Whilst being very happy with my own company, and that of my family and friends across the internet, as well as the home comforts of british radio and tv, I am interested in meeting fellow travellers and hearing their stories, without them ending up feeling sorry or responsible for me. Here’s some of these:
A long time on my visit list, the Arcachon area on the Atlantic coast is about 200 miles from Le Dorat, once again via empty ‘D’ roads through historic villages to the fantastic dual carriage N141 which didn’t appear on my lorry satnav so built in the last few years, and then free autoroute A10 along and past Bordeaux. Beautiful countryside, fantastic roads, lovely weather again – definitely warm Spring rather than hot Summer, brought me to my first campsite in this resort area which was closed, despite being on all the apps I use. No problem as there are lots of alternatives, and I followed the nearby signs to the municipal campsite of Gujan-Mestras.
What another find! Right on the coastal path, with a beach about 3 mins walk away, although this is in a large inlet bay area, rather than ocean-facing. I have a lovely large pitch for the total cost of 20eu per night including tourist tax, but I’m not paying for electricity, relying on the solar panel on the van roof and my power pack lithium battery/inverter and its 2 portable panels. Oh and free wifi. Happy me.
Lots of little leisure harbours
with cafes and oyster vendors
The campsite is also 5 mins from the train station on the Bordeaux-Arcachon line – 45 min journey to Bordeaux for 12eu – and lots of cycling infrastructure so a cycle across from here to Pyla and the Dune du Pilat, plus a train re-visit to Bordeaux provides my next two days of exploring. It’s a definite start of season feel here and I’m sure it will be heaving with people and cars accessing these areas in a few weeks. It seems to me from my first ride to Arcachon yesterday very like the Il de Re & Oleron.
My next set of days from Wednesday to the following Tuesday has as of yesterday already been planned given the unexpected week’s visit of my brother to his house (formerly Mum’s) in the village of Courry, north of Nimes – see former post for its story. So I will do the driving down & across to the Mediterranean to pick him up at Perpignan airport, east to the Cevennes/Ardeche region for a few days and then back again to Carcassonne irrespective of the increased fuel cost – minimum 2.09eu a litre for diesel here. It will be great to spend a few days with him, the places and the memories.
It’s the last day of 5 days at the Camping San Miguel Aula de Naturaleza for which I have ‘Ourtours’ couple to thank. A lovely campsite, 200 yards across the road from one of Nerja’s beautiful beaches. My only downer would be that this road is the main coast road, so particularly at commuting time, is reasonably busy and therefore somewhat noisy.
It’s possible to cycle along the beach on a dirt track which then brings you to the built-up part of the town from where it’s easy to cycle/walk to the centre, the Balcon de Europa, and other beaches. This time of year seems perfect to visit, as the temperature perhaps goes up to the mid twenties, the cafes and restaurants are open and the beaches are not over busy. There are many nationalities around in addition to Spanish, perhaps Dutch people in the majority, then Germans and Brits, and a sprinkling of other vehicle number plates.
I love the beaches as many of them are in large coves, the water is beautiful and clear, and I have been able to use my SUP board. In fact for my kayaking along the beach this afternoon, Google has classed me as being on a ferry. I’ll take that. The mountains are the beautiful backdrop for this area, and the motorway I arrived on, wends it way impressively across viaducts and in tunnels through them.
The view from my ‘ferry’
The bike continues to enable me to leave the van in place and explore, and I’ve cycled on the dirt tracks that go under the motorway and into the hills/mountains. Frigliana is worth a visit, and today I walked up the Rio Chillar path which in effect from a certain point is walking up a stream. A magical walk which reminded me of ‘Puck’s Glen’ near Dunoon in Scotland, although of course completely different in landscape (& weather when I was there, which was winter, but I know that area has had some similar summer weather around now).
In typical fashion, I was just musing to myself that even the rocks in the water were not slippy, (unlike most streams in the UK) when sure enough I slipped, and fortunately only ended up with scratches and 50% of my shorts wet from falling into the undergrowth at the side! 🙂 It was early enough in the day for the hordes not yet to be in attendance, so one’s pride was not a problem. I don’t seem as yet to have any longer-term effects from the vegetation. The higher they climb ……
This picture captures my sentiments to Nerja and its environs
I’m looking forward to a glass of wine and conversation this evening with Gabrielle, a german, fellow solo traveller, and then long drive up to Denia tomorrow.
The idea for this trip had settled on shaping the initial part of it around a first visit to Madrid, and the unexpected Christmas present of the michelin guidebook ‘L’Europe en camping-car’ from my sister and brother in-laws provided exactly the itinerary for this with Burgos as the first stop.
