February/March 2016
Our 33rd Campsite, Vilanova Park at Villanova Il A Geltru is a good site for visiting Barcelona. Although the site is an hours bus ride away, the stop is right outside the campsite and drops you at Placa Catalunya, in the heart of the city. Villanova Park is a massive holiday park with lots of mobile holiday homes. it is probably the equivalent to a Butlins holiday camp at home. The pitches are nearly all under pine trees which is great for the summer but not this time of year when you are searching for the sun. The sap from the trees made a mess of Bessies roof. Depending on where you are pitched it can be a bit of a walk to some facilities on site €5 a wash was also a bit steep but needs must. There is a good supermarket onsite.
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| Vilanova Park Restaurant |
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| Our huge pitch at Vilanova amongst the pine trees |
We had a few days exploring beautiful Barcelona and we treated ourselves to tickets to watch Barcelona v Seville at Nou Camp with an overnight stay in a hotel just off Las Ramblas. The hotel H10 Metropolitan was right in the heart of the buzz. We were served with a cocktail on arrival at Reception and a bottle of Cava and chocolates were delivered to our room. Apparently they do this with all guests, what a treat!
Our room with french doors opening onto a little balcony overlooked Placa Catalunya square, and the room was bigger than Bessie! The bed seemed huge and the walk in shower was heaven!
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| Our room with a little balcony and a big comfy bed! |
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| Our view of Placa Catalunya square |
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| Rooftop Pool but only if you dare! |
After a relaxing afternoon at the hotel, we caught the Metro to Nou Camp along with thousands of fans squished like sardines onto every Metro!
The Stadium is massive, hold on to whoever you are going with because you can easily lose them in the rush to get to your seat! We had great seats on the 1st tier near the goal and had a clear view of Messi and his team.
Watching Messi play along with 80,000 fans in this amazing stadium was worth every penny and a big box of popcorn was only €2.50!
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| Neils excited! |
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| Their Hero! |
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| Warm Up |
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| Nou Camp comes alive! |
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| This was the queue at the Metro Station near Nou Camp after the game! |
After the game we hoped to catch the Metro back to our hotel but the queues were immense, so we had to start walking. The taxis and buses were overflowing with people everywhere After an hour of walking and getting lost at midnight, we finally flagged down a taxi, so relieved to get back to the hotel with very tired feet it definitely deserved a night cap and luckily the bar was still open!
We had wonderful neighbours at Villanova Park. Don is 85 years old looks and acts like a young man! He is still pulling a caravan to the sun every year with his lovely wife Jan age 65!. Don offered to pick us up from Barcelona if we had any problems getting home but we wouldn't have expected anyone to do that in the middle of the night let alone Don!
When we arrived back at the campsite the next day they had a pot of coffee and cakes were waiting for us! It still amazes me after 6 months on the road how kind and friendly some people are to virtual strangers, we had only met the day before! Don and Jan live not far from us at home so we hope to see them again.
After a wonderful few days, we now had some decisions to make on where to go next. The weather is much cooler this high up the coast our original plan was to carry on Northwards into the south of France to see Marseille, St Tropez Nice and Monaco but the weather is not good there a lot of storms and rain are forecast and its cold. We don't do cold!
After lots of deliberation and researching the webs forecasts we decided to head back down South for at least the whole of March. April should be more settled and we can then decide which route to take next.
Because of the lack of availability on some sites we have been pushed up the coast too early in the year. So plan B is to head to Alicante/Murcia area where the their micro- climate is 5-6 degrees warmer than Barcelona for March and on average 260 days a year of sun!
March 2nd
we started our journey travelling South again and after a 3 hour journey we arrived at a small camper park at Pensicola called Camping Los Pinos for 2 nights. A neat and pretty site with various size pitches and friendly staff.
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| Our Pitch at Camping El Pinos |
The weather was 24 degrees and sunny! We had definitely made the right decision. The next morning we both woke up with stinking colds, our first colds for 6 months so not bad really. Of course Neil had man flu and he was much worse than me! I wouldn't be surprised if we caught the colds on the Metro in Barcelona! There were people coughing and sneezing all over you.
Our next site was a site we had tried to get into on our way south in February but they were full so this time I emailed them and booked a pitch ahead of time. El Campello camper park is only 1 year old and is well organised with 6 or 8 amp electric and very good wifi available. The town of El Campello is a cycle ride away but you can walk to the wide sandy Muchavista beach and promenade from the site. From the promenade you can catch the Tram to Alicante and Benidorm.
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| El Campello Camperpark |
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| El Campello Showers and Petanque area |
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| Muchavista Beach |
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| View from Promenade towards Benidorm |
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| The Metro on the Promenade |
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| El Campello and Marina |
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| La Illeta Watchtower built in 16th Century |
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| A few wild campers on the outskirts of El Campello by a dry river bed |
We visited a local Mercado (market) close to the site, there is usually one in most towns on a Saturday or Sunday.
This one was a cross between a car boot, Antiques fayre and a farmers market. I had a rummage and found a designer top for €2!
The washing machines and laundry rooms on sites usually invites a little chat from fellow campers and I met a lovely lady called Anne we shared a clothes dryer and pegs whilst having a natter. Anne and her husband Danni are from East London and are away on an 8 week trip in their Campervan touring Spain. We swapped notes and tips as you do and had a lovely afternoon chatting with of course a few drinks!
We took the Tram into Alicante, a pleasant 20mins ride away along the coast. Neil decided he would like to take a look at the castle you can see in the background! I think we took the long way round and not the tourist route because the steps were so deep you could only climb a few at a time! A few blisters later we didn't make it to the top but the views were lovely.
When we arrived back at the site a couple asked us if we had had a good day in Alicante and did we take the lift up to the Castle?!!!!
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| Alicante Marina and Castle ruins we climbed in the background! |
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| The pretty backstreets of Alicante |
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You can just about see me!
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After a lovely week at El Campello we move on to Murcia for a few nights, we have enjoyed our stay at this Camperpark and would definitely return here.
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Early Evening G&T in the sunshine.
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