We did not produce a web blog this winter as we were having a very lazy time. We sailed from Portsmouth to Santander, but had trouble booking a ferry so close to our desired departure date managing only to get a “cattle” class cabin on a ferry that arrived at a convenient time and made our way down through Spain stopping just one night at Camping El Astral where we knew there was a good restaurant. We were not disappointed with our local meats mixed grill - fabulous. The following day continuing to the Alentejo region of Portugal where we stayed at Camping Alentejo for ten days - a period of R&R. Very enjoyable.
Just one more stop before settling down to prepare for Christmas, we first went to Camping Castro Verde winter 2018/19, it is a municipal site where for some reason the long term stayers, settle close together on a hard standing very reminiscent of a car park while the short termer’s, such as our selves settle not on the grass pitches but on the site roads - flat surfaces, lots of space, pleasant views. Why oh why do the long termer’s squash together in a “car park”?
We stayed at Camping Castro Verde just four days before heading off to Camping Milfontes for our fifth Christmas there, the fourth in a row.
Christmas did not change much from last year, on Christmas day, after a long lie in, we had turkey leg (we buy a giant leg as we don’t particularly like the white breast meat) with all the trimmings cooked on the BBQ washed down with one of our favourite local wines, we bought 5 litre boxes and at the equivalent price of €1.35 a bottle so could afford to be generous with it.
New years day also had the same dinner meat menu as last year a three bone rib of beef again cooked on the BBQ. Just six days after the new year we set off again to another of our favourite sites, at the Algarve seaside town of Armação de Pêra, Camping Canelas.
While we were there we took a phone call from friends Lynn and Mark who were in Portugal for a weeks holiday and were ringing to see where we were. I told them and they replied that their hotel was just a mile from where we were camped - wow very spooky.
We spent a very pleasant few days with Lynn and Mark, we revisited some places and found some new places to explore as well as enjoying a meal together on their last night.
While we were on the Algarve we also managed to get to Cabanas to have lunch with pals John, Ann and Bella the Yorkie who spend their winters in Portugal and summers in France.
After five very lazy and enjoyable weeks at Camping Canelas we moved back to Camping Milfontes to prepare for visitors.
We were expecting two visitors, Sue’s Uncle David was flying in to Faro Airport for an eight day stay and the day after we took him back to Faro Airport we toddled off to Lisbon Airport to pick up Alex who flew in from Kiev in The Ukraine for a five day visit. Such a pity that Faro is in the south of the country while Lisbon is in the north. To mitigate the driving distance we booked an apartment in Lisbon for two nights. The first night so we could drive to Lisbon, pick up Alex from the airport and not have to face the long drive back to the caravan and also, as we were very fond of Lisbon, to show Alex some of the many attractions of Portugals capitol city.
We have been renting holiday apartments and villas for many years and although some were stunning and some just good all were places where we were happy to stay. What happened to our selection skills in Lisbon? First off I should say that the apartment was clean, very well equipped and as described, sadly you had to read between very murky lines to discover the real truth, for instance there was a large flat screen TV but not in the lounge, in one of the bedrooms and the lounge was not being used as a lounge it was full of beds, oh and it was on the third floor and without a lift.
So disappointed were we that we packed up and left after breakfast after just one night and instead of exploring Lisbon (there were so many roadworks that the sat-nav repeatedly got lost so we gave up) we went straight back to Camping Milfontes. We had a super five days with Alex whose highlight was surfing and swimming in the Atlantic Ocean. Our highlight was NOT surfing and swimming in the Atlantic Ocean.
When we returned Alex to Lisbon airport Spain was hitting the headlines as a European pandemic centre - we had just a few days to pack up ad drive across Spain to catch the ferry back to UK. When we arrived at Camping Alentejo the Spanish Covid 19 pandemic was at full force, all campsites were closed, foreigners already on a site were permitted to stay but if they left they were not allowed to return and, of course, all other sites were closed to them, the entire country was on lockdown. We were advised that we may be better staying in the low risk area of Alentejo, Portugal rather than risk the two day drive across high risk Spain to Bilbao. We postponed our ferry crossing for a month and settled down to wait it out. The day of our original ferry crossing came and went, we found out later it was the last passenger ferry crossing before all Spanish ports were closed to non-commercial traffic. We would not be going until the pandemic eased and ferry services from Bilbao restarted.
We were now settled comfortably at Camping Alentejo, where the occurrence of Covid19 was low (three confirmed cases at the time we left) and shops and shoppers operating sensibly so no shortages other than sanitiser gel and vinyl gloves. The site owner had said he was planning to remain open as he felt it was a safe secure environment - we agreed and planned to sit it out there and see what happened although we did discuss with other campers that in the event of the site closing many of us would form a convoy as with practically no sites open on the route home this would give us a measure of security.
