Category: La Manga

Journey from Bilbao to La Manga – Day 2.

IMG_0764Well, it may not be the best campsite we’ve stayed on, but we had a good night’s sleep and woke up to a brilliant crescent moon pointing out to a well illuminated Venus. Although the water had been cold everywhere else, the showers were excellent, so a good start to the day.

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More excellent motorway, a little busy as we skirted Madrid but otherwise very easy driving. We had arranged to pick up the hire car at 3:00 so we hoped there would be no delays – and there weren’t. We arrived at Murcia Airport to collect our car, a white Fiat 500 at 2:20, perfect. image

Lesley followed me as I had Sat. Nav., bad move, I went wrong at the first roundabout. A small problem counting to 4 for the fourth exit. Apart from that we made good progress and were on the campsite about half an hour later.

We were saying hello to friends before we even got to our pitch, and lots of our friends, who knew we were arriving came to say a quick hello. It was good to be back.

Journey from Bilbao to La Manga – Day 1, the sunflower trail.

IMG_0752Ferry arrived on time and we didn’t have to wait too long before we disembarked. This is our third time of doing this and with Lesley in charge of navigation we made short work of any potential sidetracks and headed on our way towards our overnight stop at Camping Pico de la Miel.

IMG_0744All together we drove 211 miles, an easy drive helped by the fact that the weather was excellent the roads superb and the traffic very light. The first part of the journey is through very green  and luscious landscapes, undulating and very pretty. Further on and there is a definite change to the landscape, it is now much more open country side, the trees disappear and there are huge areas of agricultural farmland, a prominent crop seems to be sunflowers. At this time of year they appear to be dead and I assume they are waiting to be harvested for their seeds. IMG_0730The hills when you get to them are big, at times we are in excess of 1500m.

Apart for stops for lunch and fuel we drove straight through arriving at Camping Pico de la Miel at about 6:00pm.IMG_0732IMG_0746 IMG_0731

Ferry: Portsmouth to Bilbao

imageAfter a good trip to Portsmouth we queued up (in first place) ready to go through check in in the morning. 4G signal at the dock (in fact most of the way to Portsmouth) meant that we had pretty good internet access so were able to access emails, our blog and social media. The ferry, “Cap Finistere” was the same one we have travelled on before and it’s okay, nothing fancy but nothing missing either. Wifi is free but not very fast. It’s still impressive when you think we are moving and must be locked onto a satellite to get it.

There is a small cinema on board showing a selection of films throughout the journey. We opted to watch “Tha Man from Uncle”, it was absolute rubbish, but on the plus side the seats were very comfortable and we had a good view of the screen.

We had dinner in the restaurant and the food was very good, I can’t remember the names of the dishes Lesley had scallops followed by Sole for the main course and I had serrano ham and a poached egg followed by a sumptious pork dish. Unfortunately as it was now dark and the boat was rocking a bit I started to feel a little off. Lesley had taken some sea sickness tablets and was feeling fine. We decided to watch a bit of telly as a distraction but at 9:00 decided it would be a good idea to go to bed. I felt better lying down and slept quite well. The restaurant’s Petit Dejéuner was basically the full English, it was very nice and should set us up for the day. No delays so far and the sun looks like it could be there for us as we arrive.

La Manga here we come

imageWe left home about 11:30 in beautiful  weather with blue skies and bright sunshine. We were in no rush so we took our time. It was just as well as the weather conditions became very mixed and traffic quite busy. We found a good services to stop at at Tothill in Newbury where we had tea and watched telly for a while. The final final leg of our journey took about an hour and we arrived just-in-time to queue up ready for tomorrow. We actually managed to be first in the queue.

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Racing in Spain

IMG_5799Lesley and I have enjoyed our races in Spain. We have run five races in all with distances as unusual as 5.2k and 14k to the more usual 10k and two half marathons. We did quite well in our age groups with 2 first places and 5 second places. Prizes are given for the first three in each category but they do sometimes cap the upper age group. Two of the races capped the vets’ categories at 50! Races cost between 10 and 18 euros with great goody bags, often with two technical T-shirts. All the races were well organised and had chip timing, they don’t bother with finishing funnels. Post race time is important. We always had music, usually live, and free food and drink (including beer), for the runners and their family and friends. We would highly recommend races here if you get the chance.

Los Dolores 10K

Trophy ShotProbably the last of our Spanish races for this trip resulted in a win for Lesley in the FV50 age category. This was the first time this race had been run and we felt uncertain about how well organised it would be or how big, especially as they capped the vet categories at V50. We needn’t have worried however. There were over 300 runners entered, as usual the race was chipped. The goody back contained a long sleeve tech running vest and plenty of goodies. Lots of supporters and loud music added to the festive atmosphere.

The race followed a two lap flat course, which kept us near the centre of the town and the spectators. At its ends the runners doubled back on themselves allowing you to see the runners in front and of course Lesley and I were able to see how each other were doing. I could see that Lesley was having a good race and that there was a good chance of her winning a prize. I enjoyed the race (even though I had a sore chest) and finished in 43 minutes, nowhere near the contenders in the over 50 group. Lesley stayed strong and ran a fast time of 52 minutes and was first FV50 runner. The only problem was that the cup a really just a little bit too big for our motorhome trophy shelf, but I’m sure we’ll fit on somehow. All in all a good day at the races. To celebrate, we went to Paddy Singh’s restaurant for Sunday lunch. Lovely.

Website for race, details and results.


Bridge Lesson

Well, we’ve had our first Bridge lesson today. Recent years have seen my card playing limited to snap with Ella, my Grandaughter, and, from memory, Ella won. I expected it to be a bit more involved than the card games of my childhood and I was right. For a start, you have to hold 13 cards, that’s a lot when you’re not used to it, then there’s the business of the suits having different ranks, cards having different values, bidding, etc. All made more challenging because the cards, like our teacher, are Dutch. Martin conducted the whole lesson in English, very impressive. With all the challenges of learning the basics, (we have 8 weeks before we leave for France), I can see that this is a game we will enjoy. Now I need to do my homework ready for lesson 2.

Los Belones

Time for a coffee. As usual we had our Spanish lesson this morning and of course while we were there the wind was blowing and the windsurfers were having a great time. By the time I got to the beach at 12:00 the wind had dropped off. I did an hour but nothing very exciting.

We decided to go to Los Belones for a coffee. Pictures show a view of Fuente and a mural of Los Belones (painted on the gable end of a building from the same street).

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