Jaén province…. .

Leaving Portugal after so long was a bit of a wrench but a welcome wrench as we shot straight across the Algarve and into Spain.  We headed straight for the Province of Jaén in north-eastern Andalusia.  It’s an area that we’d cut across in 2016 when making our way from the Costa Blanca to Córdoba to meet our friends Di and Chris for a couple of days.  We’d had a few days, at that time, to get from east to west but absolutely loved the area and wanted to see more so earmarked it for a future visit.

Province of  Jaén – olives, olives everywhere.

The province of Jaén is the largest producer of olive oil in the world accounting for twenty percent of the worlds market.  According to Wikipedia 66 million trees grow here covering 550,000 hectares.  It’s fair to say that it’s enorme.  A huge patchwork of green.

The province also boasts four natural parks.  On our way across the area in 2016 we met a chap called John who gave us various co-ordinates and advice on where to stay and what to do in the area so we dug them out to have a look.  He’d recommended a 128km via verde (cycle track on a disused railway) running from Jaén to Puente Genil.   We headed for an aire just outside the little town of Doña Mencía.

The aire at next to the via verde cycleway at Doña Mencía. 

It never ceases to amaze me the facilities that are put on for motorhomers in some European countries.  We parked up at the aire adjacent to the via verde for just three euros a night.  Can you imagine that next to the Camel Trail in Cornwall?  You probably pay three times that just to park for the day.  All facilities were there.  Showers, water, waste disposal and electric.

There’s also a visitor centre, cycle hire and cafe.

We ended up staying five nights and explored the area by bike and on foot.  Apart from the obvious draw of the cycleway there are several good walking trails in the area as well.  We had the pleasure of watching several pairs of vultures circling above and below us on our afternoon walks.

Looking towards the delightful village of Zuheros a couple of miles away.

Views from the cycleway.

A walk in the hills above Zuheros.

So thank you to John wherever you are now for all the good info you gave us.  As I’ve said on the blog before, when travelling there are so many unanswered questions that go through my head.  How many olives are there?  How many trees?  They surely can’t harvest all these by hand like we saw in Greece?  If they do then there must be a mass influx of seasonal workers?  Who owns them all?  How did they water all the trees in the olden days?  Do the owners have a detailed map of all their trees or is it in their head?  What’s the maintenance plan?  Is there ever a day in the week when you don’t hear the buzz of a chain saw in the background?  And so the questions go on.

A cycle ride in the hills around Albanchez de Magina east of Jaen.

A long descent took us into the town of Torres.

Torres.

Another of John’s recommendations was the Segura Natural park east of Úbeda.  Cazorla is a perfect base to explore some of it with a handy aire located at the top end of the town with spectacular views looking out over the olives below.  It’s just a big layby really but as laybys go it got a thumbs up from us.

The aire at the top end of Cazorla.

Cazorla is in a superb setting with craggy mountains above and thousands of acres of olives below and boasts several historic monuments.  There are many walking trails, most of which you’d need a few days to complete but we set off up the steep hill to join one of them to see how far we’d get before turning back as there didn’t appear to be a viable circular route.

Views up to the castle in La Iruela just a short walk from the aire.

Looking back down at the castle.

 

Processionary catarpillars we saw at the beginning of our walk.

After an hour and a half of mostly uphill climbing we were heading through patches of pine forest.  The shade was welcome as it was roasting hot but then we saw some pine processionary caterpillars.  When we looked up we could see their nests in the trees and all looked to be empty.

For those that don’t know, these little creatures can be harmful to people and pets.  The hairy caterpillars are part of the moth family.  I won’t bore you with their life cycle but just say that they feed on pine trees in nests.  Then between February and April they descend from the trees and make their way to the ground in a long chain (hence the name) searching for the next place for their life cycle.  They’ll eventually disperse to go underground for the next phase of the lifecycle.  They pose a risk to animals and humans at the stage when they are marching across the ground.  Those hairs are the cause.  If they are threatened, stressed, prodded or poked they can eject their hairs which act like tiny harpoons and can penetrate and irritate exposed skin.  Generally dogs lick affected areas thereby transferring the hairs to their tongues resulting in itching, swelling, vomiting and even death.

There were lots more later on the higher we got!

We carried on for a while but were seeing them in increasing numbers so whilst I sat on a tree stump consulting google Tim hopped from foot to foot.  After telling him that I was sure it was just animals that were at the most risk I thought I’d check just to be on the safe side.  I read out the end of the second paragraph ‘the pine processionary caterpillar has even made its presence felt amongst dog owners themselves, causing painful, itchy rashes, or at worst, fatal anaphylactic shock’.  So I asked him if he wanted to carry on.  Stupid question really.  He was off back down the hill like a greyhound out of the starting trap.

Well signed routes around Cazorla.

Having retraced our steps we took the road up out of the town in the opposite direction and were rewarded with more spectacular views.

View down to Cazorla from the other side.

A sunsey walk in Cazorla old town.

After a few days soaking up the surroundings of Cazorla we headed to the aire at Úbeda forty or so kilometres away to get some washing done.

We love these places!

We arrived in Úbeda this morning in search of a self service laundrette to find parks closed, events cancelled and most people in the supermarket wearing plastic gloves.   The aire, which we’d stayed on a few  days ago, was practically deserted.  There’d been probably in the region of twenty before.

We took a stroll into town earlier this evening to find, other than two or three cafes and some mini supermarkets open, everything else is closed.

The Coronavirus has been rumbling around in the background of our travels for the last two weeks but today it looks like preventative measures have been ramped up considerably.

Our rough plan for the next three months had looked like this:  Take three to four weeks to make our way across Spain to Barcelona, catch a ferry from there to Sardinia, spend a few weeks on Sardinia before hopping over to Corsica for a look see, then back onto mainland France, up through south-eastern France into Switzerland, maybe a bit of Austria before landing in Germany towards the end of May as I’m doing a weekend course with donkeys somewhere in Bavaria.  It was a very loose three month itinerary.

Fortunately we only really ever make loose plans as you never know what is around the corner.

It looks like Spain, as I write, is going to announce a lockdown of the entire country.

Better to be safe than sorry.

Time for a change of plan………..

Adios!

Onwards into Portugal…. .

The great thing about vanlife is that if you arrive somewhere and don’t feel the love for it you can just move on.  Equally, if you do feel the love for somewhere you can stay longer than you’d originally intended.  Marvão, a few kilometres over the border into Portugal was one of those places that waylaid us.  By a week.  We’d intended staying a night or two but……..well…….we couldn’t tear ourselves away.  If we hadn’t needed to be further south by the end of October we would probably have stretched our stay into two weeks.  Or three.  Admittedly we had a spell of warm sunny weather so that always makes a difference.  Pitched up at Asseiceira camping we relaxed into rural life in Portugal.

Camping Asseiceira.

The hilltop town of Marvão probably is the main attraction for visitors to this area of the Alentejo region of Portugal.

Marvão.

