Viva España

The journey continues after we lined up the Duke for a water replenish and an empty of the chemical toilet! We headed into the little center of Hosten and discovered the only café to offer coffee was not open till 10 am - we were banking on a last French petit dèjeuner and so waited. The proprietor then informed us he had no food - so we nipped round the corner and bought a couple of croissants and quiches for lunch. Then off down a road that would only allow one vehicle to be confronted by a huge lorry - finally negotiated that to reach the open road to Spain. The Pyrenees began to loom in the distance as we passed Biarritz and we wondered if my plan to avoid any unnecessary hassle over crossing into Spain would materialize. It couldn’t have been more perfect. We actually don’t even know when we entered Spain as somehow the towns we passed through seemingly morphed from French style into Spanish and before we knew it we were winding round mountains on a fast toll free motorway with signs for Madrid and Burgos! No border in sight. We ate lunch on the go and then made our way South West, planning to stop around 6 pm at one of the overnight Camper Van places I had identified. Unfortunately, despite the title of my blip, we found Spanish hospitality sadly lacking. The first place in Palencia (no that isn’t a spelling mistake - there is one beginning with P) had a toilet block that was locked and when we asked in our halting Spanish why, the owners at the garage over the road didn’t have a reason other than that it was closed. We moved on to a less attractive option which was basically a services on the motorway but supposedly had electric hook ups and water only to find they were all out of order. In desperation as it was getting dark, we headed to a camp site further South just outside Valladolid - it had one review on Google and that was one star - but it did boast all the services that would be helpful before turning up in Portugal including laundry. Magic! This place was friendly and everything worked. Leyna managed to get all the washing done while I cooked an English Breakfast for dinner. This preceded by a glass of Ricard and once the days BG work was done - we retired with the exciting thought that we would most likely be in Mourao by mid afternoon tomorrow. This picture taken from the motorway of the northern plains between Burgos and Palencia. Oh and there are so many petrol stations in Spain - cheap and plentiful - but for the next week nos vamos ficar no Portugal!