It was an easy drive from La Granja to the historic town of Avila, with its main fame being its intact medieval walls. I stayed at a paying campervan stop just outside them, for a relaxing 2 nights which enabled me to pay to walk round them, and then the next day do a half a day exploring the very nearby reservoir and rest of the town by bike.
Real life goes on inside these walls, with a mixture of old and newer housing and the whole is very understated re tourism.
Today, after another 2 hour drive I arrived at a campsite 11km from the centre of Madrid, very near one of the motorways round and through. As ever a complete change from the rural but school childrens’ noise, and then the tarmac car park small town setting of the last 4 days and nights.
I put my trust totally in two satnavs to get here, and mused to myself as we were steadily guided across complex motorway intersections, helped no doubt by the fact it was Sunday, that I could just sail on by and out of Madrid, for all I knew of where I was going. In previous times, I would have written down a list of all the junctions and then main road numbers, and in studying the map, I would have had a good idea of where exactly the campsite was relative to suburbs, other towns etc, so then seeing these on signs would have been reassuring. Nevertheless, Via Michelin and my lorry one both got me to my destination, and the non-toll route did involve a very high climb into the drizzling clouds with thankfully low visibility, and a 50km/hr speed limit, to get across the mountains. Google maps continues to shut down when I press ‘Start’ for a car journey, although it doesn’t for cycling??, and only disabling/enabling, then restarting my phone, seems to do the trick for a session.
So I’m finally here to do a second much wanted city visit, after being fortunate to spend a long weekend in Copenhagen last month. My trusty steed and google satnav took me this afternoon to the centre briefly, then back out again, just so that I could get an initial ‘feel’ of the city. Much of the route in was on good, marked, cycling track provision, athough on the way back, heading up a 6-lane long avenue, I was told by a bus driver in the bus/taxi-only lane to my right within about 2 feet of me, (there were plastic road divider things between his lane and mine) that I should get into the middle of the lane I was in, rather than be on its right. At least this is what I very quickly understood from his “Medio, medio…” gesticulation from a glance out of the corner of my right eye. Indeed the markings on the road did indicate that this whole lane was for bikes (and cars!). This caused me to expect hostility from the car drivers behind, to be mitigated by me putting on the motor at its top setting, so that I could zoom off and reach tremendous speeds of 15mph in only a few seconds from the many, many red traffic lights. And bear in mind, there’s no ‘preparation’ amber, and this was uphill for several kilometers. Ah well, it’s all in the good cause of exercise and staving off dementia 🤣.
I’m going to treat myself tomorrow, travel in by metro and spend the day exploring on foot. It’s a shame the weather isn’t quite what I was expecting – showers, some sunshine, then showers. I haven’t been out of jeans and jumpers since I left the UK, But I am enjoying being on the road again without the pressure of a turn-around time within a couple of weeks, loving Blue’s home from home comforts, and thankful to continue to have such opportunities to explore the setups of different countries and hear bits of other people’s stories.