The views are superb.

And it is spectacular perched on top of a high peak, but for me it was the rolling, granite bouldered landscape with miles and miles of traffic free lanes to explore on the bike that captured my attention.

Typical hamlet in this region.

I’d been sadly disillusioned exploring Cornwall by bike whilst we were working on a campsite during the summer by the amount of traffic I had to contend with even on the minor roads.  Everywhere seemed to be rat run to get from one place to another.  In contrast the bike riding around Marvão was completely stress free and practically car free.

Miles of glorious cycling.

According to Wikipedia the Alentejo region of Portugal covers over 27,000 square kilometres with a population density averaging less than twenty people per square kilometre.  Cornwall on the other hand covers 3,500 square kilometres and during the summer months has a population density of over 12000 people per square kilometre.  Quite a difference then.  Sheesh, no wonder it felt soooo busy in Cornwall.  Anyway, hopefully I’ve got the maths right there as it has never been one of my strengths.

…….and acorn eating pigs.

So the Alentejo then is a vast area covering a chunk of Portugal which stretches from the Atlantic coast in the west to the Spanish border in the east and the Algarve in the South.  We’d explored some of the south eastern area around Monsaraz in 2016 and really loved it and we weren’t disappointed with the north eastern part either.

The old station at Beira.

You really can’t beat a hilltop town for a good old exploration on foot.  Marvão at over eight hundred metres is the highest village in the Alentejo.  It is enclosed by 13^th Century walls, has a castle at the top where you can walk the walls if you’ve a head for heights, some formal gardens and narrow medieval winding streets lined by white washed houses.  On a good day the panoramic views all around are worth the climb up.

Walking from the campsite to Marvão.

It’s gets pretty steep.

The campsite we stayed on is just outside the workaday little town of Santo António das Areias and just under five kilometres from Marvão.

Cork oaks.

An early morning walk.

The view over Castelo de Vide, another historic town in the area.

After a walk or a cycle we enjoyed popping into the mini market everyday for a coffee and a pastel de nata to observe village life in action.  There’s a little cafe inside the mini market with a couple of tables and it seemed to be the hub of the town.

Simple pleasures.

A steady stream of people would come in, order a coffee, have a chitty chat with whoever happened to be in there at the time, buy a few groceries and then go again.  Everyone seemed to know everyone and happily spent a few minutes chewing the fat.  Barely a mobile phone in sight.  You do have to have a bit of patience or time on your hands when buying your groceries in rural towns and villages in Portugal as no one appears to be in a hurry.  News is swapped and children are cooed over.  We are so used to standing in a queue at a check-out, being served briskly with no one exchanging a word because everyone is in a hurry.  It’s quite the mind set change but a refreshing change at that. 

It felt good to be back in Portugal but time was pressing on so after a week we reluctantly moved on.  Having been brought up by the sea and then spending over twenty years being a two hour drive away from the sea we’re still always drawn to it.  We do like a good coastal walk so after an overnight stop in Évora we spent a few of nights on the Atlantic coast before arriving just over the border into the Algarve for an extended stop. 

Back on the Atlantic coast near Vila Nova de Milfontes.

As regular readers of the blog will know we are swapping van life for bricks and mortar life this winter.    

It will be a chance to take an extended break from travelling and van dwelling to relax, recharge, regroup, reset, reflect and reboot. 

Well that’s the theory anyway. 

We moved out of the van yesterday. 

Time will tell to see how it all pans out and how we get on. 

Até breve!

A hop, skip and a jump to the Algarve…. .

It’s raining again.  Time to update the blog then.  We’ve had a bit of a hotch potch of a week with a mixture of city life in Coimbra, beach life in Nazaré, village life in Óbidos, coastal life in Vila Nova de Milfontes and now van life in Alvor on the Algarve.

So first up then was a bit of city life in Coimbra.  And I mean a bit………..just a little bit.  We were feeling a little bit tired of sightseeing and couldn’t really drum up too much enthusiasm for a full on expedition.  That’s one of the drawbacks of fulltime travel.  Burnout!

The aire at Coimbra.  A ten minute walk from the lower town.

After a quick scoot up through the botanical gardens (most of which were closed off due to storm damage) to the university and a coffee and a mooch round the alleys and narrow streets of the old town we were done.

Coimbra university.

We were in need of a change.  Nazaré fitted the bill perfectly.

Ever since seeing several Youtube videos of the big wave surfing at Nazaré we knew it was somewhere we wanted to see for ourselves someday.  With our very own eyes!

Well, that someday had finally arrived.  We got parked up at a tolerated parking spot in the town by late afternoon with just enough time to hoof it up to the point to have a look see before it got dark.  The last couple of surfers were heading back in but it really didn’t matter as it was great to see where it all happens.

It didn’t look much on the day we were there but the biggest wave was surfed here in 2017 by Rodrigo Koxa……an 80 foot monster!

It’s a euro to go into the fort where you can get out onto the roof and watch the waves from on high.

The perfect viewing platform.

It was fab and well worth seeing even without the surfers.  Now we just need to go back when there is some big surf.

Inside the fort is dedicated to all those that have surfed Nazare.

So after beach life came village life at Óbidos. And what a perfectly charming compact little gem of a town it is too.

Delightful Óbidos.

Completely enclosed by medieval walls it was just a pleasure to explore.

We didn’t feel it had sold itself out to tourism too much either.  Just a couple of streets with the usual gift and craft shops, restaurants and cafés.

You don’t want to walk the walls if you are the least bit shaky about heights. No handrail and a sheer drop of over ten metres in parts.

It was a looong way down.

Wall walk or not we think Óbidos is definitely worth a visit.  Get there early and you’ll practically have the place to yourselves at this time of year.

So then came coastal life at Vila Nova de Milfontes in the Alentejo region.

Our beach parkig spot just over the river from Vila Nova de Milfontes.

For those of you that know your geography you’ll have sussed out that we have missed out a big chunk of Portugal.  Namely Lisbon and around.  We debated about doing Lisbon.  We really did.  But after the fabulous time and weather we’d had in Porto, followed by our burn out in Coimbra, we decided Lisbon can wait for another time.  I expect it will still be there next year, or the year after.  Or whenever we find ourselves back in Portugal.  Anyway, a bit of coastal walking was on the agenda.

We walked a couple of sections of the coastal path south of Vila Nova de Milfontes over a couple of days.  It forms part of the Rota Vincentina long distance footpath (a 340 kilometre walk from Santiago do Cacém in the Alentejo to Cabo de São Vicente in the Algarve).

I wouldn’t have put storks down as sea birds.

Ah, I love it.  It’s just beautiful.  Steep rocky cliffs, sandy coves, pines, a carpet of green amongst the orange sandy soil and that smell.  This is the fifth time we have come to this region of Portugal and I always remember the smell.  I can’t really describe it.  Kind of a sherbety smell.  I think it’s the rock roses that grow here.  Whatever, I absolutely love it.  It doesn’t have quite the same effect on Tim.  Probably because he is fed up with hearing ‘ah that smell, I just love it’ over and over and over again.

