Unforseen circumstances

After visiting Casares on Saturday, we headed to Olvera on Sunday, to another free overnight stop.  There also happens to be another Via Verde there, part of which we intended to ride with Powell before heading to the other end of it at Puerto Serrano and doing the same.  Unfortunately fate intervened.

Leaving Marbella for the mountains

It’s Saturday 27 December and we left the campsite in Marbella this morning.

On Boxing Day, Ash and Mand came over for a final supper and Pete made us a scrummy casserole, which went down well with everyone.  Ash and Mand provided the dessert, Christmas pudding and custard; even in Spain we managed not to miss out on those little British Christmas foibles!  As we were all departing the next day, we managed to not make too late a night of it and were all in bed by midnight....a first all week I think!

New friends and Christmas on the beach!

Christmas has been and gone and we’re still in Marbella.  Well, when I say we’re in Marbella, we’re actually about 5 miles from the centre, but we’re still in the same campsite we were in on Monday!

I'm (not) dreaming of a white Christmas

Following the interesting sights in Orgiva, we made the decision to stick to the countryside for our second day in the area.  We had initially planned to ride out to Lanjaron, around 11km from the campsite we were staying at.  However, I had second thoughts after realising how much uphill cycling was involved so we stuck to the valley instead!

Bikes, booze and bohemians

We finally left Almerimar on Monday, with slightly heavy hearts, but good memories to treasure.  Having eventually spent just over a week there, it was our longest stopover by far.  We’d have been happy to stay for longer, but had decided we needed to move on soon before the restlessness kicked in.  We were also on a mission (well, Pete was...).  After he discovered that his bike is starting to fall apart, he worked out that it would make far more sense to replace the bike than upgrade his exisiting bike and during his internet search, had seen a bargain in a shop in Malaga.  Conscious that it wouldn’t stick around forever and having already spent extensive hours looking for THE perfect bike, he convinced me that it was enough of a bargain to warrant an excessively long drive to go and get it.  Although to be honest, even if I’d objected, I couldn’t have done much anyway as I’m not the driver!

We're Still Alive!

A lack of decent wifi access recently has caused me to neglect the blog a bit, hence the 13 day gap since my last update.

A week in the life...

Sunday 22 November saw us head inland again to a free stopover in Morella.  We were treated to some amazing views, along with some more hair raising bends and sheer drops en route and arrived to an almost empty aire.  It had capacity for at least 20 vans, but there were only 3 of us there and one of those vans left shortly after we arrived, leaving us and another Brit couple from Scotland.

The chains in Spain break mostly when the shop's shut

So, we're nearly at the end of our first week in Spain and haven't had much wifi access.  However, we currently have free wifi so I'm making the most of it...

Our last night in France (for now)

After giving the reigns to Pete for a couple of days, I’m back!

This morning, we woke to cold air, but clear blue skies.  As the weather had been kind to us, we set off to walk along the beautiful Caranca Gorge as we’d discussed the night before, taking the high path first, so as to catch the amazing views before any potential bad weather came and ruined it.  We needn’t have worried; the sky stayed blue the whole way round the approx 10km route.  The ascent was fairly steep, but with unsurprisingly impressive views of the valley below as it took us up and around the rocks.

Our spot on Saturday night

Driving in the Pyrenees

After breakfast we conferred and decided that Quillan should be La destination du jour. Leaving Carcassonne proved usual, with Hazel and me having words. It should have been around 50 Km for the day, leaving plenty of time to relax and read a bit. There might have been time for a little guitar practice too, had the place at Quillan not been overrun with a car-boot sale. I’ve been saying since we left UK how odd it is that there are no “booties” in France, then the first one we find is on our free over-night stop. Bum.

Carcassonne

I figured that after being on the road ‘properly’ for over a month and the blog existing for considerably longer, I’d better have a go at an entry other than a feeble stall for the “Tech” page and the budget bit (which Sue updated last night on my behalf, thanks honey). Here goes....

Well Albi, we're nearly in Spain!

Wednesday saw us heading to Cordes sur Ciel, another hilltop fortress, built in the 13^th century.  On arrival at the aire, the €3.50 fee our book had claimed, had inflated to €5, but as it included a jeton for 3 hours of electricity or 100 litres of water, we didn’t feel too hard done by.

Lot's a lovely view

On Monday, before leaving our parking spot in Domme, we went for a wander around the village.  We had to be back at Dora by 10 am and we discovered that was around the time that most of the shops opened, so we almost had the place to ourselves!  It’s a lovely little fortified town above the banks of the Dordogne, which dates from the 13^th century.

Change of direction

I’m not sure where the time’s gone, but it’s 4 weeks tomorrow since we arrived in Calais and started our Euro meanderings.

