Farewell España 💃

The white cliffs of Dover

After over five months travelling around Spain it was finally time to make our way back home to our home in Sussex. We felt sad to be leaving especially as the weather seemed to have settled, every day was warm and sunny and the wind had finally settled. Spain was doing what it does best by offering fabulous weather!!
We had a truly wonderful trip, visited lots of amazing places and made many new friends. We feel that we have become part of a new community and feel sure we will be meeting up with many of the people we have met along the way, it's all so much easier to keep in touch now with social media - Facebook and Whatsapp etc.

The lovely promenade of Mojacar Playa

We didn't always have an easy time of things, it was challenging trying to book the vehicle in to a garage to have the work done for an urgent safety recall, Google Translate is brilliant if you want to send an email but it's not so easy when you come face to face with someone who doesn't speak English and you don't speak Spanish!! But we got by and managed to get the work done although we did have to spend the night camped up on the Industrial estate for the night so that we could check the van in at 8am! We also had to find a dentist when Keith developed toothache, but we solved that problem easily by travelling to Mojacar where we found an English speaking dentist where we were given excellent treatment.

Islamic arches in the Cathedral of Córdoba

We enjoyed the coastal resorts, revisiting some of our favourite haunts as well as finding new places, but we also travelled inland and enjoyed equally exploring the city of Córdoba as well as some of the less visited areas such as Ubeda. We ventured off the beaten tourist track and found what felt like the 'real' Spain.
Our final week was spent at Castellon de la Plana (one of our favourite haunts!) on the area designated for Motorhomes by the airfield so not only could we enjoy the cycle path right outside the gate but when we were back at base we could watch the light aircraft and parachutists. Every day we headed along the cycle path to the Via Verde from Benicassim to Orepesa, we just didn't tire of it with its beautiful views.

Our last Spanish stopover by the airfield at Castellon 

Whilst we were there we met a couple, Anne and Terry. Anne introduced me to Polarsteps a great app for recording your journey.









I have set it up for our journey home if you want to have a look:
https://www.polarsteps.com/AngelaGardner/648016-home-from-spain?s=27695db8-89fd-41fe-a0f7-18f57e05efce

Back home cycling the disused railway line in Sussex 

And so my blog for this trip comes to an end, but it's certainly not the end of our travels - we are planning our next trip already, inspired by Colin and Sandra, we hope to make the journey across Europe to Greece in 2019 - just watch this space!!

Our Motor-Roaming life

I was wondering what to write next on my blog and I thought you may be interested in what it's been like to be living in Spain in our motorhome for the last five months. It's wonderful to be free to go where you want whenever you want and to visit so many different places - cities, countryside or coast.
Spain is such a diverse country there is always somewhere new and different to discover and their customs and culture often surprises us. Sometimes we get a bit lonely when all we have for company is each other, but over the last months we have begun to feel more and more that we are part of a large community of like minded people touring around in their motorhomes for months and sometimes years (or sometimes the motorhome is their home having sold up in the UK)

With every place we visit we have ever-changing neighbours and if they are from the UK we often get chatting over a coffee or even enjoy a cycle ride or a meal together. One couple, Alan and Sophie, we met in Chinchilla, we chatted and Sophie and I contacted each other a couple of times using Whatsapp. A week or so later we were cycling along the Benacassim cycle path when we thought we recognised Sophie going the other way, so I sent a Whatsapp " Was that you we just saw?" I said, and it was! We were both parked up at Castellon about a mile apart, the next day we met for coffee and the day after a cycle ride along our favourite Via Verde. We have a lot in common, Alan being a keen runner and Sophie is a hypnotherapist like me, our friendship was cemented and we hope to keep in touch as they live in Sussex (like us). With all the people we have met over the last few years, I think we now have more motorhoming friends across Europe than we have at home in the UK. With today's social media it's so easy to keep in touch and we exchange ideas, information about gadgets (Paul Steel especially!!)  and our favourite places to stay - there's nothing better than recommendation - so many of the great  places we have stayed have been as a result of a recommendation from a fellow Motorhomer.

The practical side of life as a Free camper can be challenging at times especially finding somewhere to do your laundry.
Can you imagine my delight when we found the El Palomar camperstop on our route? I had been told by someone we met that you had use of the washing machine free! And the added bonus was they only charged 5€ a night to stay.
We stayed two nights and in that time I did four wash loads and got it all dry on our makeshift line.