View towards Zambujeira do Mar.

After a couple of days of walking we headed down to our old haunt of Aljezur but we didn’t stop as we’ll be back there at the end of next week on our next Helpx.  We continued on down to the aire at Lagos for a bit of a reminisce.  The fair on the aire put paid to that though.  I have lost count of the amount of times we have turned up to an aire to find either the circus or the fair have got there first.  No reminiscing was to be had then as it was getting late and we needed to find somewhere for the night.

Not wanting to go over old ground we plumped for the aire at Alvor as we hadn’t been to the aire or Alvor before.  It’s fair to say that the reviews were mixed about the aire and we can now see why.  It’s basically a piece of land waiting for development and being used as an aire in the meantime.  It is in a great location though just behind a long sandy beach with some nice cliff walks towards Portimão.  But it’s grim when it’s wet as the surface turns into an orange sludge.

The aire at Alvor.  One night was enough.  We would have liked to have a tour of the biggun next to us!

Of course it was dry when we arrived but it rained overnight.  If you have a dog it would be a nightmare.  I minced across it all this morning on my way to the beach trying not to get covered in the claggy orange stuff.  One night was enough and we have decamped to a car park behind the beach a kilometre of so further east.  We run the risk of a visit and a fine by the policía but that’s preferable to dirty shoes!

Nice platform to get a view of a huge sinkhole…….

……….and there it is.

The view towards Portimao.

Alvor.

Ok, we’re all up to date now.  Tomorrow we have a date with Tim and Jan who we have never met before.   They started to follow the blog after meeting our friends Sam and Chris when they were working at a campsite in Scotland.  Even though we have never met them we seem to have quite a lot in common.

Of course, you can never be too careful when meeting people via the internet so we are meeting up at a campsite.

Safety in numbers.

Stranger danger and all that.

For all we know they could be serial killers!

No doubt we’ll find out tomorrow.

Tchau!

Traditional scenes in Portugal…. .

The frontier town of Tui, our last stop in Spain before crossing over the border into Portugal, was anything but twee.  The old town, topped by the cathedral and standing above the river Minho has a dilapidated but up and coming kind of air about it.

Granite alleyway in Tui.

It’s all a layered mish mash of granite alleyways, compact housing (some derelict and some restored), stone walls, steps and glimpsed views of the river below.

Handsome square in Tui.

On the hillside opposite Tui, on the Portuguese side of the river, Valenςa do Minho is reached via the handsome iron bridge designed by Gustave Eiffel.  He of Paris fame.

Hot tip – don’t go across the bridge in your van.  It didn’t look wide enough for a car and van to pass and it is really busy with cars presumably trotting across the border into Spain – land of the twenty cents a litre cheaper fuel.  Portuguese cars were queuing up to get into the Repsol garage in Tui.  Eiffel had thought of us pedestrians though and conveniently provided a footpath on either side of the bridge.

Fortress walls of Valenςa do Minho .

Safely nestled snugly within its fortress Valenςa is just lovely.  Touristy but lovely.  If you want some new tea towels, towels or bed linen then this is the place to come.  It’s one of those places where seemingly every shop sells the same stuff.  But tourist shops aside the all but intact seventeenth century double ramparts and the beautifully restored buildings within the medieval town are undeniably worth some of your time.

Tiled facades in Valenςa.

Heading south from Valenςa towards Ponte de Lima it felt like a weight had been lifted.  The endless urban sprawl of the previous few days in Spain were a distant memory as we wound up and down through farmland and terraced vineyards in all their autumnal coloured glory.  We arrived in Ponte de Lima to find the car park along the river was flooded after all the recent rain but we managed to bag a space on the pavement in front of the cafes just as a car was leaving.  We found a better place to park for the night after a quick recce of the town so went back to move the van.  Only the policía had shown up by then.  Oh poo.  Several car drivers and one Portuguese motorhomer were clutching tickets in their sticky mitts trying to state their case but plod was having none of it.  They hadn’t quite got to our van so we got in hoping for a quick getaway but a uniform appeared at the window before we could make our escape.  Now, not being able to speak the lingo of the country you are in does sometimes have its advantages and it turned out that this time was one of them.  After Tim apologised in English and waved his hands about a bit the policeman just let out a big sigh and gave us a dismissive wave to say ‘oh just get out of my sight’.  Tim gave him a thumbs up, a big smile and we drove off without a fine.  Excellent.

Open all hours in Ponte de Lima!

We stayed a couple of nights in Ponte de Lima as it’s a pretty little town with lots of tiny bars where the beers were €1 each and we managed to pick up some superfast free wifi and, as it rained for most of the time we were there, we had the internet to occupy us.  We’d parked up at the large carpark at the edge of the town next to some sort of exhibition centre and all was well.  We were amongst a few other vans and the police did a drive past every once in a while so obviously weren’t bothered about us parking there.  Saturday night passed without incident.  Sunday night we were rudely awakened at midnight by a gathering of youths in several cars right behind the van.  Sunday night is obviously a day off for the police which means its race night in Ponte de Lima for any young person with a car and a tank of fuel.  We didn’t feel threatened by them as they really weren’t interested in us but I guess they gathered where we were because we were under one of the few street lamps in the car park.  We always feel a bit twitchy whenever anyone gets gung ho showing off their driving skills in car parks though as you never know when they may lose control and plough into something.  Like us.  Fortunately on this occasion their own cars were parked in between the speeding cars and us so if they were going to hit anything it would be their own cars first.  Thankfully after an hour or so they left us in peace.

I noticed in the morning that the van next to us had a bright lime green dog bowl outside their van.  I thought ‘I bet they don’t have a dog’.  I don’t think it would have been much of a deterrent for any would be thieves.  The bowl gave it away really as it looked brand new and had fresh clean water in it.  Our dog’s water bowl only ever stayed clean for a millisecond before one or other of them had slurped from it and dunked a mucky beard in it and then slopped most of the water all over the floor leaving bits of mud or gunk floating in the water left behind in the bowl.  Anyway, I couldn’t imagine any self respecting rabid guard dog drinking out of a lime green plastic bowl.

Monday dawned with wall to wall sunshine and by ten o’clock it was wall to wall cars in the car park.  The huge fortnightly market including livestock and birds was in full swing.

The small producers at Ponte de Lima market.

The lady with the green bag spent ages rummaging through all the Octopus picking up each one until she found the one she wanted.

After a quick stroll around we escaped to the hills of the Parque Nacional da Peneda-Gerês, Portugal’s only National Park, to make the most of the change in the weather with a bit of walking.  In the first year of our trip my favourite country visited was Portugal.  Then it changed to Slovenia in the second year.  Then this year after visiting Scotland it was a joint tie between Slovenia and the Highlands of Scotland.  After a few days of walking in the National Park around the little granite village of Soajo my favourite country is now back to Portugal.  How fickle am I?