Our blog updating has become a little more intermittent as we settle into a slower and all together less organised existence!  Although we’re away, we’re technically not on holiday, so we don’t feel ourselves rushing around trying to take in every single sight for fear of running out of time.  Maybe a faux pas, as we won’t necessarily be visiting the same parts of countries twice, but if we played tourists every day for two years, we’d frankly be exhausted, so we’re just bumbling along.

Au revoir Brittany, bonjour Pays de Loire

After a lovely wine fuelled catch up with Francie in Carnac last night followed by a Powell walk / visit to the monoliths this morning, we said our farewells and made our way to St Nazaire, marking the end our our travels in Brittany and the start of another new page in our map book.

Lazy days

We’ve been a bit lax on the blog update front; partly because our internet connection has been rubbish recently but predominantly because we haven’t actually done a great deal since Friday.  We’re still moving around, but more often than not, we’ve been in living mode rather than holiday mode, having now settled into the reality of life on the road.

We headed to Huelgoat on Friday, the first stopover that hasn’t been a stone’s throw from the sea since we left the UK.

Huelgoat is a pleasant and very small village in the Arree mountains, although like the Harz mountains in Germany, they’re more like hills really.  While we were there, we took Powell for a wander in the Argent Valley, an ‘enchanting’ forest area, with unusual rock formations such as Le Champignon (the mushroom) and La Roche Tremblante (the trembling rock), to name but a few.  

Pete managed to get the trembling rock to ‘tremble’ after being shown where to push it by a passer by.

Le Champignon

Pete and Powell are in the pic to give an idea of the size of the boulders...they weren't small!

There are all sorts of legends attached to the area; our favourite was that Gargantua was less than happy with the hospitality that he’d received from the villagers so he threw giant rocks at them!

We managed not to get any trick or treaters that night, despite there being some kids in the village knocking on house doors.  They’d have been highly disappointed with our treats anyway as we only had beer and wine!

Saturday saw us leave Huelgoat behind and head back to the coast, this time to Plogoff (yes, it’s a real place!) and another free overnight stop with a bit of a sea view – it was slightly obscured by a house or two, but you could still hear the sea, so it still counts.  The weather started to turn while we were there and we spent the evening listening to the snare drum that is our roof when the heavens open.  It was a bit blowy too; luckily Dora is a good weight as we might have been blown around a lot more than we were.  Unfortunately the camera had a wobble and both of the pictures below are really blurred, but they're the best ones I have off Plogoff.

On Sunday we had planned to walk round to Pointe du Raz, approximately 4 miles from our stopover, but because the weather was so bad, we had a change of heart and moved on to another free beach stopover at Fouesnant.  Other than the obligatory Powell exercise, we didn’t get up to a great deal with the weather still being pretty dire, so much so that from Saturday eve to Sunday eve, I managed to start and finish a very good book by Ben Elton - Two Brothers - a really good read! Not sure that Pete was so happy though....I tend to get a bit antisocial when I read a good book!

Sunday night saw more snare drumming at bed time, leading to next to no sleep for me and only slightly more for Pete; that is definitely one of the down sides to rainy nights in here.  If it’s drizzling, the sound is quite relaxing but if it’s torrential, it’s just loud and annoying.

So, sleepless night done with, we woke to slightly better weather on Monday and decided that another laundry day was needed.  Having initially decided we’d go to Concarneau, we arrived to find the aire was out of service and couldn’t find anywhere else to park.  As a consolation prize, we went to Quimperle instead as I’d read that it was supposed to be fairly nice, but on arrival we were pretty disappointed.  However, we did manage to top up our water for free, so it wasn’t a completely wasted journey.  We also found a laundrette in the car park of the Carrefour there...well, I say laundrette but it’s not even in a building, just two washing machines and a dryer, boxed in and with a little shelter over the top, providing 24 hour access to do your laundry!  I forgot to take a pic, but you can see what I’m talking about here.  Can’t say either of us has ever seen anything like it before, but apparently another major supermarket, Super U, has them too – makes perfect sense – do your shopping and laundry at the same time!  Fantastic idea, but the dryer wasn’t very good, meaning that for most of Monday, Dora doubled as a Chinese laundry while we tried to dry out our clothes in the much lower than last week autumnal temperatures.  Having been unimpressed with the stopover at Quimperle, we ended up spending Monday night at Guidel Plage.  The weather improved marginally, meaning a much better nights’s sleep for us all.  We would happily have stayed another night but unfortunately there was a 24 hour limit; we’ve found that’s often the case with places we actually like.

So now it’s Tuesday, marking just over 3 weeks since our journey began and we’re in yet another free stopover, this time, in Carnac.  We’ve yet to see the main attraction; the megaliths that are strewn all around this area, but it’s on our ‘to do’list tomorrow morning before we leave.

