space to the right of the big cruise boat?
As we were passing the Museum of the Duoro we took a look at their restaurant but it was set up for dinner but I just wanted a sandwich. We kept going just stopping long enough to take a picture. The back gate of the museum led out on to a side street and a nice man smiled at us and I don’t know how it happened but next thing we are sitting in his restaurant ordering lunch. Not sandwich lunch, no – pork chops, salad and chips lunch!
And the sun shone…
It was divine. I hadn’t realised how hungry fear of heights makes me. We probably would have had enough in one portion between two but on the other hand we left a few chips and we didn’t eat all the bread or the olives or the bowl of rice. Yes, must remember next time a nice man invitees us to his restaurant – just order one portion. And the cost €25 total, including water.
The train passes in front of that cute house every day. I suppose they get used to it?
And then the rains came. Storms all over central France. Bringing a weather show like we haven’t seen in Ireland.
Raindrops and green leaves
The stage opens with the temperature rising, humid damp heat follows your every move. Don’t move! Except to open every window and door. The skies slowly fill in with white clouds turning to grey clouds. Then something shifts.
The navy blue sky
The sky grows darker, darker again, almost navy blue. And here comes the music – booming thunder. And the light show – streaks of lightening. And the finale – beating rhythm of torrential rain while we race to secure the roof windows. And all for free.
Raindrops and River
And then it’s all calm again with a cooling breeze, sunshine and fluffy white clouds.
Fluffy clouds return
The heatwave in Spain has made us very grateful for weather, any weather. (Well, any weather except weather with temperatures that start with a 3 and are two digits long.)
Another show tomorrow
By the time we return home at the end of this month we will have forgotten the heatwave and be wishing for a few extra degrees, in the meantime we are enjoying the rain.
Can you see the rain dripping from the open window?
We reluctantly left Béziers after two days and travelled north again for an hour past Montpellier and to motorhome parking outside the town of Remoulins. It turned out to be waaaay outside the town and there were no path and fast cars on the roads making walking perilous.
River Gardon Remoulins
We struggled to go for a walk but there was something even more beautiful, something we had missed. Something we have not been about to get a hold of since Zafra in on the west side of Spain, 32 days ago… Rain. It rained! Not for long and not very heavy but enough to remind me that rain is a good thing and I’m sorry for not appreciating it.
Cute square in Remoulins
And then it stopped and the sun came out and it’s even cooler. All is well in the world.
Next morning we moved. There was parking closer to the town with walking and cycle paths nearby. The town is very old in the old part and very busy in the new part. And there’s what I have started to call the singing bridge between our parking and the town. We went for a walk to get groceries in the morning and although the bridge has a very lovely singing voice, I do not feel at ease crossing it by foot so I went in the opposite direction for my afternoon walk.
The church seems to have a birdcage on top…
As I have repeated to you often (sorry) the afternoon is the hottest time of the day but… this is France and hundreds of years ago someone had the great idea to plant trees along the road and today I benefitted from their foresight. And the shade they provide. I know I’ve also mentioned shade a lot on this journey but I have to mention it again – shade is a precious, precious thing and trees give it unselfishly. Thank you to the trees and thank you to the planter of the trees.
The shady walk to Pont du Gard
It was 2km down that shaded road that I found a huge surprise – an aqueduct. Yes! Another one! This one was built by the Romans in the 1st century AD. I think it is magnificient. It’s called Pont du Gard, Bridge over the river Gardon. Its purpose was to bring water to the town of Nîmes, 50Km away! Those Romans were something else. It’s a UNESCO world heritage site and it’s just down the road. This France… is also something else.
Pont du Gard
P.S. We’re going to visit the Pont du Gard museum on Saturday, it’s on the other bank of the river and closer. Hopefully I’ll get better pictures.
We had our day trip to Lagos and stayed in a very, very old campsite. It’s age means it’s located close to the town and the sea. Plus, it has old, old trees, with loads of branches and leaves and leaves and trees give you shade and shade is very, very important here. To me anyway.
