Back where it all began

Well, today marks 6 months on the road for us.  I can’t believe how quickly it’s gone.  We’ve so much left to see and time just whizzes by.  We knew it would, which is why we’ve picked up the pace considerably this week.

 We’ve done some miles since my last update a week ago; just over of 500 of them in fact!  After deciding that we needed to get a wriggle on following our relaxing few weeks in southern Portugal, we had to up the mileage if we wanted to retain any hope of reaching Scandinavia by mid May.  It’s been fun though and we’ve seen some beautiful places en route to our current location, in France, where we started our adventure, albeit in a different town.

After 5 nights in Foz do Arelho and following our decision to change tack and leave the rest of Portugal until the autumn, we headed to Marvão on Tue 7 April.  The views on the approach to Marvão (some 700 odd metres above sea level) were a lovely sight and we were rolling along quite happily until a car passing in the other direction got too close us – wing mirrors collided and half of Dora’s ‘ear’ was broken off.  There was nowhere to pull over so we continued up the hill to Marvão, which thankfully was only a few hundred metres further.  We parked up and inspected the damage and a Portuguese man started speaking to us.  Although we had no clue what he was saying and my ‘Fala Ingles / Español/ Deutsch’ drew a blank, we correctly assumed that he had seen what happened.  It turned out he was trying to tell us that the perpetrator was turning her car around and coming back uphill.  We discovered later that he had actually been driving behind us.  Within a couple of minutes, the driver of the other car arrived; she spoke a little English and understood a little more, but we were soon joined by the lady from tourist information, who proceeded to act as translator.  A lot of Portuguese conversation and translation ensued; she said Pete was over the line, although we know he wasn’t; and we said she had been driving way too fast - this she didn't really deny, just shrugged as if to say...of course I was!  As her wing mirror was hanging off and we only had half of ours left and each one was blaming the other, we agreed it would be best not to involve police or insurers and to pay for our own repairs out of our own pockets.  Ultimately, she was the local so we knew how it was likely to pan out if we had insisted on the police attending...  Car insurance seems to be more expensive in Portugal than it is in the UK, although judging by some of the driving, we’re not surprised!  We also found out that it costs 60 euros just to get the police to come out to such incidents, so it’s really better all round if you can sort things out amicably.  We exchanged contact details just in case ‘Magdalena’s’ husband had anything different to say about the matter and after Pete had helped her disconnect her wing mirror to save it banging on her car door en route home, we parted ways.  Thankfully our side repeater is still working, so although a repair is required, it’s not too urgent.

Oops

How it should look!!

  The next morning, we went to the tourist information office, to thank the lady for translating, in addition to checking that Magdalena hadn’t had a change of heart overnight.  Luckily she hadn’t and we’ve heard nothing from her since.  I’m still convinced it wasn’t Pete’s fault anyway and had she not been hurling down the road, it could have been avoided all together.  The road was narrow, but we’ve travelled hundreds of miles on narrow roads and never had any wing mirror clashes before.  We also noticed that there were other marks on her car from previous run ins... so it obviously wasn’t the first time she’d been in a scrape.  It’s all done with now, but it’s a little annoying that Pete is so careful all of the time, but there’s nothing one can do about the way other people drive.  It did dampen our day a little.  Just as an aside, we’ve noticed another bit of damage to Dora today; it looks like someone’s dinked us with a wing mirror or bike rack when they’ve been manoeuvring out of one of the aires and either been oblivious or just haven’t bothered to let us know that they’ve done it.  It was bound to happen at some point but I didn’t expect her to get war wounds quite so early on in her life!

Marvão itself, a hilltop fortress village, is a really pretty little place.  It’s also very quiet out of season and there wasn’t anything going on in the village, but the views are quite something.  The aire (a wonderfully peaceful location right next to a convent!) afforded us a beautiful view across Spain and the other side of the village offered an equally stunning view of Portugal.  Aside from the wing mirror business, it really was a fitting location for our last day in Portugal.  We still love what we’ve seen of the people and the place and we’re looking forward to seeing more in the autumn.

