europe – apathtosomewhere

Heading South – Day Thirty Five

Now this is more like it – brilliant sunshine and deep blue skies.

We did our usual morning routine and I went for a shower and was very happy. The shower cubicles were self contained with your own loo, washbasin, big mirror and numerous hooks. The shower had a tap and you regulated your own temperature. I was in heaven.

We decided to visit the Monasterio de Piedra, some seven minute drive up the road – sort of Spanish National Trust – and parked in an ample car park. We wandered in under an avenue of trees and went to the gate to get in. The man at the gate, peppered us with rapid fire Spanish, but we soon realised we had to get tickets from the shop that we had just passed. Once we had accomplished that, we spent a glorious few hours wandering this delightful park – there was a map showing the different routes, but it was also signposted with arrows, so we just followed them, through trees, tumbling streams, little towers, small ponds until we reached the waterfalls which were just a sight to behold, cascading down rocks and cliffs. We stood for many minutes in awe. We climbed up steps, we walked down steps, we stood over a valley and watched beautiful birds of prey riding the thermals. It was fabulous.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monasterio_de_Piedra

https://www.spain.info/es/lugares-interes/monasterio-piedra

We strolled back to the exit – there were photographers posted throughout the walk wanting to take your photo to which we had declined. Yet again, we were accosted here and were replying in very broken Spanish “no photos, thank you” to the young girl who was pointing at the Pup until she finally said “Exit” and pointed through the entrance. The official exit was a turnstile affair with no chance of getting our four legged friend through – this lovely photographer was trying to help. Suddenly it dawned on us on what she was saying and feeling a touch stupid, we thanked her profusely and smiled apologetically.

We were hungry so we went to the restaurant bar -no dogs inside, but we could sit on the terrace which was completely empty. Billy No Mates. So we wandered up to the monastary, to kill some time, which again didn’t permit dogs, but we decided to go in one at a time for a quick look and was so pleased that we did. We’re not normally ones for stately homes and such like, but this was a gem. Part of it was attached to the very upmarket hotel, so you could see into the lobby, but further down there was a beautiful courtyard with archways. A little further was a wine exhibition over two floors and beautifully displayed. Wandering down the side of the courtyard, you then came across the original monastery, with its roof missing and open to the elements, the walls still intact and standing. I stood there amazed with my mouth open – it was simply beautiful and serene with the cream stone against the azure sky. I could of stayed there all day. I went back to do some dog sitting while Hubby went in and had a look and he came out equally astounded at what he had seen. What a beautiful little gem.

The restaurant terrace was busy by now and we sat in a sunny corner. We got the gist that you had to go in and order, so I did. The coffee and the tea arrived at the counter first (a cup of watery milk with a teabag (black tea, not green like I got the other day) on the side) while I wondered what happened with the two sarnies I had ordered. It was while I was in a state of total indecision and on the urge of using Google Translate to voice my concerns, that the sandwiches arrived and my next dilemma was how to get everything outside (no trays), so I did two runs. Hubby had a bacon y queso (cheese) in a baguette and I had ordered a patata omelette squeezed into a baggie – weird, but very nice.

We had kind of exhausted the Monasterio de Piedro and we also had a two and a half hour journey across the Aragon region to our next campsite – it was gone one o’clock already. So we jumped into the Van and headed off, along twisting roads, valleys and ravines. This was definitely Spaghetti Western country, so we looked it up to check – Aragon and the north east of Spain were definitely used as locations in 1960’s and 1970’s as Mexican deserts, though it was further east. This landscape wasn’t too far off and with a little imagination, you could see Mexican snipers high in the hills ready to pick off Yul Brynner.

The terrain changed soon after – we came out on a wide plain with mountains in the distance and a long straight road ahead of us. Satnav said to stay on this road for 29 kilometres and we hoped it might bend between now and then. The road was essentially a back road with hardly any traffic bar the odd tractor – it gave our Van’s suspension and our backs a good work out. The odd village appeared out of nowhere, it’s dominating church tower pointing skyward, which the road circumvented (we never went through the centre of these communities). There were lengthy patches of brand new tarmac along this never ending road which were a delight before they abruptly ended and the bumpiness resumed. The ground was a reddish colour, the fields tilled but full of small rocks – every now and again, stacks of rectangular hay bales stood in the fields, recently harvested.

The lowland hills beckoned and now we were back into woodlands, crags and lolling hills. Some trees were in their full autumnal glory. It was like turning a page in a book and the plot changing. It was certainly an interesting landscape and we spent a lot of time gasping as we came around bends. At Calamocher, a sizeable town, we finally went on a bigger A road and went over the A-23. The land briefly went flat again, travelling across arable farmland, the soil changing colour and gradually we wheedled up back into the hills – we reached the giddy heights of 1260m above sea level before we rolled back down again. I stopped taking photos – the panorama too vast and wide for the camera to appreciate – you had to be there to be able to take in the ever changing vista.

The terrain then turned mountainous again, we bypassed little towns and villages all in that look of disrepair. Our road was wide with large junctions, but there was hardly any traffic on them – it seemed new in places with gleaming barriers. The engineers had also blasted through rock obstructing their path through the mountains as there was no other way, but it seemed wrong to destroy such beautiful surroundings.

