Hola from Spain

Well we’ve done it and have arrived safe and well on our camp site at Marjel in Guadamar just south of Alecanti. 

The weather is beautiful the temperature is in the high thirties and its wall to wall sunshine. Mind you it’s uncomfortable sitting here typing half naked and soaking with perspiration (sweat to you and me).

The journey down well that’s the interesting bit…..The crossing from Plymouth to Santander was great, the sea was as calm as a mill pond, which is highly unusual for the channel and the Bay of Biscay. 

The boat was great with good food and good entertainment, but something’s like the cinema where a bit pricy.

Unfortunately we were kept back till last to get on board, now I’m not sure if this was because of our height and length or because we had used Camping & Caravan Club to do our booking, as it seems some of these companies use a bit of jiggery pokery when it comes to allocating vehicle sizes. I would advise anyone else to book direct with Brittany Ferries.

Waiting to Board

Our ship Pont -Aven

Goodbye Plymouth

Hola Santander

Mike and Paula’s RV was parked right at the front and we were right at the back. 

We were supposed to be following Mike & Paula who were the first off, which meant they were miles away by the time we exited the boat. 

It was a bit of a frightful drive navigating the traffic system alone through Santander and it was fourteen miles before we caught up with them at an Autopista garage on the A67 south of Santander.

Santander

Finally Caught up with Mike

Mike is an Ex lorry driver who is used to the Spanish roads and he was off like a rocket so for me it was often a case of playing catchup. The road out of Santander the A67 is very busy and before long we were climbing the Cordillero Cantabrica mountain range, a range high enough that there were snow hazard warning signs on the road. There were lots of tunnels and high viaducts and crazy fast Spanish drivers.

Autopista Tunnels

Very High viaducts 

We headed down the A67 to Orsono La Mayor where we went onto the A231 towards Burgos.

Here we exited the Autopista on the way for me to top up the petrol tank as I wasn’t sure how far I could get on LPG alone. Mike had a bit of a problem exiting the garage and before I had completed the top up he was off like a jack Rabbit. 

Needless to say I found it hard to catch up with him and we ended up going off at the wrong junction at Burgos. 

As Mike was supposed to be my guide we were now completely on our own. We did eventually catch up with them after many miles at a BP station on the A1 heading south towards Madrid. He had stopped there to change into lighter clothing and catch a snack and a drink.

We had intended to stop for a few hours before Madrid but Mike wanted to get this part of the journey ‘the M50 ring road’ out of the way. So on we drove until it was getting late into the evening which at this point we had been driving near solid for ten hours.

Now this might be OK for a seasoned trucker but for a sixty four year-old on his first foray into Spain a bit of a task, although we were grateful for their help. 

We’d pulled over in a filling station parking area, even though we were aware that often these were the places that thieves gassed and robbed unwary travellers, we arranged that one of us in each RV would stay awake while the other slept.

The night went peaceful enough with a few visits from the Guarda Civil checking that the lorry drivers and we were safe. But this meant that we were getting very tired as sleeping in a strange bunk bed on the boat the previous night gave me four hours sleep and now a further four hours just 8 hours in 48 hours.

We were off early before daybreak crossing more mountain ranges part of the Sistema Central down the R4 towards Albacete where we intended to fill up with LPG on the A31 but during this part of the journey we encountered thick fog.

We arrived just as the place opened up for business, this is where the fun started. 

The petrol attendant tried to navigate me into a narrow tight little road to where the pump was situated. It soon became plain to us that we wouldn’t get in and we were stuck. So we had to demount the Toyota and disconnect the trailer. We had sustained a minor little scrape by the door, nothing that I couldn’t fix but it could have been much worse if Mike hadn’t noticed the attendant was trying to get a 3.5 meter RV under a 2.5 mere roof.

Parked at the rear of the LPG pump

We were to find yet more problems

By this time Mike had reversed his RV across rough ground to the pump and managed to get his tanks filled up, now it was my turn. I reversed in narrowly missing a huge 3 foot concrete hole only to find that Mike had filled with all the LPG was left in the tanks.

So as we were hitching up the trailer we said goodbye to Mike feeling that we were holding them up as they were going a short distance back up the A31 and then south on the A30 towards La Manga.

Just after they left, disaster. 

We noticed that the electrical connector between the trailer and RV was bust up with the connectors hanging loose. It must have torn loose as we tried to reverse out. 

We spent a few hours of trying to get through to ADAC or to get one of the non-English speaking Spanish to let us know where a local motor electrical repair man could be found. Eventually one of the partially English speaking lads from the factory turned up and helped us out. A local auto electrical mechanic turned up and within minutes and had us on our way minus 55 Euro's for five minutes work.

 

That's a big Bull

Castles in Spain

We programmed the Sat-Nav to get us down the A31 onto the A7 for Alicante and then the AP7 towards Guadamar and our final destination Camping Marjel where we arrived at three in the afternoon.

In getting to the first pitch I managed to knock over a post on a tight corner where a workman had unfortunately left his van parked. Then after much toing & froing we found we couldn’t fit into the pitch it was too narrow. 

After a visit to reception we where told we could use a larger pitch just opposite until Sunday ‘as unfortunately it had been pre booked’. We can then move onto another pitch on millionaire’s row that will be large enough to accommodate our RV.

While trying to reverse swing the RV onto this pitch I scraped a line of bushes which have left some scratches along one side so once again these can be T-cut out so its not too bad. Needless to say I was short tempered, tired, hot and very hungry and poor Kay had to put up with my bitching and moaning.

One of the English residents came to our assistance, of which we were very grateful for his help.

Our Street

Finally Settled

The site is fantastic and after a good shower and a hot meal and a most needed good night’s sleep we’re settling in well. We have even had our first invitation to go out this Friday, with a group of other English snowbirds here for a Chinese meal.

More Anon