Murcia and Valencia, Part 1

28th November, 1999

Having decided against staying in Almeria, we headed towards Benidorm, stopping late in the day close to Murcia itself.  The camp was close to the motorway and a little strange in that the camp had its own truck stop and BP petrol station.  That said, it was one of the best sites we have stayed at and if we had thought there was much to do and see in the area, we might have stayed longer.

29th November, 1999

The campsite El Raco in Benidorm had been recommended to us by Geoff and Patricia as having storage facilities for the caravan and we were increasingly of the view that we might get a flat and store the caravan.  We found the site after yet more diversions and were given a limited choice of pitches.  The camp was almost full and, for the first time on any site outside the UK, Brits were almost the largest contingent, with the Dutch just a whisker ahead.  When we arrived, though sunny it was quite cold, particularly at night and we felt quite sorry for our British neighbours in a relatively small camper and the one or two other campers who were under canvas.

30th November, 1999

To the left is the most used view of Benidorm.  The guide book makes the point that until the fifties this and the little harbour was Benidorm.  We first visited well over 20 years ago and had not been back since.  We were surprised at how little we could remember of it and how much it has expanded.  While the Brits may not quite be in the majority in the camp, on the streets they are and, at this time of the year, they are mostly senior citizens and middle aged drop outs.

Below centre is the view from centre of Benidorm looking over the Playa Levante.

After a little essential shopping, we walked the Playa de Levante which is to the east of the old town.  We spotted the sand sculpture shown on the right which we thought quite interesting - which could not be said of the majority of the resort.

We were still thinking of flats and surprised at the number of sea view flats with "for sale" or "rent" signs.

1st December, 1999

For the first time in ages, we used the bikes to ride down what used to be called The Rincon, but is now Avenida Doctor Severo Ochoa to the little supermarket near the front.  Before returning, we went into a nearby estate agent who showed us a one bedroomed flat, for which they were asking the princely sum of 70,000 Ptas per month.  It was clean and well equipped and, when the workmen have finished refurbishing the lifts, will have quite a good approach.  We were not completely sure that we still wanted to be so close to the centre of Benidorm itself and, as our neighbours had told us to look in Albir, we went there in the afternoon.

While exploring, we came across the Camping Club where Geoff and Patricia had their mobile home and where we expected them to be shortly.  We went on as far as Altea, but were not able to find any property to look at.  The most promising estate agent was closed for the afternoon.

Albir is one of the more salubrious suburbs of Benidorm and has a very pleasant promenade, shown right.  It is not as crowded and does not have so many tacky cafes and bars, but sufficient facilities to make life livable.

As we returned to camp, we were struck by the very vivid sunset, which lasted only a few minutes.  Once again, we were unable to stop where the view was at its best, but caught the picture above right.

We turned our minds to the trip back to the UK.  We had been thinking of driving and set out to plan and budget for it. It was soon apparent that it would cost between two and three times as much to drive as it would to fly, even allowing for a hire car.  This is in part because of the distance we would have to drive our gas guzzler, but we then have to add ferry cost plus meals and hotels.  The attraction of driving was that we could sight-see on the way and that would extend the time a bit but that would further push up the costs.

2nd December, 1999

We went off in the morning to catch the estate agents and went to look at a two-bedroomed flat with garage space close to the front in Albir.  This was probably the closest to what we had in mind and the price of 90,000 Ptas per month was about right.

After lunch we went into Benidorm and bought tickets to fly to Luton.  We probably paid over the odds but at so close to the time we wanted to travel we didn't have much choice.  Now that we had settled the return trip we were committed to stay at El Raco so we put up the awning which had sat in our car since we left Torre del Mar.

The day had started overcast, as the red sky at night suggested, and by the evening it turned wet.  However, the temperature went up a bit.

3rd December, 1999

Despite having a satellite feed at El Raco, we decided that we really needed to get our own as this would give us access to the British radio stations as well as TV and let us do so on sites without feeds which is by far the majority.  We had seen an advert for a second hand decoder and LNB on the camp notice board and, after looking at the decoder, we went to get a dish from Midsat who are based in Hinkley but have a branch near Alicante.