Yesterday I decided that I would visit its Museo de Evolucion Humana, on the way to my next destination of La Granja/Sitio Real de San Ildefonso. For 6 euros entry and 1.40 eu parking I spent a really interesting 2 hours learning about what was discovered from the prehistoric human species sites in the local Atapuerca region as well as my own personal evolution 🙂.
In the afternoon 2-3 hours easy driving on the toll-free, empty A-1 motorway between Burgos and Madrid went through beautiful countryside, climbed to higher uplands and skirted the mountains of the Sierra Guadarrama, arriving at my current camper stop 3km from La Granja and 11km from Segovia.
This is a park-up without electricity but with a toilet and shower for 10eu in the grounds of an outward-bound/farm residential centre for schools from Madrid and roundabout. There are animals just over the wall and a resident peacock, which is regularly calling the shots. I was given 5 eggs from one of the wardens and information about the location, namely that we are already at about 1200m, and the mountain within 16km has a ski station at more than 2000m.
Having got the van battery warning sound last night from watching too much TV when I cut short my intended evening walk because it felt too remote, I was debating not staying for a second night in favour of moving to a campsite with hook-up and more people around. This would have meant missing a visit to the Spanish royalty Versailles equivalent in La Granja, and visiting the old town.
But waking up to sunshine, I found the motivation to get on the bike without any further procrastination such as breakfast, and visit the gardens, free entry is always attractive. It was a great decision. The photos don’t really do it justice and don’t capture the mountain backdrop. Another piece of information I was given about this area was that it only has 4 weeks of summer, and by summer, Hassan the warden meant reaching 38 degrees (he is originally from Morocco!), whereas in winter it can be -15. So I could easily imagine the hoi polloi of the Madrid court needing to move outside of these 4 weeks to this fresher mountain air, and do their aristocratic sauntering up and down the beautiful shady ‘calles’, interspersed with their gorgeous fountains. The fountains are switched on every Saturday in late spring/summer these days.
So I got back, had some of the eggs which were delicious and then debated with myself whether to up sticks and move the van to Segovia, or cycle there. In the meantime, I paid for my stay to another worker at the centre, and found out that she had spent a couple of years working at Wath, a village in the middle of nowhere in North Yorkshire. Who would have believed it! I felt surprisingly encouraged by this conversation to stay another night – still no other company turning up – and therefore use the bike again.
I wish I was able to express just how delighted I was to find myself cycling on part of an official Santiago camino trail, as I took the risk and headed off the road onto a bumpy track, past a field of bulls, with no sight in the distance of my medieval town on a hilltop destination. But thankfully I passed another solitary human and a quick question to him about whether this track would eventually end up there, resulted in reassurance as I determined that this American was walking part of the camino to there, before getting a flight back to his Chicago home. I should have asked whether he wanted any conversation – as I would have been up for some – and through his sunglasses and hiking attire I didn’t detect an axe-murderer, but instead zoomed off with my new-found confidence in the route. The track went across moorland, with a bridge over a significant high-speed rail line, and then under the A-1 motorway, and indeed eventually took me straight into the centre of Segovia, famous for its Roman aqueduct and other sites, medieval old town, walls and churches. Well worth the visit, and the bike ride. I was fortunately able to re-trace the return journey at speed, driven by the anxiety of a phone without battery. Alls well that ends well, and I have been joined by 3 other vans.
Time and again, the moral of the story for me is get out and do it. Avila and then Madrid here I come.
My poor ankles and feet were swelling from sitting at my computer in that heat, and trying to get them raised just added to the twisted position I had had to adopt, given the best layout of my kit. I had to sit-on a quadruple-folder thick towel in my swimming attire, and even ended up abandoning the decorum of the tee-shirt. Whilst the bottom half of my body could not be seen, and even though I had disguised my campervan office with an MS Teams background, when there were no more formal meetings, I had thrown caution to the wind removing the tee-shirt and who cares if I’m sitting there in a tankini top. I had thought I was safe with this, but it did cause the retired house-husband and acting butler of my colleague, with whom I am regularly MS-Teaming – the colleague not her butler – in the first instance to suddenly avert his eyes/nay presence when he caught a glimpse of me on the screen, to then deciding if you can’t beat then join and suggesting that he should take his top off when delivering the cups of tea/coffee.
Well, I worked the full 5 days this week but am not working next week so that I can be un-pressured in the long journey back.
The map told me that I shouldn’t do a stay at Lake Garda, as there were other places to visit on this trip as part of a more direct route home. My first main destination was approx 350 miles, so I was going to set off Friday after work and stop over at the campsite on the Mreznicki river again, thereby being able to leave early for Slovenia on Saturday morning and beat the border queues for the stamp in my passport.