View over Soajo village.

Tourism has only really lightly touched this area as the village caters mostly for locals with a couple of cafes, two hardware shops, a bakery and two mini markets.  Some of the housing has been restored for holiday accommodation and there is a little tourist information office in the centre of the village but it doesn’t feel too much like a holiday destination.  Not at this time of year at least.

Soajo.

Cunhas village.

Shepherds still walk some of their cattle up through the town in the morning to their pastures returning again in the early evening.  Flat capped elderly men mingle in the village square and inside the cafes chewing the fat.  Black clad widows tend to washing or sit outside their front doors enjoying the warmth of the sun.

The aire at Soajo.

We enjoyed three days here at the excellent aire on the edge of the village with a view of the twenty or so espigueiros (grain houses) on the rocks overlooking the valley beyond.

The espigueiros at Soaja.

We frequented the cafe owned by Manuel who was born in the village but left at the age of fourteen to live in New York and work as a truck driver for forty years before returning to the village ten years ago.  He was a very modest chap shifting from foot to foot whilst telling us, in perfect English, a bit about his life and life in the village.  Or I should say poifect English as he had a New York/New Jersey twang.  Think Marlon Brando in The Godfather!

Lots of footpaths to choose from.

Fabulous granite footpath to Adrão.  You could see the tramlines worn into the stone over the centuries by ox carts.

Traditional corn stacks.

Not a bad spot for a coffee break.

Barrosa cattle.

We said a cheery Bomdia to anyone we met on our walks and one couple out tending their vines chatted to us in French telling us they had both been born in the village but had lived in Versailles just outside Paris for thirty two years and had returned to the village to retire.  I would have never expected I would be practising my French in a tiny Portuguese village.

Terraced vines.

A lovely young dog looking after her goats.  She was a real softy:)

It was hard to tear ourselves away from the area and in a way I wished we’d stayed longer but the need to press on south was strong as we only have a couple of weeks before we need to be in the Algarve for our next Helpx.

There are over fifty nineteenth century granite espigueiros in Lindoso village.

So onwards it was then to Portugal’s second city, Porto.  We stayed at the cheap as chips Campismo de Salgueiros campsite on the coast five miles or so south of Porto.  It’s a tad scruffy and has dated facilities but the welcome was warm, the showers were hot and it was just a mere three minute walk to the beach.  €7.10 a night with EHU, €4.75 without.  What’s not to like?

It was actually a great place to be and we could have spent a week there had we had more time as after you’ve done Porto there are plenty of cafes to frequent and beach walks to be had.  A bus would have taken us into Porto but as it was a lovely day we decided to walk in and get the bus back.  From the campsite it was about a two hour gentle stroll (the route doubles up as a cycleway too) along the seafront and along the banks of the river Douro into Porto and was an excellent way to arrive as it brings you in on the southern side of the river with splendid views across the water to the UNESCO Ribeira neighbourhood.

Time for lunch with views across to Porto old town.

The Rebeira district in Porto.

Handsome houses line the river.

We couldn’t have had a better day weatherwise and I think we saw it at its best.  I can’t say we did anything cultural (not unusual for us) as all we did really was poke about and mooch around in all the nooks and crannies that make these sorts of places fascinating to explore.

The tiling depicting the history of tranport at the train station.

We loved it and would definitely recommend it as a weekend city break.  You can take in a cruise on a barcos rabelos, one of the traditional boats used to take wine down the river from the Douro port estates or join a tour of one of the many port wine lodges or just drink it all in from one of the many pavement cafes lining the waterfront.

If we hadn’t walked into Porto we wouldn’t have discovered Afurada, a compact area of colourful fishermen’s houses about four or five streets deep behind the small marina on the south side of the Douro which wasn’t mentioned in our guide book.

We knew it was going to be something special when we saw the clothes drying area next to the river and the community washing tanks nearby.

The communal washing lines.

When we passed on the Saturday there was just one lady with a face mask on presumably cleaning the tanks with bleach but on the Sunday it was a hive of activity with washing being scrubbed, slapped and soaked in the tanks.  It’s amazing that this tradition still lives on.

The communal washing tanks in the Afurada fishermens village.

As the campsite didn’t have a washing machine we’d carried our washing the half hour walk to the nearest laundrette that morning and we’d been feeling mightily pleased with ourselves at getting three weeks worth of washing done whilst troughing pizza slices and pastel de nata’s from the Lidl next door.  That was our work for the day done!

Fishermen tending to their nets in the Afurada district.

Anyway, the Afurada was a joy to saunter around.

The traditional houses.

We’d arrived after the lunchtime rush but it was still pretty lively with the charcoal barbecues in front of the restaurants still in full flow so we stopped for some lunch.

I don’t really do fish but I had the sardines cooked on the grill.  I’d like to say I thoroughly enjoyed them but I’d really rather have had grilled courgettes!  Still it gave me my weekly dose of omega 3.

So, another week has gone by and we’re heading further south now to Coimbra.

Adeus!

North West Spain…. .

Our last visit to this part of Spain in April 2017 was but a fleeting one to take the ferry from Santander back to the UK.  We said then that we would come back at some other time and explore more of Northern Spain.  And here we are.  I was happy to be back here for no other reason than to stay at the ‘elephant aire’ again.  The toll free A8 motorway crosses right across this region close to the coast so it was just a mere six or seven kilometre detour.  Situated on the edge of the Cabárceno Wildlife Park this free aire is, we think, a great stop before or after the ferry or at any other time really.

This cow was completely non-plussed by our presence and didn’t even get up as we walked past.

We did get our walking boots out this time though and followed a path up the hillside which eventually crests the ridge of the hill for a superb view of the bay of Santander below and then further on for about a kilometre to a peak for more views across the countryside.

 

Views across Santander bay.

It was about a three and a half hour there and back trip and gave us just enough time go and see the elephants again before it got dark:)

 

I could have put that little one under my arm and taken it with me!

Santillana del Mar is billed as one of the most attractive towns in Spain with its collection of 15^th to 18^th Century stone houses.

 

La Colegiata in Santillana del Mar.

We had a beautiful sunny day to see it and there is no denying that it is an attractive village but it felt a little bit too twee and perfect, a tourist town with all the many associated restaurants, cafes, souvenir shops and coach parking areas.  Maybe we were having an ‘off’ day but it didn’t hold our interest for long.

 

Santillana del Mar.

Even though the Picos de Europa mountains were calling me (not so much Tim!) we could clearly see the white stuff on their peaks and we felt we’d left it a wee bit late in the year to explore them this time.  (Queue a huge sigh of relief from Tim).

 

The tide stops play on Playa de Meron.

We decided to stick to the coast instead stopping off at different points along the way and to enjoy a bit of coastal walking.

El Capricho in Comillas, designed by Antonio Gaudí , now a restaurant.  I did have to look up if that is where the word ‘gaudy’ came from!          