Can you read the notice? And see the tanker?
Oh, nearly forgot, we ran out of gas again… and so had the garage in Lagos! But the tanker was there! I’m not making this up, seriously, the tanker was filling up their gas tank when we drove in! Unfortunately, for some reason, they couldn’t sell us the gas until the next day. They said we could go on to Portimão where there might be gas.
Pastries at Chez Hands Helen
But we couldn’t go on to Portimão, we were staying the night here to visit Helen (and Carmel and Abigail) in the morning. No gas for cooking meant we would have to go out to eat… oh well. And no gas for the fridge meant we would need electricity but the campsite was not too old for electricity – so all good.
Praia da Batata, Lagos
Lagos is a beautiful old town on the south coast of Portugal, with numerous picturesque beaches. The streets are narrow with plenty of shade for wandering around (not at the beach, no shade at the beach – was tempted to bring our umbrella… the rain one.)
The Garden
We found a cute restaurant in a garden, called, The Garden. It was nestling amongst old apartment buildings. The entrance is via the back gate on a narrow street. There were mismatched tables and chairs and the ceiling was a weave of branches and trailing plants, keeping everything cool. The main food attraction was barbecue meat and the smoke from the fire did a great job of keeping the mosquitos away. Thank you, smoke. Way up above us I could see a woman hanging out her washing. I wonder did it smell of smoke when she was taking it in? Smoke’s not all good.
The washing’s out
Next morning I woke early and took advantage of the temperature to go find the beach (5 minute walk) and take some pictures for you. I’m so glad I did. Portugal again teaches me that it’s all about the natural beauty… never about the age.
Early morning at Praia do Pinhão
(Yes I’m talking about myself… and some other people I met in Lagos… and You❤️)
We’re well into our second week of travelling and it’s time to catch you up on where we are. We spent two nights (Wednesday and Thursday) in Vitoria Gasteiz. The city is a very handy stop for campers as there are two supermarkets nearby, water and waste disposal and plenty of walking available among the tree lined streets. Both of us started daily walking during the first lockdown and we have kept it going so we are always on the look out for walking routes. One thing we’ve noticed here in Spain is the level of mask wearing is much higher than we noticed in France. Most people wear masks inside here but at least 50% also wear them outside. Not sure why but it’s very reassuring.
Sweet graffiti in Palencia
This route we are taking through Vitoria Gasteiz was the one I was hoping we would take. On our way to Portugal we generally take the northern coastal route and leave this diagonal route until we are coming home in May or June. That is because there can be snow at this time of year. But as luck would have it while we were in Bordeaux we noticed the temperature was forecast to rise later in the week so we stayed an extra night. And it worked, there has been no snow and the temperatures have been rising steadily.
Palencia park up. That’s the motorhome washing in the distance. Very excited!
After Vitoria Gasteiz we moved onto Palentia and as the van badly needed a wash we were very excited to see they had added a motorhome wash right in the parking area. This park-up also has toilets and showers and a restaurant nearby. I went for a walk to the town and took some photos of the huge cathedral and it’s ginormous door. It was the day before Palm Sunday and I passed a gateway nearby where there was a statue of Christ carrying his cross on a wooden plinth preparing to be carried by 6 men. All around was the smell of burning incense while the men chatted and smiled (behind their masks) and encouraged each other. It seemed to me I was witnessing a moment of sincere bonding and it was too private to photograph.
Ginormous cathedral door in Palencia and me for perspective
On Saturday morning we woke to heavy fog. Great day for doing the bookkeeping we’d been postponing followed by the van washing. A few hours later the sun was shining and we were on the road again, this time to the city of Valladolid. We parked at motorhome parking near supermarkets, cafes and restaurants and took a walk to get lunch supplies. We must have passed at least 30 benches in the shade. I was very tempted to sit and watch people go by but I was hungry.