No sooner had I made these plans literally yesterday, than a rare, in fact pretty (not a comment on how they looked 😄) non-existent, fellow sole traveller female from Germany invited me to join her for a restaurant meal in the evening. The restaurant meal would be the first such on this trip, and Claudia seemed nice based on one little conversation where I told her that the pitch opposite was better for the shade. Plus I do try to be open to unexpected opportunities…. but my journeying plans would need to adapt.
We spent a lovely evening together – although I was significantly germanly-challenged, as she didn’t speak too much English. And thank you my brain for presenting me today, having singularly failed me yesterday, with the words I wanted to say such as ’empfehlen’ – to recommend – as our conversation ranged across divorce – she similarly is, and has 3 adult children – 2 sons and a daughter, our jobs and trying to explain mine!!!. She is a physiotherapist and part of her work is therapy through horse-riding – she has a very gentle, aged ‘therapy horse’, lives in Villach, Austria. This was her first trip alone in the campervan she and her daughter own, and from today she is spending a week sailing round the islands with 4 other sole individuals from all over Germany, leaving her van at Trogir marina. I haven’t described all of this to underline the depth of the linguistic challenge in exchanging all this information, but more to record another interesting set of stories from random meetings.
I must recommend my new toy and the beaches and inlets round this spot are perfect for it. It is a 500m walk from my pitch which doesn’t seem far, but it is quite a load to carry. The model I selected is great – it has a kayak seat, paddle holders, bottle holder and waterproof bag for the mobile, and also a shoulder strap, and I have used all of these. In fact will be taking some ibuprofen shortly for overuse of my shoulders and arms. The only negative was the oar which came with the board, with a plastic joining piece snapping on the first use back in the UK. So got an easy refund from the supplier, and bought another, which is holding up so far, but will need some electrical taping for the standup handle to fit more tightly. The reviews indicated that this would be the case, but it seemed the best one for the price, so at least no surprise, and I think I will end up using it in kayaking mode more anyway which is fine. The board is fantastic for kayaking on these calm sea waters, and today I tried the stand-up bit, which will take abit more practice, but I did manage to get from kneeling to standing and paddle back to shore without falling in.
Two kayakers came paddling by today, and in our on-the-water conversation I found out that they were young British women, one of whom had cycled from the UK to Croatia with her boyfriend – took them 4 months – gauntlet there for my Folkestone to Rome cycling buddies – being visited by her friend, as the boyfriend had flown back to the UK for a wedding. They were doing a 4-day kayaking tour of the coasts and islands from Split, using the company ‘Red Adventures’, wild-camping along the way. I love such meetings. 🙂
There they go into the distance, on their 17km day’s sailing
Tomorrow is back to work Monday, following the lovely beach day I’ve had today. It’s a very laid-back relaxed place here – only the campsite + some lovely beach bars and restaurant or two. Mostly German holiday-makers, but other nationalities and their languages come and go, including Belgian, Dutch, Slovenian, Polish, Italian, French. A variety of ages, with still a few German school-age children. Apologies if my subject intermingling annoys. I am aware I’m doing it, but quite like recording other bits and pieces through minor meanderings back to the main paragraph topic ……… The internet connection via the campsite’s wifi is enabling me to stream stuff to my firestick, and I’ve done a test with a Messenger video call, so fingers crossed and tonight’s activity is setting up my work desk with my large monitor etc.
But I must include my hunted-down dessert which it’s now time for – the Croatian equivalent of a custard slice/bienenstick/milles-feuilles, with a layer of marshmallow underneath the pastry. I found one in a Zagreb cafe, then saw 2-days worth in Lidl. It’s called a ‘Kremšnite’.
The weather forecast is warm all week, with rain from Thursday, so after work activities will be paddling, and a cycle ride to Trogir which is about 7 kms – hilly, but not a problem on my e-bike.
On the campsite Au Fil de LOo at Bagneres, I met this young man, who was temporarily living out of his surfer dude VW, basically kitted out, while he and his girlfriend, who was in the UK just then, bought an apartment next to the cable car station.
They really liked Bagneres from a previous visit, because of its proximity to skiing, beautiful countryside, Spain, the coasts, etc; Will is a remote worker so can work anywhere. He is a structural engineer designing steel mezzanine structures, and currently able to use the office of a British company which organises expeditions worldwide and happens to also be based in this small town. The prices to buy are 30% cheaper than in the UK so for them – why not.
As I write this, I realise there are loads more questions I’d like to ask about this ‘adventure’ for them. All very interesting.