Carnac Plage

After our first sighting of Francie in Avranches, then our actual meeting Hillion over a week ago, our paths have crossed again, as we’re at the same stopover again tonight.  We’ve already had a chat, but she’ll be joining us shortly for another catch up and a glass or two of the red stuff....after all, every day’s a Friday for us so it would be rude not to!

Still in Brittany; it's still beautiful!

On Wednesday, after handing Francie her phone back (we charged it for her as she doesn’t have the luxury of a leisure battery), we swapped numbers and bid farewell.  As we’ve already seen her twice, we imagine we’ll probably cross paths again before our paths diverge at the Spanish border.

Beautiful Brittany

This morning we left the Pleslin and headed west to our next overnight stop.  We had planned to stop off at Cape Frehel en route but our camperstop guide had misinformed us that parking was free.  Having already put back up coordinates in the GPS, (which we’ve taken to calling Hazel), we admired the beautiful views on our way to Hillion.

Leaving Normandy

After yesterdays’ beautifully sunny day, we woke up to another stunner today.

We slept ‘downstairs’ last night as it was pretty chilly and we’re trying not to use the heating until we really need to.  Powell was grateful of the company we think, although I don’t think he appreciated having to share his space again.

Next Stop, Powell's Homeland...

 After leaving Pointe du Hoc on Friday, we had intended to drive across to Utah Beach, but due to a mix up with parking (vehicles higher than 2.2 metres no longer allowed!), we ended up missing it.  Tired from an emotional few days, we made our way to the nearest free stopover at Saint Sauveur le Vicomte.

D-Day Battlefield Tour

Wednesday saw the beginning of our time on the D Day coastline.  We crossed over the Pegasus Bridge on the way, with the intention of riding our bikes back to look at the museum.  Unfortunately, we didn’t make it back there though.

Biscuits at last!!

Can you tell where we shopped?!

Today we left St Jouin and headed south to Ouistreham, the start of the D Day beaches.  First stop was the enormous Carrefour in the centre commercial to pick up supplies.  Never go shopping when you’re hungry....

Biscuit hunt in Bruneval

You know when you could just eat something sugary, like a biscuit or some cake, but there’s nothing in the cupboards to satisfy the craving....?

Today we travelled to St Jouin Bruneval; a sleepy hollow of a village just outside Le Havre.  Not long after we arrived at the free aire, we decided we both fancied something sweet, but as we had nothing in, we set off with Powell to find a shop that sold biscuits.

St Valery en Caux

Today we drove 21 miles, to St Valery en Caux; a smaller, much nicer version of Dieppe.  The stopover was right on the harbour with views out to sea.

Dieppe

Tonight is our sixth night in France and we’re spending it in Dieppe.  The stopover is unfortunately not free, but at 7 euros, it's not exactly expensive and water is free, so we’ll be sure to top up before we leave tomorrow.

Cheesy cidre in Criel sur mer

After making the most of the free water opportunity, we headed to our fifth free overnight stop at Criel sur mer.  You might have noticed a distinct pattern in all of our stopovers so far.  We’ve decided to follow the coast more often than not, or at least until we get further south to warmer climes.

Breezy Berck sur mer

Thursday morning brought more wind and rain.  But it also brought us to Berck sur mer and another free stopover.  It wasn’t supposed to be free.  From what we could work out, it was supposed to be 10 euros until the end of October, but the ticket machine was out of order when we arrived and it was still out of order we left; bargain!

Montreuil....mmmm

After two relaxed but very rainy nights in Wissant, we headed south to Montreuil.  It used to be called Montreuil sur mer, but the estuary dried up years ago so I guess that’s why they dropped it.  Although judging from the amount of rain we’ve had, I wouldn’t be surprised if it filled up again soon!

Nous somme en France!

On Monday, we travelled the final 74 miles from Kelvedon Hatch to Folkestone.  After some last minute shopping at Pets at Home and Sainsbury’s, followed by some last minute administration for Pete, we were Eurotunnel bound.

One more sleep...

It’s hard to believe, after planting the seed of an idea over 18 months ago, the eve of our great European adventure has finally arrived. We’ve spent the last month living full time in Dora and she’s well and truly feeling like home; good job really, seeing as this is it for a good while!

Family Reunited

It’s a week since we arrived back in the UK and now just 3 weeks until the start of our adventures.  From day to day, certainly during the week, although relaxing, life has been fairly uninspiring. Fortunately, as we’re only back in the UK for a short time, we've made arrangements to catch up with various family members each weekend, so we’ll get a change of scenery Friday to Sunday.  The first catch up weekend was with my side of the family.

Aufwiedersehen Deutschland, a beautiful day in Bruges and a rude awakening

I’m typing this whilst sitting in Dora on a campsite 3 miles from Leek, Staffordshire.  We arrived yesterday afternoon after a steady 3 day pootle down from Fallingbostel to Calais.

It already feels like an age since we left Fallingbostel but it’s only actually been 5 days.

Nearly there...