We finally came up to a roundabout which was a bit of a shock after all this time of non stop driving. It felt that we had been in a coma. We only had a few more kilometres to go before we circumvented the town of Mas de las Matas and sitting on its southern edge our campsite, Camping la Palanca del Mas, a small, but compact little site. We found a sunny spot and set up home, the German guy camping next door coming over to explain everything to us. Later another German couple turned up in a camper with a huge Bernese Mountain dog lumbering out – that must be cosy. The woman had a chat with us in a mixture of English and German though she said she was better in Spanish. I was just rubbish in both languages and sometimes English too. After a well earned cup of tea, we wandered into town, some ten minutes walk away, looking for a beer. We walked down its quiet, narrow streets full of tall buildings and found a row of bars, most of them shut. One was open, but was tiny and just had two local guys swapping stories over a beer. We hesitated – it was only 6pm, but nobody was about and there was no atmosphere. So we carried on until the road opened up into a little square where the church stood, its bells chiming the quarter of the hour and its tall steeple looking across the countryside. We sat on a bench and contemplated – two ladies walked past, yoga mats tucked under their arms, three cars pulled up and then disappeared and the hairdressers opened up – otherwise the town remained quiet.

We had read that the bars opened at 8pm, but our stomachs couldn’t wait that long. We wandered around town, locating bakerys for the morning and coming across open eateries, but lacking in clientele – again, it was men who sat outside clutching beers and the ambience just wasn’t there. We walked down some residential streets before heading back to Van and cooking pizzas. We had it in our heads of towns coming to life in the early evening, drinking and eating convivially until we realised that probably happened in the larger (and probably touristy places) rather than small rural places like this. It was a nice wander in the evening sun and nice to visit little towns, the underbelly of European countries rather than the tourist towns and their gift shops and other attractions.

Darkness fell heavily and we curled up with a bit of catch up TV before retiring to the warmth of our bed to read. Tomorrow, a little short hop and squeezing in a couple of little medieval towns.

Heading South – Day Twenty Two

We’re back to blue skies and sunny mornings. Yesterday was just a blip.

We watched all the different birds wading on the sandbanks of the Loire -cormorants, egrets, gulls enjoying the morning sunshine before we set off south.

We were doing a big jump today, but still stuck to the smaller country roads rather than big dual carriageways or motorways. The countryside was mixed with woodlands, opening up to small fields and then big, wide industrial sized arable fields with big skies and big clouds. We were now looking out for boar as well as deer when we passed along wooded roads. The latter part of the journey became a bit monotonous – becoming flatter and with long straight roads that went on for miles. We were glad when we stopped.

We were heading to Gencay first, as apparently there was a market there – it was only about 40 minutes away which would be perfect. Gencay turned out to be a tiny hamlet, possibly even a village of scattered dwellings, in the middle of nowhere and not a soul about. It was evident that there was no market here. We concluded that we had been led up the garden path and slightly disappointed, continued on our way.

We stopped at Chatellerrault, hoping to visit a chateau, but hadn’t really looked into it properly – getting too laidback. So we just we ended up sat in the Van, googling nearby chateaus, finding them either closed, privately owned, no dogs allowed or we had driven past them. Fail. So we went to a Biocoop store instead to stock up on food and then headed south again.

https://www.tourisme-vienne.com/en/webzines/chatellerault

The roads round here were not the best. They were either breaking up along the edges or had been badly patched that the Van rattled like mad (not sure what’s worse -our potholes or these bumpy highways) and we jiggered in our seats – there were many signs marked “chaussee deforme” and they weren’t kidding. We also noticed that the villages added mini roundabouts and didn’t seem to let people be aware of it – well, at least not Apple Maps. We were informed by Apple “to go straight for the next kilometre” but three roundabouts had been surreptitiously added so you had to be one your toes a bit! Perhaps Apple was aware, but with so many roundabouts in France, had gone all French and downed tools.

We came across a little town called Chauvigny and would of just driven through it until Hubby spotted a roadside sign declaring that this French town was twinned with the very English town he was born in! So when we hit the town centre, we parked in one of the copious car parks that made up the square (which were all full of vehicles, but where was everyone?) and had a little wander in the sunshine. The temperature had dropped from the giddy heights of 28 degrees to a sobering 17 today, but out of the wind it was quite pleasant. We looked in the shop windows before heading to a nearby patisserie to get sandwiches (6 euros each!!!! Ouch, though the Pup got some form of pastry – God knows what it was – from the shop assistants which she inhaled with gusto). We strolled back to the Van with our booty and made a cuppa.

https://www.tourisme-vienne.com/en/webzines/chauvigny-incontournable

We carried on with our trip, passing through little towns and villages decorated with pink umbrellas and bunting -the whole area was behind Breast Cancer Awareness as it was October. It was fabulous to see whole communities sending out the message. We passed through Gencay, a large town and the true home of our missing morning market (it was too far from Montsoreau to get there in time). Finally we were coming up to Ruffec, our home for the night, the campsite a little way outside of the town. The satnav took us on the scenic, yet tortuous route to get there and we rocked up outside a campsite that reminded us of a Carry On film. We did hesitate outside briefly, but this was our spot. We parked up under trees in a site with more static homes than tourers – it looked like it was more residential than holiday. But it ticked a box and the sanitaire was probably the best so far – loo paper, a toilet seat and lid rather than bare porcelain, taps rather than push buttons and clean, though as usual was a bit tatty around the edges.