On the morning of Sunday 22nd March site owner Seibo had a police visit and was ordered to be closed by the end of the day. Two and a half hours later we had formed a convoy of eleven units, Dutch, German and English and set off to the Spanish border.
The Spanish police had closed the border and in order to cross the reg number of each vehicle was recorded together with the number of persons and final destination of each vehicle and a “permission to travel document” issued, it didn’t take long and soon we were all on our way again heading for a camp site that had told us we could not have pitches but we could stay on their car park for the night. When we arrived the car park was rammed and we stayed on a farm track alongside the very noisy motorway, the first 237 miles of the journey behind us.
Someone knew of a site on our route in France run by a young English couple that was rumoured to be open, a phone call confirmed this and eleven pitches were booked for the following evening
Travel day 2.
This was a big day for us, not only was it a very long drive but we were crossing the border into France, everyone was tense as there were so many rumours as to the requirements and attitudes of the French border police. We all carried a document downloaded from (I think) a French government web site on which we had to write in French that we were travelling by car only to return to our home state. Every person had to have one that was completed signed and dated. The problem was some sources were saying that one of these documents was required for each day of the journey while others were saying that only one was required for the entire trip. It did not help when a few miles from the border the traffic slowed to a virtual standstill and it looked as if we would be many hours in the crossing.
In the event the (quickly cleared) holdup was caused by a lorry breaking down in the middle of road works and when we did actually cross into France although there were a lot of police present we were not stopped and our carefully collected papers not checked.
Once on our way through France the roads were virtually empty, trucks only going south and trucks, us and the odd French vehicle going north. We did once pass a police road block but we were waived through. Only, it appeared, French car drivers were being stopped and their transit papers checked.
Eventually after around eleven hours and 460 miles we rolled into Twin Lakes Caravan Park every one completely exhausted. Everyone still in the convoy that is. One couple hit an object in the road and had to stop and wait for the police to turn up and call out a garage to replace the tyre, they caught us up the following day .One caravan outfit went through the wrong tollbooth on the motorway and finished up on the road to Zarautz we never did see them again. A couple of Brits decided they must push on at maximum speed as they had to organise vet inspections before they could return to UK with their animals and a couple of Dutch units had lead right feet that the rest of the convoy could not match. The convoy now comprised four Brit units and one Dutch unit.
There was another Brit caravan on the site who had made a similar length journey to us and had formulated a plan that would allow him to rest on Tuesday have a pretty long run on Wednesday but a short (125 mile) hop on Thursday morning to Calais ferry terminal. It was a good plan that we adapted and adopted.
Rest day 1
A rest day - fabulous - showers, cooked food, quiet environment.
Travel day 3
Up with the lark and on the road before our planned 8:00 am. It was another long long day. The only positive being that with so little traffic it was easy to keep to hoped for averages, even going through the centre of Rouen the traffic was so light we hardly paused.
A little before five we reached our planned stopping place the Aire de Quincampoix. Unfortunately like an increasing number as we travelled north it had been closed but a further 40 or so kilometres further on was the Aire de Bosc-Mesnil, it was as expected packed but we all managed to squeeze in somehow and by five o’clock we were trying to relax and gather energy for the final push to Calais.
Travel day 4
We got out of bed at 7.30 am this morning to unhitch the caravan and drive the wrong way along the service station roads to the fuel pumps. Here I made what could have been a disastrous mistake. I was checking the oil and had decided to add a little when Sue who was getting a card authorised to get fuel exclaimed that her card had been declined. I shut the bonnet and paid for the fuel with one of my cards. It was not until we arrived at Calais that we discovered that in our declined card panic of the morning I had failed to replace the oil filler cap and the back of the car and front/sides of the caravan were covered in oil but fortunately the filler cap was still sitting on the top of the engine where I had left it (a testament to the French road system perhaps) so I was able to replenish the lost oil and refit the cap.
We arrived at the ferry terminal at 10:40 am and were put onto the 11:55 am ferry 55 minutes ahead of the one we were actually supposed to catch.
Once aboard we realised why P&O were putting people on the first available crossing. The boat was practically empty, just a couple of dozen trucks half a dozen or so motorhomes and one caravan - us.
We disembarked the ferry at 1:15 pm UK time and by 3:30 were setting up at Little Henham ready to start our 14 day "returning from abroad" isolation. At least I got a couple of cases of Old Speckled Hen on the ferry at half price to help pass the time and with the task of getting the coating of oil off both the caravan and the car. Sadly we only have enough food to last a week so we thought we may have a problem next week but where we are camped we have been offered a shop service next week - here’s hoping.
26th May 2020
We have now been on lockdown since 26th March - two whole months. I have not been out other than for a short walk around the farm each day and other than one trip to Tesco for shopping, neither has Sue. We are very fortunate that the farm owners son has been going shopping for us each Tuesday evening and with Sue’s one big shop we are coping remarkably well, but even if we weren’t, as an over 70 year old with breathing difficulties I would put up with any amount of discomfort.