4th December, 1999

David went off to buy the decoder from the Dutch couple but when the LNB (that's the bit that dish focuses the signal onto) was produced it was obvious he had fallen into a deep hole as it was completely incompatible with the dish we had bought the previous day.    After a call to Midsat it was decided to go the whole hog and get a new system - which we would not have considered.   Even worse was that the price when we got to the shop was much higher than we were led to believe would be the case.   Having now made two trips to Alicante we bit the bullet.    That said we now have a super system except that the world is now going digital and we bought analogue.

Many of the Brits out here have smart cards to enable them to get some of the scrambled channels despite the fact that they are in breach of the rules for their cards.     So prevalent is the practice that the local papers publish the TV schedules

After completing our chores, we thought we would go and let Geoff and Patricia know where we were.  When we had left Torre del Mar, they had not drawn their curtains back and, as we had promised to see them before we left, we felt a bit guilty.   By now we were feeling less inclined to put our caravan in storage, at least before Christmas, as we had worked out that, based on the reduced rates for over 30 days, we were better off leaving it where it was.  We thought that Geoff, however, would be interested in storing his caravan at the site.  After a little confusion, we found them in the Caravan Club of Albir.   They seemed pleased to see us, if a little surprised.  The part for their heater had not arrived and, after waiting longer than they wanted to, they had left  money for it to be forwarded and followed us to Benidorm.  By coincidence, they too had stopped at the truck stop at Murcia.  In fact, that site is an obvious way-point between Malaga and Benidorm, which is a bit much for one day.

Geoff and Patricia have quite a large and very comfortable static mobile home on the site in Albir and effectively live there, as do many expat north Europeans.  They were most interested in the storage charges at El Raco, which are quite modest.  They had put their caravan on the nearby Mediaeval site, but were paying several times as much.

We left Albir and returned to change and then catch the bus into Benidorm in search of a good restaurant.  The one we chose looked interesting and had a certain amount of style, but the food was a little indifferent.  The green beans were very green and the carrots were bright orange and both must have come out of tins or packets and been full of colour enhancers.    We took a taxi back to camp.  We asked the driver where El Cisne was and he told us.

6th December, 1999

Geoff and Patricia had invited us to go with them for lunch at Cala Finistrat, which is just beyond the far end of the Playa de Poniente to the west of Benidorm.   While it was cool in the shade the sky was clear and the sun hot.   It was a public holiday and the town was very busy.  We  went in on the bus which stops just outside our camp and walked through the old town to catch another bus.    Cala Finistrat is, like Albir, much quieter and prettier than Benidorm and a lot less busy.  We found a table, outside in the sun, almost on the shore, and had a four-course meal and half a bottle of wine each for the princely sum of 1100 Ptas.   At least that's what it should have been.  In fact, the waiter got the bill wrong, possibly because one of us was using the facilities when he wrote the bill, and we were charged even less.  Patricia had had a bad experience the other day, trying to correct an under-charge, so we decided to leave the balance as a tip, rather than discuss the matter.

We had had a most pleasant and filling lunch that had lasted well into the afternoon and we walked it off along the entire length of the Playa back to the centre in time to catch a bus back to camp.  By now it was quite cold again and Kate had wished she had brought a jacket.   We realised that this is the way many expats spend their winter hibernation - get up late - lunch on the 'menu of the day' for most of the day then couch potato with Sky and back to bed.

7th December, 1999

We had been getting up at dawn and before the sun was over the hill to the east.   The morning trip to the ablutions block needed some courage and was only undertaken out of necessity.  Today, however, it was almost warm before the sun appeared.

As the next day was another public holiday, a major shopping expedition was the main business of the day.  We have taken to using the ring road to zip down to Continente at the western end of the town.   With the cold weather of the last few weeks we had come to the conclusion that our sleeping bags were perhaps not up to it and had decided to get a duvet.  Choosing one turned out to be quite hard as we don't speak the lingo and the technical descriptions were a bit complicated.  In the end we finished up with a pillow case for a long bolster we did not need but it came with the cover.

When we returned, we thought we would look for El Cisne and, if it was still as charming as we remembered it, we would go back for a meal one night.   In fact, it was right on the junction of the ring road and the main N332 coast road and we had passed it several times.   When we last dined there it has been a taxi ride from Benidorm in open countryside.   It was a romantic restaurant with a garden full of pergolas with climbing plants.  Inside the dining room was circular with individual curtained alcoves for groups of diners, with a log fire in the centre and a brass chimney that hung from the ceiling.