We’ve had mixed weather over the last week from warm sunny days to squally rain and one overnight storm where, once again, reinforcements were needed to retain possession of our roof vents.

Yep, that should do it.  (picture taken in the morning when the sun was back out again!)

New elastic hair bands were deployed and tightened, the suction cups were resucked and the washing line was affixed from skylight to toilet roll holder in the bathroom.  The belt, braces, stockings and suspenders approach.

Toilet roll holder s have more than one use!

We’d had a beautiful sunny day with a fabulous coastal walk but big black clouds loomed up late in the afternoon and we had a similar sleepless night to one we’d had in Greece last year where we thought we were actually going to take off.  Thankfully by the morning it had all blown itself out.

Universidad Pontificia overlooking Comillas.

You see some curious things when travelling to new places but tractor surfing is probably up there with extreme ironing.  We’d seen tractors on the beach scraping up the seaweed when we were in St Jean de Luz in France but in Spain they take it to the next level.  We were quite far away so the picture isn’t great but it all looked a bit dangerous.

Tractor surfing.

Three tractors with a comb like contraption attached to the back were being buffeted around in the surf whilst trundling back and forth into the waves dragging in the seaweed.

The seaweed comb thing.

We’d seen a lot of seaweed seemingly being used as mulch come fertiliser in the farmer’s fields but we’ve also seen it left in lots of little clumps on wasteground too.  I haven’t been able to find out anymore about it though so it will remain a mystery.

Seaweed in the fields.

Buzzard taking a break.

A traditional hay stack.

Another unexpected sight whilst out on a coastal walk was a spectacular blowhole on a little island off the coast.

The blowhole might not look much in the photo but it was pretty impressive.

The waves were crashing up the coast that day and we probably wouldn’t have seen it on a calmer day.

A closer view.

It’s a rugged coastline which reminded us of parts of the Cornish and Pembrokeshire coast.

You could be on the coast of Pembrokeshire.

There’s not a complete coastal path as such but there are plenty of coastal walks to be had using the towns as a starting point.

A brilliant day to watch the waves.

The seaside town of Ribadesella.

Cudillero.

I was like an excited puppy clambouring all over Cudillero up and down the steps and alleyways.  Much of it is quite rundown but I really liked it.

Cudillero from higher up.

You could easily spend weeks exploring the north west coastline but as inclement weather had been forecast we swung a left inland effectively chopping off the North West corner of the country.  We were into Galicia now and part of the Galician coast is called the Costa da Morte because of the number of ships pulverised against the rocks during stormy weather.  We didn’t fancy any more sleepless nights on a windswept coastline lying awake wondering if we would survive the night so thought it best to cut our losses and get further south.  We couldn’t leave this region without visiting Santiago de Compostela though.

The cathedral in Santiago de Compostela.

After the supposed discovery of the tomb of St James the Apostle (Santiago to the Spanish, Saint Jacques to the French) in the 9^th Century, Santiago became Europe’s second most important religious shrine after St Peter’s in Rome.  The cathedral is the showpiece of Santiago and at the heart of its medieval core and is mightily impressive but then the entire old town is impressive really.

Cathedral.

A tightly packed feast of narrow lanes, Plazas, squares, monuments and ancient churches all of which is pedestrianized.

The colonaded streets of the old town.

Our guide book says ‘uniquely Santiago is a city at its best in the rain’ and goes on to say ‘water glistens on the facades, gushes from the innumerable gargoyles and flows down the streets’.  Mmm, yeah right.  Water does gush from the innumerable gargoyles but quite often instead of flowing down the streets it drips down the back of your neck.

A dribbling gargoyle.

Still, we did enjoy our visit and planned on watching ‘The Way’ when we got back to the van just to get into the whole spirit of the El Camino de Santiago thing but then discovered we didn’t have it.  Doh!  I remember watching it a few years ago and was convinced we had it.  Ah well, we can download it another time.

Our penultimate stop in Galicia before we hit the frontier town of Tui on the Spanish/Portuguese border was the little fishing village of Combarro to look at the collection of Hórreos (stone granaries) on the seafront.  The town apparently has the largest collection of them in Galicia.  We arrived at the aire which has a view of the bay about a mile outside the town just as all he cocklers were returning with their hauls.

Coccle pickers returning with their haul at Combarro.

Traditional hórreos on the seafront in Combarro.

Raised above the ground on pillars to stop those pesky rodents getting at the contents.

So it was time to head for the Portuguese border.  Alas, the rain has followed us:(

Hasta pronto!

Biarritz, Bayonne and the Basque countryside…. .

Well, the continuous run of good weather we’ve been having for the last month finally broke last night.  We were lashed by continuous rain throughout the night which looks like it is set for the day so it’s time for a duvet day and a catch up on the blog.  We are more than happy to have a lazy day after a week or so of sightseeing and walking.  It’s a shame it’s the weekend though as a duvet day is just that little bit more enjoyable on a weekday. Especially a Monday.  But hey ho you can’t time the weather.

So leaving our final stop at Capbreton on the Côte d’Argent we continued south into the La Côte Basque heading for an aire at Anglet at the mouth of the river Adour from where we would be able to walk to Biarritz and Bayonne.  The aire was in an ideal location set below the road at the edge of the river away from the large seafront carpark.  It would have made for a perfectly relaxing couple of nights had we been able to actually get in to it.  Ah, the joys of over engineered machines.  After fifteen minutes of faffing, jabbing, prodding and poking the machine the barrier still wouldn’t budge.  By this time I’d paid twice and been harangued by two French couples simultaneously jabbering away at me in rapid fire French offering me the benefits of their wisdom on the workings of the machine.  I did thank them as they were only trying to help but I couldn’t concentrate on anything with them all talking at once.  The upshot was that the machine was supposed to print out three different tickets but only spat out two (well, four because I’d paid twice) which wasn’t the magic formula for opening the barrier.  Fed up by this point we reversed away from the barrier and decamped to the sea front car park.  Meh.

Ce n’est pas grave as the French would say as we still had an excellent couple of days soaking up the ambience of Biarritz and around for a spot of people watching.  Surfers were out enjoying the waves, families and dog walkers were out strolling in the sunshine and we were out observing it all.  We walked the four or five miles along the sea front to Biarritz which took quite a while as we were waylaid stopping to watch the surfers one side of the path and the golfers on the other.   Before going into decline in the 1950’s, Biarritz was the Monte Carlo of the Atlantic coast and a playground for monarchs and important shiny people but the rise of the Côte d’Azur in the 1960’s put paid to that.  Rediscovered in the early 1990’s by affluent Parisians and a new international surfing set it is now firmly back on the map.

Grande Plage, Biarritz with the restored 1930’s Casino behind the beach to the right.

Boasting six lovely sandy beaches it’s a great place to lose a few hours sitting at a beachfront cafe eyeballing the surfers.  It definitely has a glamorous but laid back feel to it although every inch of space on the promenade, beach and water is, I suspect, fiercely fought for in the height of the summer.