This church was hiding in a shopping center in Valladolid!
Next morning was cold but sunny and we got up early to walk to the city and get a coffee. Valladolid is famous for its Holy Week and Easter Processions and we saw lots of extended family groups making their way towards the centre. The children were carrying what looked like sheafs of corn. Later that morning we moved to a campsite outside Salamanca. It was so warm we were able to sit outside (in the shade) for the afternoon.
I could see the statue up there from a distance and assumed it was on top of a church. Nope, it’s an lingerie shop
Next morning almost all of the campers had gone, probably on their way to Portugal like us. We spoke to a couple from the UK who told us rain was due and they had decided to change direction and move an hour back northwards towards France to escape it and make full use of the mobile nature of their motorhome. We didn’t follow, Denis’ new coat is rainproof and since we started the daily walking habit the quote from Alfred Wainwright, “There’s no such thing as bad weather, only unsuitable clothing.” makes perfect sense.
Our grey Monday
As I write we are parked at a petrol station, the wind is blowing fiercely, rain is pelting the roof windows, the sky is dark grey and we haven’t had a walk… maybe we will head north after all.
I love projects, I have about sixteen on the go at the moment. Yes they are exhausting and yes it is a little sad when I consider that I will never finish them but they were so exciting in the beginning. There was the great project for an art piece for my sister’s kitchen, his and her wedding masks, the garden and all its many projects, the website design project, the fiction book, the eat healthy project, the get up early project, the walk to the beach every day project, the make a stick trellis for the raspberries project… until yesterday I thought it was just me. I’ve been reading (listening to) the book Happy by Derren Brown. The subtitle is, Why more or less everything is absolutely fine. Very uplifting. Derrren is the illusionist, magician guy from the telly and he’s very interesting. Anyways, it’s a long book and I’ve been reading (listening to) it on and off for months and yesterday he had started talking about death… yes, I know, interesting. He was saying, among other things, that humans love projects. All humans. So it’s completely natural that I love projects. Funny thought, lately, I have been falling out of love with my projects.
Project Potatoes
I get very excited when I think of a new project, I fall in love with it and fantasise about us walking together along a sandy beach into the sunset. It’s all very romantic. But just at the moment when the project becomes real, the love disappears, the sand becomes stony and there’s a thunderstorm. This is at the precise point where I have to jump into the unknown. Maybe I have to learn something new or share something stupid or risk looking ridiculous or I just don’t know what to do next. By that point I have committed and have to stay with the new project until death do us part. Very often I can’t wait for death to do us part. Now I think the problem is I commit to the project before having a good look at what exactly is involved. I will be more careful in future.
Project Jigsaw
Like our blackbirds. I say OUR, they are in fact wild blackbirds but they do seem to be getting friendly. So, back when Eilish was still here, she and I researched home composting. Before I go any further let me be clear – the research was not in a scientific way… we searched on Youtube for a video about home composting. It was very interesting… and confusing. So in order to get started we stopped watching and summarised what we remembered (not a lot) from the fifteen videos we’d already watched and began home composting. This is a perfect example of a project.
Project Trellis
We already had a compost bin but it was stuffed to the top with rose bush pruning that was not turning into compost. First step, empty the bin. Then start adding vegetable peelings, paper towels, grass clippings and leaves. Keep the bin uncovered. This did mess with the structural integrity of the bin but I found a bungie chord to sort that. Finally, add water regularly. Only a week had passed when Eilish spotted the first member of our blackbird family popping in for a nibble. Yes, popping into the compost bin to root around in our leftovers! Well, we thought it might be the leftovers but there were bugs in there too so maybe that’s what they were after.