Unfortunately we've had internet issues which have prevented regular blog updates. Add this to the fact that I'm not the best blogger in the world and you'll find that my entries aren't as regular as I'd like. Still trying harder...

The wonders of modern technology

To enable us to keep in touch with the world, our banks and our blog, we decided that having some form of mobile internet access wasn’t a bad call. Although we want to be off grid in one sense (not having to hook up everywhere we go), in this day and age, going completely off grid and without internet access, is a bit less realistic; at least for us right now.

Long overdue update

So it's been almost 2 months since our last update;no excuses, I'm just not very good at keeping things up to date right now. Since the last update, some significant progress has been made towards our great escape. The most recent development being that we have sold our car! The only motorised mode of transport we now own is Dora. With just over 2 months until we leave Germany, we were keen to sell the car to give us one less thing to worry about, so it's a huge weight off our minds. We've also managed to sell a good amount of furniture and other bits and pieces, but we still have a few weeks and a lot of stuff left until the cull is complete.

Reality

The enormity of what's ahead has just hit me.  I'm super happy about going away, but also a little sad that another chapter is coming to an end.

We've had a change of plan as far as storage goes, which has lead to us having to rethink about what we can do with our stuff.  As storage is quite expensive and our trip length is pretty much indefinite, the most cost effective solution is to sell as much as possible and then to give away anything we can't make money on.  It's a big job and a little heart wrenching knowing that there's so little we can keep hold of.  We had always planned a cull, but a complete clear out wasn't the intention.  I just have to keep telling myself it's just stuff and we'll always have the memories.

The First Big Break - Pt 4, Sachsische Schweiz

Day 6 – Weds

Wednesday 16 April marked the halfway point for our getaway and the 9 year point for our marriage!  We left Dresden and headed southwest to the next stopover, Koenigstein, in Sachsische Schweiz (Saxon Switzerland).  Unfortunately due to Sat Nav wobble, we missed the turn off for the stellplatz and ended up on the other side of the river; fate had obviously intervened as we ended up at a much nicer location, here.  We couldn’t have chosen a lovelier place to celebrate our anniversary.  And after the grey day we had yesterday, the sun came out!

The First Big Break - Pt 3, Dresden

Day 5 - Tue

Following our enlightening trip to Colditz, we made our way to the next overnight stop in Dresden.  At 14 euros, it wasn’t the cheapest, but being Dresden, we had expected the price to sneak up.

The First Big Break - Pt 2, Colditz

Day 4 - Monday

After umming and ahhing about the next stop, we decided we’d take a look at Colditz Castle en route to Dresden.

The First Big Break (well, 10 days) - Pt 1

Again, I'm starting to lag behind on the updates.  Must try harder.

So we're back from our first 'bigger than ever before but not that big really' break away in Dora and it was great.  It's just confirmed what we already knew and we're now really, really looking forward to the big off.

Stadhagen

Well, it’s Monday and another motorhome weekend has been and gone.
Stadthagen, another town on the Deutsche Fachwerk Strasse, was the destination this time.  After a couple of hours taking the scenic route from our house, we arrived early on Friday evening at the stellplatz at Tropicana.  Parking and tank emptying was free, with electric hook up and water available for a small fee.

Hitzacker

If you look really closely, you can just about see where we parked...

Windmills and cheapskates

In addition to France, we had heard that Germany is ideally set up for motorhome travel and so far we haven’t been disappointed.  On the weekend of 21 Mar, we headed to Gifhorn and a free stellplatz outside the Allerwelle swimming pool complex.  As is usually (but not always) the case, there was water and electricity available at additional cost, but grey and black could be emptied free of charge; we love free weekends!

Nienburg

So, I've already started to lag behind on the blogging front.  I must admit, this is the first blog I've ever written and it does take a lot of inspiration to keep it up to date.  Unfortunately, as we're only away for a couple of days at a time before the weekly grind starts again, I've been lacking the enthusiasm required to create anything vaguely worth reading.  However, I am pressing on regardless in the hope that more regular updates reinvigorate my creative side!

Oberhaverbeck

Next up, on 28 Feb,  Oberhaverbeck.  Again, with it being out of season, we had the place to ourselves and, it was free!

Amelinghausen

It’s just over 6 weeks since the Dora adventure began and we’ve averaged around 100 miles each weekend, which is bang on target for the kind of mileage we’ll want to be doing when we set off on our travels (around 50 or 60 miles a day).  Any more than that and we’d just end up missing too much and spending too much on fuel.  It also takes a lot longer to get anywhere in a motorhome so slow and steady is the way we roll!

New Beginnings

After a 7 month wait and an extremely long and uneventful road trip back to the UK, the day finally arrived for us to collect our new motorhome. I don’t think we’ll ever top this years' Valentine’s gift!

Good things come to those who wait

8 days until we pick up our new home on wheels!