Now El Cisne was on the edge of a major road interchange surrounded by discos, shops and garages.  It had long since ceased to be a select restaurant and is now a Sunday Flea Market with individual traders occupying the discreet alcoves in the former restaurant.   Once again, we should have left well alone and stuck to our memories.

After lunch it started to get a bit windy and David decided to put all the pegs into the awning.   The pitches at El Raco are "hard standing" which in many ways is better than grass.   It is the very devil to get the pegs in however and when we first put up the awning we only managed to get just over half in.  Now we felt it necessary.   That night we had very strong winds and we were glad we had the full complement of pegs in.   We were also very glad of our new Duvet and have not felt remotely cold in the night since.

8th December, 1999

The day started bright and sunny, so we took our cameras and walked into town, exploring the high ground beyond The Rincon.  We had in mind to look again at the hotel where we had stayed all those years ago.  We had come across it almost by accident a few days ago and were surprised how little it has changed.  It is pictured above left.  The view from the beach where we used to take the children is shown above centre, with a close-up of the new land-mark for Benidorm above right.   We had noticed this enormous building when we first arrived, but were to learn that it has not been worked on for some time as it has developed a lean and is now the subject of a court battle.

As we walked back to camp for a late lunch it was actually quite hot and thoughts of renting flats seemed to be a bit remote.   We set about planning the return to the UK and juggled with the various camp rates that vary with the number of days we stay.   The long stay rate is aboutr £5.50 a day.   At that rate it is less than half the cost of a flat.   We had thought of putting the van into store for the the trip back but the amount we save is small and the site could be full or at least we might not get a pitch we are happy with.

9th December, 1999

Having decided to fly back for Christmas, and not having figured out how to hire a car, we went again to the internet shop to search the net and found CarJet.com where we filled in a booking form.  Very quickly we had a quote back, which we thought was a little more than we wanted to pay.  We found the Luton airport page and made a note of the local car hire companies. 

After dinner that night, while cleaning his teeth, David noted that we had lost water pressure and, on investigating, found a major problem.  Water was pouring out of our water heater and indeed a little water was evident inside the caravan on the floor.    Despite being dark, we thought we should at least find out what had happened and removed the outside cover.  The fault was quite obvious as the pressure relief valve had broken away allowing water to pour out.  The valve itself was functional and the break was in the plastic union in the hot outlet.  The plastic had clearly died of old age rather than excess pressure.  We are constantly coming across problems with plastics that are subjected to high temperature water and it is amazing that it is still used in this application.

10th December, 1999

What we had intended to be a touring day was now an essential repairs day and we set off in the direction of Alicante where we had seen caravan shops.  The design of the water system does not allow for isolating the heater and some way of blocking the leak had to be found.  In fact, neither of the caravan shops carried parts, nor offered to try to get the part, and, after a trip to the supermarket, we returned to try to sort the problem out.  We had not been using the heater for some time as the washing up facilities here are first class, so we pulled a fuse and blocked the leak with a modified wine stopper.

In the past we have had excellent travel deals through our credit card company so we tried to organise a car rental.  The prices offered were between £400 and £600 for the 19 days we wanted.  As we didn't need the car all the time, we considered having two shorter periods, but this made no real saving, so we decided notwithstanding our concerns over e-commerce, to sign up with CarJet the next day.

11th December, 1999

Another warm and sunny day arrived and we still could not indulge in tourism as we had to go back and organise the car hire.  We were impressed with the speed and efficiency of the CarJet system, which almost got it right.  We had been warned by a well known hire company (and one of the most expensive) that these internet car hire firms didn't provide full insurance cover, so we felt it necessary to print out all the T's and C's.  In fact, CarJet operates through small rental companies who do not have the marketing clout of the big guys and presumably not their overheads.  This is another example of how the internet is going to enable the little guys to get at the market as effectively as the big guys and for minimal cost.  We shall report after the event how our first major use of e-commerce checks out.

12th December, 1999

The day started bright, though it was not as warm as the last few days.  After doing a washing load, we settled down to trying to bring our journal up to date.  Needless to say, it clouded over and we had some strong winds.  By evening it was a bit brighter and the washing was all dry.   As the journal is now up to date and the next few days will be taken up with preparing to travel we shall close it till the next millennium.

Last updated: 18/03/01