We had a little bit of downtime, the Pup did a few rounds of zoomies and she and I went for a waddle to check out the rest of the site. A little while later, we waddled down to the River Charente.

We walked down the hill and came across a very pretty area. On one side was a restaurant (closed today) overlooking mill ponds – we discovered an old watermill at one end of the restaurant and it all started to make sense. There were a series of bridges that allowed us to cross the mill ponds and the River Charente to a big field – a big sign declared the area as a sporting hub with bike routes, fishing, walking and other sporting activities. We strolled under the trees to the riverbank and watched fishermen casting in the river. Spotting a wooden building opposite, we retraced our steps and found the canoe/kayaking base (closed for the night) but again with a board showing where you could kayak to, the distance and the time. We wandered around a little more – it was very pretty surrounded by trees and the little waterways, all very peaceful. With our stomachs starting to rumble for tea, we headed back up the hill to the Van and settled down for the night. It was quite cool, autumn definitely now settling in.

Tomorrow we are heading to Bergerac.

Heading South – Day Ten

Slept well last night and woke about 8. We wondered why we have been “sleeping in” since we started this trip and then it dawned on us. Firstly, we’re a hour ahead so really it’s 7.00am GMT which is our normal time to wake up and secondly, the large hound who sleeps with us has stopped setting her alarm to ungodly hour and booping us for breakfast.

Today, we have a plan. First on the agenda is to do some laundry so I lugged our bag for the far side of the site (of course it would be), got some tokens, bunged the whole lot in the washer (coloured and whites so hope nothing runs) and pressed start. The washer whirred into life and flashed 45 mins on its little display. I waddled back to The Van where hubby was giving it a bit of a deep clean and put a timer on. Another waddle back to the laundry to put it in the dryer (the whites were still white, but now hoping nothing shrunk) and headed back for another 45 minutes. Basically it took all morning, I think I nearly did my daily quota of 10,000 steps, but at least we had clean clothes for another week and mission accomplished.

We decided to walk to the Intra-Muros, or the Old Town of St Malo, some 20 minutes away. We walked through the marina, skirted the little beach, negotiated the port entrance and finally ended up in front of the walled city. There was an archway that led into the streets, but we turned and took the steps up, so we could wander along the top of the walls and appreciate the splendid views across the bay. Various ships were crossing the estuary of the River Rance – catamarans, small sailing boats, a huge cruise ship, schooners, a DFDS ferry followed by a Brittany Ferry car ferry – it was very busy and they all had to negotiate the many outcrops of rocks and islands scattered around in the bay. We peered over the ramparts and watched people on the beach below – there didn’t seem to be any dogs, so The Pup was denied again. We wandered most of the way round, before we had to go down steps and back to the street level. Here it was very busy with restaurants and bars – their tables and chairs spilling out on the wide street. We stopped at one and ordered two beers which came with some peanuts and little biscuits and a pot of fish paste, relaxed in the sunshine and did a spot of people watching. The architecture was beautiful – it dates back to the 17th century, so there’s a lot of history. We carried on through the ancient streets, full of high end clothes shops, gift shops, patisseries, restaurants and much more. After a wander we came across a creperie and asked for a table for two. We ended up with a lemon and sugar crepe and a banana and chocolate washed down with coffee – again we sat outside and watched people. It was another fine day, weatherwise and quite warm. We had another little wander around and decided to head back to the campsite, but needed to visit a supermarket for food for The Pup. So we walked down the road into a small neighbourhood with a lovely little High Street, where we found a Carrefour City mini supermarket and bobbed in there. Then we wandered through the back streets back to the seafront -it was nice to see a local area rather than a tourist area – and sauntered back to the site. We checked out a couple of restaurants for a possible evening meal too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint-Malo

Once back at the Van, we plopped into our chairs and enjoyed the late afternoon sun – so much that some of us had a little nap. Our little plan of walking back down the road and eating out didn’t seem so exciting now we were comfy, so we decided to cook in the Van – very glamourous: fish fingers, homegrown potatoes and a tin of baked beans. We know how to live it up!

A cat tried its chances and one of its nine lives, by sauntering past our Van’s side door, not realising there was 25kg of canine lying inside. The cat jumped and The Pup went to chase – heck! We shouted at Pup to stop and bless her, she did and I grabbed her collar, though I felt her pull a couple of times. A little bit of excitement! Thank goodness, The Pup is so obedient!

After tea and a cuppa, and the night closing in at 8:30, we shut up shop. We’re binge watching a TV series at the moment, so it’s nice to curl up. Tomorrow we plan to catch the ferry over to Dinard, across the River Rance, and spend the day over there.