Andalucia, Part 3

13th November

The day started calm after the quietest night in a long time.  David's cold was still severe so we decided to stay in camp and work on the journal, which is a long way behind.  By lunch, we had extracted the pictures we planned to use and, being well pleased with our progress, we decided to go up to Trafalgar by way of a reward.  

We returned along the Cadiz road and turned up the exceptionally steep and twisty road to Vejer, which is a hilltop town dating from at least Moorish times and every bit as picturesque as the guide book says.

Even on a quiet Saturday in November, parking is impossible and we were forced to overshoot the town centre and descend a frighteningly narrow street, where we found somewhere to park, from where the view above left can be seen.     We walked back to the main square shown above right, which truly is charming, and then on upwards to its castle and church which looked as if it had been a Mosque in earlier times.

We left Vejer and followed the secondary road to Los Caños de Meca.  On the way, we stopped at the Cabo de Trafalgar, which had been our real objective.  There is nothing special here and indeed the first signpost with Trafalgar on it appears barely a kilometre from it.  We presume that the Spanish do not want reminding too much.

At the Cabo there is a lighthouse (shown to the right) and a surprising number of tourists, though many seemed to be windsurfers.  For us, there is a certain magic about the place, being a name that has been so familiar for so long without our having the slightest idea of where it was or what the place looked like.

We looked out to sea (above right) as the sun began to set and thought how different things would have been but for the events this place witnessed.

We continued to Los Caños de Meca, which is a surprisingly nice resort, very close to the sea, and then on to Barbate, a fishing port of some size. 

We went on, without stopping, to Zahara de los Atunes, where a wedding was in progress, even though by now it was almost five o'clock.  We found a grand looking hotel, right on the sea front at the end of a street whose lights continued almost down to the water's edge.

By now the light was failing, but we could see what an interesting place this must be on a warm summer's day.   The whole area from Vejer round to Algeciras is a military area and, as a consequence, much under-developed.  We also found quite a lot of property available, even quite close to the sea.  This must be the last undeveloped piece of European coastline.   We returned to Tarifa to get supplies for the weekend then stopped by Charly's Disco on the main road where rumour had it there was an Internet Café.    Charly's is fairly new run by a German and a Swiss and we had yet another funny (Swiss) keyboard layout to grapple with.    Kate who touch types hates all these weird keyboards.

14th November

We now saw a new facet to Tarifa.   After more than two weeks without real rain Tarifa showed it could compete with the best and we were wakened during the night by a real downpour drumming on the roof.    We were not too bothered by the weather as we had planned to make a real effort to catch up with our writing.    After lunch we had an even bigger downpour and this time our awning filled with water and we had to rush around getting things off the ground.   It soon cleared and we noticed new arrivals with British plates.    George and Jill are Scottish and had sold their house and now had the most enormous rig we have seen.   We introduced ourselves and began comparing notes, mostly about computers and the miserable time we have with Microsoft software.  Before we knew where we were, it was dark and another day had passed without us getting up to date. 

15th November

We were making good progress with our writing until the mail arrived, just after lunch, bringing with it a ghost from the past that required some thought and correspondence.   We had hoped to leave immediately the mail arrived, but now decided to spend the next day preparing to leave.

Our pitch is shown above left and in the centre one of the many Ibis birds that wandered about the camp.

16th November

We went into Tarifa (early by our standards) to try to get on the internet, which was busy at the shop in the town, then did our shopping.  George,  who we met the other day, had told us that, to prevent his kids giving him big phone bills by calling him from UK on his UK based cellphone, he had ditched his UK service provider in favour of prepaid local SIM cards.

This we thought was a good idea and, as we had inherited a spare phone when we bought our car, we  bought a Spanish 'Moviestar' SIM card for 5,000 Pts.  The card is valid for 9 months or until you have used the units for out going calls and a further 3 months for incoming calls and is therefore the cheapest way of having a mobile phone if you don't mean to make many outgoing calls.  We were amazed how easy it was compared with the palaver we went through to set up our UK based cellphone.   We may well drop it in favour of prepaid cards in the near future.   Having been amused by the girl in Seville with two mobile phones we have now joined the super poser set and walk around with two.  

We had a wander round Tarifa, which we have come to like, and took a few photos and video.   The church is shown above left and centre.   The harbour, which sadly no longer has a service to Tangiers, is above right and immediate right is the main street where we parked our car near the internet shop.   Here we found 'vigilantes' waiting to charge 100 pts (if you were willing to pay) to keep their eyes on your car.

As the internet shop could not get into the net we moved on and stopped by Charly's, whose internet worked fine, sent a few messages and caught up on the news.  

We had spent far too long in town and, after lunch, set about preparing to break camp.   The glorious weather of the morning was replaced by ominous clouds which soon brought an end to our outside tasks.   We left our awning up as it began to rain, knowing that we would pay a price for it tomorrow. 