It's the simple things in life that can give you great happiness, who doesn't like to snuggle up at night in between fragrant clean sheets!!

Yet another Via Verde

You might be imagining when you read about our Moho adventures in Spain that we are having wonderful weather, but I think you have to agree there is definitely something unusual about the weather right across Europe. Being April we expected the temperatures to be soaring and we could put our winter woolies away, but we have experienced so much wind in the last months often a cold wind, yesterday it was a hot and sunny 25° yet today the day started at 3° and has only risen to a chilly and very windy 12° with frequent showers including hailstones . Weird eh? What is going on? Back in the UK the weather has been much, much colder - so much for global warming!
Nevertheless, we get out on our bikes or walking almost every day and we love nothing better than a Via Verde for our cycling.

Which is why when we left Ubeda, we travelled to Alcaraz, where using Park4night, we found a car park right at the start of the Via Verde de Sierra de Alcaraz, we stayed three nights and in that time we had the car park to ourselves and very nice it was too, peaceful at night with another interesting historic town to wander around and explore close by.
Not everyone likes to stay in this kind of isolated car park on their own but it suits us just fine.

On the Via Verde we hardly saw a soul as the trail wound through the rather lush hills, sometimes literally as there were quite a few tunnels (with automatic lighting, which worked well most of the time, just occasionally there was a delay on the motion sensors and we found ourselves cycling in the pitch black - Scary!!)
It's a bit strange really (and the kind of thing you find all the time in Spain) but this wonderful Via Verde which stretches 74km from Albecete to Alcaraz has hardly any access points along its entire length, which probably accounts for why we saw so few people!

Chinchilla-that's us in the bottom left corner!

Our next stop was recommended to us by a fellow motorhomer, another hilltop town called Chinchilla. Here there is a massive Aire with room for up to 50 vans with all the usual facilities of water and waste disposal with an added bonus that it was really peaceful at night (except for the chiming of the church bells - not so good if you're a light sleeper!)
Once again exploring the town on foot left your calves aching from the many steps and steep hills, but it's always worth wandering around the winding narrow streets that have hardly changed in the last few centuries.

Spain - Inside out

Portuguese windmill - photo taken on one of the few dry days!

I cannot begin to tell you how much we have been enjoying travelling around the interior of Spain these last few weeks. We had a brief visit to Portugal but left a bit hastily when we encountered day after day of heavy rain, it was enough to see us off! 
We had a second attempt at visiting the Roman ruins of Italica - this time we had time to visit the whole site, although it was a bit wet from a previous downpour. 

Located just north of Seville this amazing archeological site is a bit of a hidden gem when it comes to Roman cities, the ruin of the amphitheatre is the 2nd largest in Europe and the remains of the city cover a large area with some beautiful mosaic floors still in situ.

We then travelled to Córdoba where we took a local bus into the city centre and visited the Mezquita Mosque-Cathedral dating back from 784 AD with its vast columned prayer hall, in 1236 it was converted into a Catholic Church and to this day has a strange feeling of a fusion of two religions. 
We also visited a museum of all the different torture items from the 16th century Spanish Inquisition, we left feeling nauseous- you cannot begin to imagine some of the implements of torture that were used on their poor victims!

Our journey of discovery continued when we arrived in the historic town of Udeba where as you strolled the narrow streets a beautiful old building would appear.
We also had the best coffee and pan au chocolate of the trip so far!!
For fellow motorhomers - there is a brilliant Aire where you can stay, it's very safe as it's right opposite the Guardia training centre!!

Cycling the 'Olive Oil route' La Subbetica Spain

After my last blog post we continued our journey West, stopping at Isla Cristina where we discovered the most wonderful wide sandy beaches completely deserted apart from the occasional dog walker. We then headed into Portugal where (like many others this Spring) we endured some very dismal weather so decided to scarper back to Spain in search of better weather. For a day or two we followed the weather front, but after a couple of brief stops we arrived at Cabra to cycle on the Via Verde de Aceite in the Subbetica region (located inland - south central Spain).

Our first overnight stop was at the disused railway station of Cabra which is now a busy Bar/restaurant where the locals congregate as well as the walkers and cyclists stopping of the trail for refreshment. There is also a restored Steam engine and railway carriages converted into dining areas. At weekends the Via Verde and refreshment stops are very popular with the locals and stopping for a quiet coffee when you're out is not going to happen - the Spanish when they gather are such 
noisy people!