Soaking up the surfing vibe with a glass of vino on Grande Plage seafront. 

Bayonne, by contrast, the following day was all but deserted although it was Sunday.  Three miles inland from the coast Bayonne is small by city standards and the narrow streets of the old town are a pleasure to stroll around.  Attractive, tall half timbered buildings abound with the added attraction of the fourteenth century castle and the twin towers of the Cathedral.  The three mile walk along the river from Anglet was pretty unremarkable and a bit noisy and grim though so we made the return journey on the bus.

Bayonne.

St-Jean-De –Luz, purported to be the most attractive resort on the Basque coast, was our next stop.  We got to the small aire situated just outside the old town and shoe horned ourselves into a space.  Happy campers we were not.  Even though it’s less than a five minute walk to the centre of the town, harbour and beach it has nothing else going for it.  It’s tight for space and sandwiched between four lanes of traffic to the front and a busy railway line to the back.  If we were going to enjoy St-Jean then it was time to spend out on a campsite.  And we are soo glad we did.  For €18 with our ACSI card we had a sea view at Bord de la Mer campsite and it was a lovely two kilometre walk along the coast into town.

The view from the window at Camping Bord de la Mer, St-Jean-De-Luz.

With its safe, sandy beach, pretty plaza and upmarket boutique shopping it’s a popular spot for holiday makers but also being the only natural harbour between Arcachon and Spain St Jean is still a busy fishing port landing mainly anchovies and tuna.

St-Jean-De-Luz.

Having hugged the coast for the best part of two hundred kilometres it was time to head into the Basque hinterland for a few days before coming back to the coast to cross the border into Spain.  We based ourselves at an aire at the delightful knoll-top village of Sare as it looked like a good base for walking and we weren’t disappointed.  We took a footpath up the steep hill out of the village which gave us glorious views over the surrounding countryside.

View towards La Rhune from Sare village.

We weren’t heading anywhere in particular but just climbing up………..and up.

Climbing up one of the footpaths from the village.

We didn’t realise, until the path cut across the railway track, that a rack and pinion train built between 1912 and 1924 climbs the steep gradient up to the top of La Rhune, the last mountain top at 905 metres before the Pyrenees fall away down to the Atlantic.  We’d passed the station on our way to Sare but thought it was more a funicular thing with the train just going a short way up the mountain to clear the trees to give a nice view.  We were fortunate to arrive a few minutes before a train trundled along on its way down the mountain and we watched and waved as it passed.

Le petit train.

The train takes thirty five minutes to get to the summit at a sedate nine kilometres an hour.

The following morning we went to the station intending to go on the train but a sign up said that the summit was hidden under a blanket of cloud so we decided we didn’t want to pay €19 each not to be able to see our hands in front of our faces at the top.  Instead we went back to the aire at Sare and I decided to walk up to the top on the off chance that the cloud would clear while Tim pottered about in the van doing various jobs and sorting out some music ready for his next gig………whenever that might be.

One of the many Pottok ponies, a breed of rural pony living mainly in the Western part of the Basque Country, were freely roaming the hillsides.

Oh I’m so glad I made the effort to walk up as by the time I got to the top the cloud had lifted and I sat eating my lunch in glorious sunshine with a panoramic view.  Merveilleux!

View on the summit from my lunch spot.

I must have enjoyed it as I walked up again with Tim the next day.

Three trains on the track below (there is a passing place on the flat section of the track).

It was touch and go whether we’d see anything at the top but we surfaced into the sunshine above the cloud hanging over the summit and had our lunch under warm sunny skies.  Parfait!

On the top above the clouds.

A quick flit to the pretty village of Ainhoa, lined with seventeenth century houses, ten kilometres away ended our tour of the French side of the Pays Basque and our time in France before we pointed ourselves in the direction of the coast again heading for San Sebastián or Donastia to give it its Basque name.

The pretty village of Ainhoa where these houses have a ringside view of the Pelota court.

Hasta luego!

Bimbling in Brittany…. .

On the road again………. .  Whenever we have stayed put for more than a couple of weeks we always spend the first few days back on the road singing the first line of that Willie Nelson song ‘On the road again’.  We only sing the first line because that is the only line we know.  No matter, it makes us smile and keeps us happy.  And we are very happy to be back in the saddle as it were haphazardly making our way through Brittany.  In fact, Tim has been grinning inanely for the best part of the last week.  Even more so as the weather has improved day by day.

The boules have been broken out after a very long time in hiding.

We’ve had no particular plan other than to head in a more or less southerly direction as we have a couple of weeks of Helpxing booked in to start this weekend near Niort which is south east of Nantes.

It’s been a bit of a reminiscing tour as over twenty five years ago we spent three weeks cycle touring around the coast of Brittany from Roscoff to Concarneau and back taking in the Finistère coast to the west.  All we can really remember about it was after forty eight hours of continual rain in the second week and with everything soaking wet we caved in and hired a caravan for a week’s respite to dry out.  We really aren’t cut out for hardship.  Tootling about in the van this time it’s been a much more sedate and laid back affair.

Ah, happy days on a cycle tour of Brittany circa 1992.  Do you remember those towels Mum?!  We still used them for drying the dogs off right upuntil 2013!

I have to confess the bikes haven’t seen the light of day for quite some time.  When we were working at the campsite in Cornwall we’d started with good intentions to use the bikes for all our trips out including the weekly shop.  Yeah right, well that lasted for the first two weeks before we succumbed to going shopping in the van.  Unfortunately, an eight mile round trip to Lidl on the bike after a week’s work lost its appeal pretty quickly and we haven’t quite got the cycling mojo back again yet.  So it’s been a week of beach walking.

Beaches and estuaries galore in Brittany.

I’d forgotten how incredible the beaches are in Brittany.  Long ribbons of fine white sand broken up by estuaries and rocky headlands.  They are perfect for bracing walks when the tide is out.  You are spoilt for choice for aires and campsites along the coast and we have enjoyed parking up behind windswept beaches and being able to roll out of the van in the morning for a brisk walk before breakfast.

The perfect spot for an overnight stop – the little white dot in the middle above the sand is Ollie, our van.

One place we did remember from our cycling holiday was Concarneau with its 14^th Century walled town built on an island in the harbour and accessed by a bridge.  Alas, it’s sold itself out completely to tourism now with the compact interior lined with tourist shops and restaurants.  It’s still pleasant to explore and enjoy the views from the ramparts though.

The ramparts of Concarneau.

The town is also still a big fishing port with huge fish sorting sheds lining the harbour which we passed when walking in from the aire on the outskirts of the town.

The walk from the aire into to Concarneau.

Moving further south we pitched up for a night on an aire just north of Quiberon.  This spit of land was once an island and the West side of it is known as the Côte Sauvage although it didn’t look particularly sauvage when we were there as the sun was beaming with just a light breeze ruffling the grass.  It’s a busy stretch of coast line and appears to be very popular.  We walked along the coast into Quiberon itself and spent a very pleasant hour basking in the sun out of the wind sitting on the beach eating our picnic watching the sailing boats ply to and fro.