As it was our last night at Tarifa, and had been our longest stay anywhere, we decided to treat ourselves to a meal in the camp restaurant.  The waiter, who was also the barman and the chef and seemed to do odd jobs round the camp during the day, spoke very little English and, of course, we speak very little Spanish.   He seemed to be recommending a particular menu, though in reality this was the only food on offer.   We thought he said "pea soup", but it turned out to be fish soup, and although David used to be very allergic to shellfish, and the soup was full of shellfish, he ate it anyway and at the time of writing is still alive and kicking.    We ordered what we thought was an expensive veal, but turned out to be steak, the likes of which we have not had for a very long time.   So good was it that David regretted having been so mean as to order a half bottle of Rioja.  The bill came to 20 quid, which was not bad, and we returned to the caravan for the cheese course washed down with cheap red wine.   We had a good night's sleep, undisturbed by any rain.

17th November

We were awake early and after breakfast started to break camp.   The awning was absolutely soaking and we expected to have to take it wet.   It was a clear day, though, and when the sun finally arose, it was warm.     However, we felt that Tarifa was getting colder each day and it was not until well after midday that we were able to get the awning dry enough to pack.

We thoroughly recommend Camping Paloma on the Cadiz side of Tarifa.    There are many camp sites which may be equally good and loads of hotels and hostels.   It is the windsurfing capital of Europe and has a lot of interesting things to see around.   Compared with the Costas we were heading for, it was quiet and unspoilt.   Apart from the next three months, we think it is the best part of Spain.  

We drove past Tarifa on the infamous N340.  David spotted a police car behind, but it passed with two motorcycle outriders, apparently on other business.    We are nervous of police cars, because the speed limits on Spanish roads are below our stalling speed.   We drove up the hill towards Algeciras, it was dead calm again and all the windmills were at rest.   It was a considerable pull with the caravan and a long winding descent to Algeciras.   We had another fabulous view of Morocco and relived a little of our exciting visit.   Then Gibraltar loomed large.   We had been there twice before and didn't really feel the need to go again. 

We stopped for lunch in a lay-by overlooking the Mediterranean at Punta de la Chullera just outside Estepona.   For some reason, we felt a sense of exhilaration.  At last we were in the Med.  We had thoroughly enjoyed our trip around the Atlantic coast of France and Iberia and had seen many interesting towns and ports, but in the end we do like the Med.   We had decided that Malaga was probably enough for one day and were heading for one of two sites close to Torre del Mar.

We had thought of going to the site just west of Torre del Mar, where we had been invited by a camper we had met on the way, but we were not sure that we were really ready yet for a naturist camp, nor whether it was warm enough for that sort of caper.

After a comparatively short over-shoot, we found the camp and were allocated a pitch.   After the space and quietness of Tarifa, this was a culture shock.    Opposite was the clattering of workmen on the traditional half-built hotel or block of flats.   We should not be surprised in such a popular holiday resort that real estate is at a premium and we are crammed in like sardines.   The main camp road runs north-south and, as we looked up it, we could see a line of satellite dishes all angled at Astra or Utelsat, looking rather like the media feeding frenzy we sometimes see on American TV on such occasions as the OJ trial.   So narrow was the road that careful planning was required to reverse a caravan into our pitch.    The other campers, who were waiting to manhandle the caravan, wondered why we bothered.   We also had to carefully plan where we put the awning, as a water tap - which may well be convenient to us - was right where a corner ought to be.    The site is all hard standing, which means it doesn't get muddy, but on the other hand getting tent pegs in is a difficult job.   We went to the camp shop, who seemed to be doing a roaring trade in hardened steel pegs, and set up our awning.  Kate cooked dinner while David finished the pegging and, afterwards, David found an English language FM station with BBC World News!   Life is beginning to look up.

18-20th November

For a couple of days we decided to just chill out, catch up on the washing and be a bit lazy.    Until now we had been on what, with hindsight,  had been "touring sites".  That is to say, people stayed from days to weeks and moved on.   In Torre del Mar we experienced our first "over-wintering site" and our first "satellite site".   Below left is the view along the main road of the site, with almost all the pitches having at least one satellite dish.   We also realised, with hindsight, that a satellite feed was piped round the site and, had we known it, we could have had Sky News as well as the World Service.  The south-facing pitches were all "bagged" by the "over-winterers" and, for the first time in Spain, there were virtually no Spaniards and the English were a small minority, well behind Germans and Dutch.

We were surprised at the amount of activity opposite us when we awoke after our first night.  Despite a very chilly morning, with the sun still hidden by the nearby flats, the over-winterers were busy sweeping leaves, wiping dew off cars and awnings and talking loudly.  We had come away to be as lazy as possible and do the minimum cleaning and tidying to stay civilised, but our neighbours  seemed to have to stay busy all day, doing and re-doing tasks that we could have easily put off for ever.

We learned that, within half an hour of our finally leaving the site, the neighbours were on our pitch sweeping up the leaves that we had let accumulate. 

The camp site was to the west of Torre del Mar.  Unfortunately, our site guide book said it was to the east and we had taken ages to find it.  It was, however, convenient for the town and only a couple of hundred metres from the sea.   Below left we show the view just outside the camp with the beach just beyond the far trees.  The beach is another working beach with boats and winches, as there is no harbour.  The promenade that runs the length of Torre del Mar is shown lower right and is pleasant and uncrowded - in November at least.   At the far western end, we came across some pavement art, shown below centre. 