We then moved to an Aire at Doña Mencía a few miles along the trail where we were able to cycle more of the route. The weather was lovely and the scenery spectacular- none more so than the 'Bonita' (beautiful) village of Zuheros, dominated by the tumbledown castle built into the hilltop rocky crags by the Moors in the ninth century. The narrow streets wind steeply upwards, past all the typical white andalusian houses up to the top to the Plaza with a restaurant where we enjoyed a beer served with rather chewy garlic flavoured olives and the magnificent panorama, the tranquility broken only by the chiming of the church clock. 

The area has been inhabited for thousands of years, nearby in the craggy cliffs are caves where artefacts have been discovered from the Palaeolithic age. We hope to return to Zuheros another time to visit the caves and the local museum (it was Monday and closed - which seems to be something we have a habit of doing on our travels - arriving somewhere only to find it closed or just about to!) We also would like to visit the area and cycle on the Via Verde again on one of our future trips. We love exploring inland Spain it's so different to the coastal resorts, you feel you are discovering the Real Spain.

A wander around Ronda and being a proper tourist in Andalusia

Have you ever been to the Spanish town of Ronda? This medieval town is split in two by an enormous deep gorge, hundreds of years ago a bridge was built to bring the two sides together and what a construction! It really is quite a breathtaking sight, this gigantic bridge across the deep, deep gorge as well as amazing views from the town perched on the hilltop.
The only downside to this incredible place is the coach loads of other tourists also visiting the town, everywhere was packed with people from every corner of the world, every corner you turned there was someone taking a photo with their selfie stick!

Despite the crowds I would still say that Ronda is worth a visit as despite being a major tourist attraction as it is a truly incredible sight, it has an authentic Spanish feel and the views are spectacular! The drive through the countryside to get there was very enjoyable, the landscape is much less arid, in fact it almost felt like we were back in the UK with lush green fields all around.

The disused Olvera station at the start of the Via Verde de Sierra,
 the castle perched on the hilltop in the distance

We were in the area to cycle on our favourite trail - the Via Verde de Sierra. We arrived at the Aire at Olvera, right at the start of the trail, really looking forward to
cycling through all the tunnels and seeing the vultures soaring in the National park along the route. The information centre was open so we went in to look around and were told that the Via Verde was closed along its entire length due to landslides caused by recent storms. We were gutted!! We had been looking forward to this particular ride since we set out from home.

With nowhere to cycle we walked up into the town of Olvera and visited the church and castle perched right on top of the hill. The lovely Spanish town with its steep and winding streets made up for our disappointment.

The spectacular view from the hilltop castle Olvera

Spain - a country of contrasts

Sometimes when you write a travel blog you don't feel inspired to write, but these last few days whilst travelling across Spain the contrast from magnificent tranquility to the hustle bustle of a major tourist resort was striking. After spending some time on the beach on the outskirts of Mojacar we headed inland on the A92 towards Granada, stopping by a stunningly peaceful lake en route.
Surrounded on all sides by distant snow capped mountains this out of the way location is like an oasis, a little bit of paradise.

We stayed in a car park on the shores of the lake, no facilities but a small restaurant open during the day where we enjoyed a cold Alhambra beer served with a plate of tapas. Even though there was a campsite up the road there were no marked footpaths or cycle ways, it was just completely under exploited. The quietness made your ears ring, the silence broken only by the occasional chirping of the birds.
From here we headed to the sprawling metropolis of Granada towered over by the snowy mountains of the Sierra Nevada.

The towering mountains of the Sierra Nevada

Having decided we wouldn't stop to visit the Alhambra again we headed south to the Costa Del Sol to revisit Nerja, a place where we spent many happy days when we used to visit my parents' apartment here. But it's now seventeen years since our last visit and the change in that time was quite surprising . Nerja is now a busy, bustling resort, almost every square foot has been built on and developed like so many other tourist resorts around Spain. But the narrow streets still have a rustic feel about
them even though the shops and bars are mainly for the tourists.

The main centre of Nerja is the Balcon de Europa and on that warm, sunny afternoon we saw so many tourists of all nationalities enjoying the sunshine and the holiday vibe of the place.

This time our ears were buzzing with the sounds of so many people!!
We love being in Spain and visiting all the different places, experiencing all the contrasts of this diverse country.
What are your experiences of this wonderful country? Do you love it too?