Lazy days indeed.  Tim can’t believe his luck.  Normally he lives in fear of my plans for him.  I’ve let him off the hook this week and he has been enjoying it to the fullest but deep down he knows it won’t last!

You know it won’t last Tim!

À la prochaine!

NC500….Durness to Duncansby Stacks…. .

Well, how lucky have we been?  Sun and clear skies have accompanied us on our journey north from Inverness to the top of Scotland.  It seems we picked the perfect window in the weather to explore a section of the NC500.  It was more an NC100 rather than 500 as we didn’t have time to do it all.  My nephew, who we met up with in Thurso, said he had never seen weather like it in the three years he has lived there.  Totes amaze!  We meandered along the section across the top of the Highlands from Durness in the west to Duncansby Stacks in the east before heading south for a few days in Edinburgh.  Now, I could blather on and on, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah about the spectacular scenery and beautiful weather but I’m not even going to try.  The pictures say it all.  So here they are………….

Looking towards the campsite at Durness, the most north westerly village on the British Mainland.

Remains of Balnakeil Church.

Balnakeil Bay.

Looking back towards Balnakeil Bay on a walk to Faraid Head.

 

Lunch stop at Faraid Head……….almost (the triangle of land at the headland is owned by the MOD so not accessible).  We could just make out Cape Wrath lighthouse in the distance.

Cairn on the top of the hill looking back to Balnakeil.

Looking out at the limestone cliffs at Smoo Cave.  

Ceannabeinne Beach.

Ard Neakie on Loch Eriboll.

Looking across the Kyle of Tongue to the Rabbit Islands.

The causeway crossing the Kyle of Tongue Loch.

This pig had fur not hair!

The incy wincy post office at Skerray.

Local produce for sale at the bus shelter near Torrisdale.

Thurso……….it had turned grey by then but was still dry.

The beach at Thurso.

Dunnet Head, a fantastic place to see Puffins close up.

Had to be done!

Duncansby Stacks.

So there we are, a fabulous week all round.

Next up, Edinburgh.

Feasgar math!

 

 

Sunny Skyes…. .

Well the Isle of Skye has certainly come up trumps with the weather.  Apart from one misty morning it has all been wall to wall sunshine.  So much so I’ve burnt the back of my knees. Doh!  The first thing that struck us when we arrived on Skye at the ferry port in Uig is that we weren’t going to have the island to ourselves.  I suppose that’s not surprising as it is said to be the most visited destination in Scotland.

We started our tour off on the Trotternish Peninsular north of Uig to do some walking in the Quiraing, an area famous for its rock pinnacles, sheer cliffs and rock formations.

Views from the top.

What a great couple of days walking we had amongst the rocks then up onto the top with far reaching views across towards the mainland.

Over the top.

The following day on another peak.

We saw several sightings of cuckoos perched on the rocks in those two days.  I tell you, from never having seen a cuckoo in the flesh before we have seen more than you can shake a stick at up here.

Long range shot of a cuckoo.

Further south towards Portree the Old Man of Storr, the most celebrated column of rock on the island, is a real draw for visitors.  We planned on an early shin up the hill and back before all the crowds arrived but with the clouds down over the hills that morning we didn’t see much.  The low cloud/mist did clear in and out but we didn’t think the Old Man was as spectacular as all the hype makes it out to be.

The Old Man of Storr.

The views on the way back down under the cloud line were impressive though.

Views on the way back down from the Old Man.

We’d started our walk at about  eight o’clock and it took about an hour and a half to get up there and back but by the time we got down the parking areas on both sides of the road were full and a steady stream of people were on their way up. It was time to move on!

We made a quick pit stop in Portree at the free long stay car park for a wander round the harbour area followed by the weekly shop at the Co-op there.

Portree Harbour.

The Co-op seems to have a monopoly on the Outer Hebrides and Skye as there isn’t really any other choice other than a few tiny mini markets dotted about.  It’s a shame because we’ve lost the will to live in every single one of them.  It’s not what they stock that is lacking but the fact that there always seem to be member’s of staff replenishing the shelves in virtually every single aisle taking up nearly all the space with cages of new stock and empty packaging all over the place.  All their shops seem to have narrow aisles making it extremely tedious to get round other shoppers and staff.  I don’t blame the staff as they are only doing their job but why can’t they restock when the store is closed or not a peak times?  Why?!  Even Tim who is normally patience personified has succumbed to trolley rage almost dumping a half filled trolley in an aisle and stomping off back to the van.  He probably would have done if he could have found a space in an aisle to park it.  Anyway, rant over.  And relax!

With clear blue skies and temperatures in the low twenties it was a chance to cook outside again.

Time for a few Scottish Reels with a sausage curry on the go.

I grant you it’s not often you would see sausage curry on the menu of an Indian restaurant but in the absence of any other form of meat it had to do.  Try it, we recommend it!

A spot of magnet fishing (a 2p and a 5p were the haul of the day)!

We walked the four miles or so from our overnight stop across open moorland to Dunvegan Castle, the seat of the Clan Macleod since the thirteenth century but at £14 each to go in we gave it a miss and had coffee and cake at Jann’s Cakes in the village instead.

A very relaxed Highland Coo.

Shop in Dunvegan village.

A walk through the woods from Dunvegan back to the castle.

The following day we cycled to Claigan Coral Beaches just north of Dunvegan.  The sand is made up of calcified maerl (seaweed) and tiny sea shells.  Our guide book says that ‘on a sunny day the white sands and aqua water could almost be the Carribean’ but that description is probably stretching it a bit as there wasn’t much aqua water to be seen as it was full of seaweed.

I wouldn’t say it’s quite the Carribean but very nice all the same.

It was a nice spot for lunch though.  I think we weren’t totally wowed by it after having experienced the beaches of the Outer Hebrides.

A big draw for walkers on Skye is the Cuillin mountain range which has over twenty Munros to be bagged.  The Munro baggers visiting Skye for the week must have been kicking their legs in the air on account of the clear blue sky weather we were having making for spectacular walking in the hills.  With not an OS map between us though we played it safe with a lovely circular walk around the coast of the Suisnish peninsular which gave us excellent views of the mountains in the distance.

Suisnish Peninsular.

Cuillin Mountain Range in the distance.

You can buy a holiday home like this one on Skye for £190,000.

Our final night on Skye we parked up at Kyleakin with a view of the bridge.  Whilst having a cup of tea with our door open a van parked up next to us with New Zealand flags adorning one of the windows.  A young lad appeared at our door to introduce himself and we spent the next hour or so hearing all about his travels.  At ten years old he is far more well travelled than we are having visited nearly every country in Europe.  He and his parents are on the last few months of an eighteen month tour of Europe before shipping back their van, which they’d bought in the UK, to New Zealand.  Marvellous.

Sunset below Skye bridge.