Torre, as you all know, means tower and the place is named because it has one of the many lighthouses along the  coast.  In meandering the streets, we were surprised to come across an old lighthouse some 500 metres from the shore and totally surrounded by high rise buildings.  By now we were looking in estate agents for winter flats as this year was, according to the locals, the coldest they remembered.  In one we found a series of old photographs showing the development of the town, including one that showed this old lighthouse in a deserted area to the west of a little community that used to be Torre del Mar.

21st November

We thought it was a cold night and we were right.   Our gas appeared to be running out as we cooked breakfast and we changed bottles, only to find the original one was not quite empty, which meant that it had become too cold to vaporise the last drop.   We decided, as it was a very bright and clear Sunday, to do a bit of touring and prepared to leave.   As we were doing so, we met our next-door-but-one English neighbours Geoff and Patricia and were later joined by an Irishman.    Eventually, we left and headed up north on the A355 to the Embalse de la Viñuela, where we stopped overlooking the reservoir to eat our sarnies.  A truly breathtaking vista lay ahead of us, shown below left, and we could see, in the distance, the snow dusted peak of  Maroma.

We continued our journey along the A356, which had suffered from the recent very heavy rains that had hit this area before we arrived.   In several places a metre or so of the carriageway had slid down the hill and, in one place, the whole carriageway, necessitating an emergency diversion hewn out of the side of the hill.   We stopped at Colmenar in a typical tapas bar (shown above centre) for a coffee.    The bar was yellow, with brown paintwork and adorned with yolks and bridles.    We returned via the C345 to Malaga which runs along the edge of the Parque natural de los Montes de Malaga, which rises to about 1000 metres before plunging down to the sea.  

A little way before the summit, we stopped to look down into the park and were surprised to find frozen water at the roadside.   It had indeed been cold the previous night.  We took the windy trail down into the Park itself, which is a popular picnic spot and walked for a short while.   It was getting cold and we returned to the main road.   The remaining run to Malaga offers fantastic views of the resort and is very popular with the locals - though surprisingly we didn't see a single foreign plate.  Above right is the view from Puerto del León with Malaga in the distance.  Every other corner has a bar or restaurant and in the late afternoon we had the distinct feeling that few of the local drivers were entirely sober.  

We got horribly lost in Malaga, but eventually got onto the coast road, which is now bypassed by the motorway, and had a leisurely seaside drive back to camp.    We stopped once or twice to look at flats along the coast as the cold nights were sapping our resolve as campers and the ice we had seen at the summit was taken as a warning.   

22nd-25th November

The cold weather was bugging us more than a little and our new English neighbours were telling us that it had never been as cold as this in Benidorm, where they had over-wintered for many years.  They had bought a small fan heater which saved on gas as this site - and we now realise most over-wintering sites - provide and charge for a fairly high current supply.  Indeed we realised that several of the over-wintering neighbours had microwave ovens and small electric cookers.  We got the message and went and bought a 2 KW heater and now are roasting hot at all times. 

Another British couple arrived too late to get into the camp one night having been delayed by very exceptional weather.    Both at Madrid and Granada there had been heavy snow and both drivers and the authorities seemed unprepared.     They claimed that it had snowed just outside the camp where they waited.

There are dozens of estate agents in the resort and we resolved to go and look at apartments.  We saw one single-bedroomed flat overlooking the sea (you could see a bit between two buildings in front) at La Caleta, a few kilometres north along the coast.   They wanted 50,000 Pts/month, but we thought it was a bit tatty.  We also saw a three bedroomed town house for 90,000, which was very good.  Across the road from the sea, in a quiet street, the house was almost new and newly furnished.  We were sorely tempted.

We also had a few running repairs to undertake including the bed, which was still propped by two plastic cases.  We had several attempts to find a hardware shop, but in the end managed to find two hammer shafts that, by good fortune, had exactly the right appearance, as well providing the right structural solution and we can now sleep without fear of the bed collapsing.  More of a problem was the main gas burner on which we cook most.  Its gasket had broken and gas was burning at its base.  This sounds more serious than it really was, but was never the less a problem we needed to fix.   As is often the case, the manual for the cooker did not fully explain how to remove the burner to replace the gasket and the burner was broken in the effort.  It was then clear how it should have come apart.   By good luck, there was a caravan accessories and storage trader a few kilometres away and we were able to sort this problem out.  We also had a minor repair to make on the gas bottle carrier, which was broken during the panic to change bottles earlier in the week. 

Our neighbours, Geoff and Patricia, had bigger problems.  They were planning to move across the camp to a sunny pitch and had asked us to help them manhandle their caravan.  When Geoff came to start the car, it refused.  We tried all that is possible on a modern electronically controlled car - which is not much - and left them to call out a tow-truck.  We decided to do a run out to Cordoba and then move on up the coast in search of the better weather everyone was telling us we would find there. 

Last updated: 18/03/01