Our stay in Sanxenxo only lasted one night. This was not because of the campsite, where we had a terrific pitch with an uninterrupted view of the Atlantic, but rather the result of the weather.
When we woke up yesterday a thick mist shrouded the sea and the campsite and so we decided to go in search of better weather and headed south towards Porto. This is the advantage of travelling out of season, you do not need to book campsites and so if you want to move there is nothing stopping you.
Being the stingy couple that we are, we again declined the temptation to whizz to our destination on a toll road and instead laboured down the Spanish coast on minor roads, through dozens of roundabouts, traffic lights and 50kph zones.
About half way through the journey we entered Portugal, and for once there was a sign making clear we were entering another country, which we have found the exception rather than the rule in the Schengen zone. Portugal is the 21stcountry which both Basil and the dogs have entered.
Sarah managed to capture our entry into Portugal
As usual we started to look round to see if we could discern differences between Spain and Portugal and apart from the different language on signs the only distinction was that diesel was nearly €0.10 per litre more expensive, which was not what we were expecting.
Towards the end of the journey as we neared our campsite SatNav played one of his little tricks, with which we have become all too familiar. He could see that the shortest route to our campsite was through a tiny, ancient Portugese village, but what he didn’t tell us was that the village roads were only suitable for donkeys!
Once again he fooled us and we set off up a narrow road until SatNav indicated we should take a sharp right hand turn up a short but steep road. Basil’s tyres squealed in objection as I coaxed him up the hill and then we crested the rise to see a road, lined with stone walls, far too narrow for Basil’s ample dimensions. Ten times bitten, twenty times shy is the phrase which comes to mind vis a vis SatNav, so I set about reversing Basil down the steep hill, turning him round via a now much used ten point turn and retreated, licking our wounds, back to the main road. Whereupon SatNav suddenly proposed the sensible route sticking to roads wider than six feet that he should have suggested in the first place.
Basil at our current campsite
An old mill on our campsite
Our new campsite is called Parque de Campismo do Paco (41.802597, -8.847318 €13 a night with ACSI including free wifi!!!) is a very rural site set amongst eucalyptus trees. We have explored the local area on foot and there is a lovely, large, empty beach about 1.5 km away, but that’s about all. The dogs as usual had great fun in the sand, even Mabel with her cone of shame. Being on the Atlantic there are big big breakers crashing on the beach, so powerful that some surfers couldn’t get beyond them, but the more experienced seemed to be getting some good rides.
Mabel can still enjoy herself even wearing the cone of shame.
Not Melek’s best side
Surfer
The local beach
We had been excited when we arrived to see a poster in a nearby town, which if our best Portuguese translated it correctly, seemed to suggest there was a festival of local food this weekend, but the people at the campsite know nothing about it, which is disappointing.
This stone posts are used to support vines. They are designed for the long term we think!
One amusing local anomaly is that the nearby church appears to have been fitted with a typical two tone British door bell instead of a proper bell. Every quarter of and hour we hear something akin to the door bell from the Avon adverts of the 1970s!
Next to us we have two German girls, probably in their early 20s. In the lovely weather where everyone has been sitting outside, these two have spent virtually all day sitting in their small van playing music, watching movies and generally staring at phones and computer screens. What’s wrong with the current generation!!!!!! It’s not like my friends and I would have spent hours listening to albums in a house on a hot day when we were their age – oh – as you were.
Yours truly on the beach with poor old Mabel