Project Blackbird Snack Bar
Last Friday I was sitting in the garden sending a text to my mother, telling her about the blackbirds when one jumped up on the compost bin. Since I had my phone in my hand I turned on the video and watched him getting started on his own project. He stood on the edge of the bin for a long time looking in, looking around, looking back in again. He walked around the edge of the bin and nearly toppled a few times but fortunately he had wings to help him balance. He washed himself, got interested in other birds and possibly me filming him. Then after a very, very long time, four minutes and ten seconds to be precise… he jumped in. He’s right to be careful, there are a lot of dangers around but the compost probably smells irresistibly good.
Project Walk to the Beach
From now on I’m not going to fall in love with the next irresistibly lovely smelling idea, I’m going to take my time looking into it and walking around it. I’ll tell myself I have plenty of projects, finish one of them first or better yet, finish them all.
Project Masks (Hello Roisín!)
Also, wouldn’t it be amazing to have a camera permanently mounted over the compost bin? We could watch the blackbirds when they are inside the bin and we could set up a live feed to a website and… NOoooooo! Danger danger, that’s a project luring me in, stay back! Have to go now, I think there’s a an old camera in the attic.
The gardening continues. I’ve just realised this might be why my dabbling in the garden previously didn’t bear fruit (pun intended.) It’s a continuous game, gardening. Persistence is rewarded and popping in and out once a month is very much discouraged. Maybe that’s why a team of gardeners is a good thing. We have a team here at the moment one of us is part-time but we’re getting the most out of him. In spite of his protests about being too busy I’ve seen him secretly checking out the growth of our seeds in the maternity ward.
(Here we are in prenatal… with little Rose)
So last weekend was the first weekend Denis was able to get into the garden. Eilish had a list of jobs ready for him and I learned a thing or two about keeping him on point and not wandering off to do something he liked better. The phrase, oh no you’re not finished here yet! stops him in his tracks. Let me just write that down for future use.
(FenceChat location)
He fixed the fence between our house and my friend Aileen and now I’m not worried about falling over it during our weekly FenceChat. It’s a new app like zoom but no one freezes, except from the cold.
He also hammer-actioned some screws into some wood and fixed the shed door. It seems lifting the door with one foot while undoing the bolt was not the intended way to get into the shed. We are saving a ton of time without all the gymnastics.
(Can you see those fabulous hammer-action screws?)
Then Eilish found my new favourite tool – a shredder. It was at the back of the shed and one of the things I didn’t know I was grateful for… I woke up on Friday morning with a brilliant idea. With all our enthusiasm in the first weeks we had filled three huge garden bags and numerous smaller black bags with garden debris. Then we had run out of bags and no way of getting more so we were at a tipping point… On the one hand neatly cut plants and pulled weeds, on the other, towering piles of plant cuttings and weeds. I have to be very particular when taking photos for you, one centimeter too far to the right or left and you will be horrified.
(Denis was a little too wide angle on this shot… but there’s me and my shredder)
I started using my shredder (it’s mine) on Saturday. By the way, I’m the only one allowed to use the shredder, safety issues, you understand. Stay well back now. (Don’t tell them but it’s nothing to do with safety, it’s all about the optics, I look like I’m doing a lot but the machine is doing it all. Kinda like how I used to think about ironing before I realised no one was noticing my neat piles of ironed clothes left lying around the house for weeks. The noise of the shredder ensures everyone knows I’m hard at work…)
(Here’s Denis working on the fence or maybe he’s doing a little dance?)
So now I’m shredding (well ok the machine is shredding) the contents of the garden debris bags. On top of that we can use the shredded material for mulch (impressed? that’s a new word in my vocabulary, maybe I will become a gardening app next?) on the front garden. It works best with woody material so the weeds will have to turn themselves into compost on their own. For that purpose we have found a good spot and they are hard at work.
(Even with that big pile of rubbish, this is still my favourite spot to sit and do nothing)
Well to be honest they are slow at work, very slow but that’s ok, slow is acceptable too. I can feel myself slowing down too, is it time to sit and enjoy the garden yet?
Travel stories 