One last look before we say farewell

On Wed 8 April, we had planned to enter Spain and spend the night in Caceres.  However, Hazel, our trusty satnav, had problems trying to direct us to the aire entrance.  After chasing our tails for a few minutes, Pete pulled over and went on foot with Powell to find out how to get in; only to find that the place was full anyway!  It was a rainy day, so we decided we may as well plod on to Salamanca, our planned stop, rather than try and find an alternative near to Caceres.  I’d read that the parking areas weren’t up to much, so we splurged and paid for two nights in a campsite instead.

On Thursday, it rained again.  We waited until the afternoon in the hope that it might clear up, but it didn’t, so we headed out on the bikes with Powell to see the sights of the UNESCO world heritage historical centre.  We have most definitely softened due to spending so much time ‘down south’.  Despite the fact that it wasn’t much less than 15 degrees Celsius, the rain and wind chill made it feel much colder.  By the time we’d cycled the 7kms to Salamanca, all 3 of us were pretty soggy and Powell was freezing, despite his little high vis vest!!  We had the quickest look around ever and headed back to Dora, agreeing that we’ll have to come back when the weather is better, as it really is a lovely place.

On Friday, we entered Basque Country.  In Portugal, you have the ‘oosh’; well in Basque Country it seems that they put ‘ak’ at the end of a word instead!!  For example, a sandwich becomes a sandwichak!  I’ve also never seen so many Zs and Xs used in words before.  Obviously we know it’s not quite so simplistic, but we like to give languages these little foibles to remember them by.  I like to try to find similarities between languages, but I couldn’t find anything – it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before!  I have since researched it, having had no idea of its origins and have now discovered that it truly is like no other modern European language as it pre dates them all – that would explain my inability to find link!  Anyway, our stopover for the night was a tolerated place just outside Legutio, at the edge of a reservoir.  Although we weren’t very level, we had a lovely peaceful night, despite the rain bouncing off the roof in the middle of the night.

On Saturday, we headed back to the coast to Leitikio, this time, to a free, official aire.  It was lovely to be back at the coast after a few days inland.  The weather was starting to pick up and it didn’t rain!

Sunday saw the sun come out and us leave Leikitio and drive to San Sebastian (Donostia in Basque) and another official aire, with a nominal fee of 3.25 per night including services and water.  Pete wasn’t impressed at first, as the aire itself is within the university area of the town, so it doesn’t look like it’s up to much at all.  However, I managed to convince him that San Sebastian was allegedly worth a look and as it was cheap to stay, we should.  We’re both so glad we did.  For some reason there’s no indication in our road atlas that there is anything special about San Sebastian.  An underline denotes a town of touristic interest, yet it’s not underlined...it really should be!  A 20 minute stroll from the aire brought us to the sea front and a lovely beach in the bay.  From there, we wandered up to the older part of the town and began the ascent to the Castillo in order to take in the views and get some good pictures.  It turns out there’s also a bar up there, so we couldn’t resist having a beer (which turned into 3!) at the top of the world.  After a couple of hours, we made our way back down through the old quarter of the town.  It’s full of great little bars and restaurants, not to mention lots of interesting shops and the whole place was buzzing.  One particular shop caught our attention; Donosti Rock were given a significant percentage of our weekly budget in exchange for some new music for our collection in addition to a Metallica t-shirt for Pete!  Thoroughly spent up, we headed back along the beach front, paddling ankle deep in the waters, with Powell running away from the waves.

Beers at the top of the world

We’ll happily come back to Donostia again as we only just scratched the surface.  It was another fitting end to another part of our trip though as today we left Spain and we’re now back in France, exactly 6 months to the day since we last arrived in France and we didn't even plan it that way!

We’re now staying in a free aire in Anglet, a couple of Km from Biarritz.  Pete went on a mission earlier to get a top up card for our SFR SIM, purchased the last time we were here, so we now have regular internet access for the next 3 weeks!  It’s been hot today and the beach (just a stone’s throw away) was packed.  We’d have joined the bathers had most of them not been naked!  I don’t think it’s even a nudist beach; just a French thing...!!  Or maybe it’s a European thing and it’s just one step too far for my British sensibilities!  I don’t think Powell would have enjoyed it anyway to be fair as he doesn’t much like super warm weather either.

We leave tomorrow; to where, we’re not sure, but we know we would like to be in Arcachon by Thursday as it’s rather a special day for us, but we'll see where the mood takes us...