So that was Skye.  Again, we didn’t have time to see all that was to see but time is marching on and we need to get a move on.

Feumaidh mi ruith!

The Uists, Benbecular and Berneray…. .

Across the causeway from Eriskay brings you into South Uist, home to long, white, sandy beaches on the west coast and rolling peat moors, inlets and rocky hills on the east coast.  There are sooo many deserted beaches on these islands.  Waking up in the morning and rolling out of the van straight onto a sandy beach all to myself to do my morning exercise routine has been another highlight of our trip.  Swinging about a couple of little yellow dumbbells whilst watching sanderlings skitter up and down the shoreline or listening to a couple of terns squawking their displeasure at having unwanted company sure beats wiping down the sweat of the previous occupant on the equipment at my local gym before using it.  Of course I don’t do this routine every morning as I’m really not that disciplined but when I do remember to do it and make the effort it is always worth it…….even more so on an empty beach without curious onlookers making me feel acutely self conscious and ridiculous…….except on one occasion when two gorgeous coffee and cream coloured young bullocks watched me with expressions that distinctly said WTF?

A beach all to myself:)

After our first night on South Uist the fickle hand of the weather had us scuttling off to Lochboisdale on the other side of the island to seek some refuge from the wind which had battered us overnight at our exposed position right behind the beach.  As I’ve mentioned before high winds have us praying that our roof vents will still be intact when we wake up in the morning.  Being made of plastic they really aren’t the best and the wind manages to get under them constantly making them rattle.  Tim has solved the problem on three of them with a simple system of elastic bands and suckers to hold them in place but we have one which is a wind up affair with an integral fan within it which makes it impossible for that solution to work without taking it to bits and punching a hole through a fly screen.  On the second night of the ruddy thing rattling and constantly waking us up Tim got up in the early hours to deal with it.  I woke up a few hours later to find the temporary solution in place.  Mmm, not ideal but it did give us a few hours of uninterrupted sleep.

 

The temporary fix to the rattling roof vent.

Cable ties have sorted the little blighter out now.  We can’t open it or use the fan and the fly screen is in tatters but that’s the price we have to pay for a better nights sleep and it’s preferable to a hole in the roof.

 

Lochboisdale on not such a good day.

Once at Lochboisdale we found some shelter behind a couple of containers in the harbour and sat out the inclement weather until it was time in the early evening to visit the hotel bar, sit round an open fire and upload the last blog post.  As there are next to no trees on the islands I asked the lady behind the bar if it was expensive to import wood or coal.  She said they buy a tonne of coal at a time which a few years ago cost them £700 but now costs £1300 and they sometimes mix it with peat if they’ve cut any that year.  Peat used to be an important natural fuel source here on the islands but now electricity, oil and gas have largely taken over.

 

A couple of days later we were waylayed by the most perfect pile of peat we’d ever seen before.  It was a work of art I tell you.

The perfect peat pile.

We had to stop and take a photo of it.  The owner of the house was pottering about outside and after checking it was OK to take a photo he very happily answered all our questions about it.  He gathers it once a year from the moorland which has been allocated to him and it takes six people just one day to cut enough peat to supply his home with free energy for cooking, hot water and heat for an entire year.  After it’s cut it’ll take him three to four days of numerous trips to get it back to the house where he spends the next two weeks of his spare time building his masterpiece to dry it out before it can be used.  Marvellous.  The actual pile in the pictures is half of what it was and he showed us a framed picture of the completed work of art.

 

He also told us all about how the peat is cut and showed us the tools they use which he keeps submerged in water all year round.  We were so glad we stopped and it is good to see an old tradition alive and well.

Two consecutive days of clear dry weather had us out on the bikes again.  Apart from the punishing wind it really is a great place for cyclists and we’ve seen many a happy smiling cycle tourer blasting along with a tail wind heading north.  Those heading south are generally grimacing but I’m sure they’re enjoying every minute of it.  For us, as we are doing circular routes or out and back routes, it’s fifty fifty for the wind with or against us…..grimace on the way out and smile on the way back.

Loch Druidibeag.

Shetland ponies?  Not being a pony afficianado I wouldn’t know.

Overlooking Loch Sgiopoirt.

Shame about the car in front!

A novel way to hold down the wire netting covering the thatch.

A day of walking followed where we had intended to walk to Uisinis Bothy and back on the eastern side of the island but was curtailed when we realised, when the path fizzled out after an hour or so, that we’d taken the wrong fork earlier on so retraced our steps and spent a while listening to the birds over a long lunch overlooking the sea.

Peat cutting.

Striding out on the wrong path to reach the bothy…..or not reach the bothy.

Overlooking Loch Sgiopoirt again.

 

Ah well, back after retracing our steps to just relax and listen to the birds.  We saw two cuckoos here.  We’ve heard them often enough but it’s the first time we had actually seen a cuckoo in the flesh.

The cycle of the weather has been such that a couple of days of decent weather have been followed by a wet and wild one.  Either a library or a museum come in handy on those days.  The Kildonan Museum on the A865 is a very pleasant place to while away an hour or so followed by coffee and cake in the attached cafe.  It tells the story of Island life through its exhibits, collections and pictures.

Another restored croft house.

Benbecula gets quite an unkind write up by our guide saying ‘the only reason to come to Balivanich, Benbecula’s grim, grey capital, is if you are flying into or out of Benbecula airport, or you need an ATM or supermarket’. As the weather had closed in again with mist and drizzle I confess we did what most people probably do and that is drive straight across it to get to North Uist.  It is apparently pancake flat but we couldn’t tell as the mist denied us seeing it.  We did stop at the Co-op to do our weekly shop though to spread our spending on all the islands less one feel left out.

North Uist is more of the same landscapes as we had seen on South island but I don’t mean that in any disparaging way at all but I’m running out of superlatives to describe how fabulous these islands are.

Moorcroft Campsite on North Uist.  They’ve thought of everything here.  Well kept grounds, spotless facilities, campers kitchen,  washing machine, tumble dryer, bunkhouse and three little hobbit houses to hire. 

You see some curious things when out either walking or cycling.  From a couple of fields away, through the binoculars, I spotted a sheep with all four legs in the air.  I dimly remember reading something somewhere that said if a sheep is on its back then it’s not that way deliberately and will die if it’s not turned over.   Well we got to her and got her turned over but she was too weak to get up so we went to the nearest house to let them know.

If you see a sheep in this position it needs to be turned over.

The very friendly lady who answered went next door to talk to who she thought was the owner.  We didn’t linger around as there wasn’t anything else we could do so hopefully she was saved.  I looked it up later and, when the sheep is in the upside down position like that, it’s the gasses in their stomach from all that grass eating that swell up and eventually press on their lungs eventually suffocating them.  They don’t get into that position on purpose but it can happen if they are carrying lambs or their fleece is heavy with water.

Traigh Ear beach when the tide is out.

Another curious sight also involving sheep happened after we’d done a long walk around the peninsular at Granitote.  Traigh Ear beach at low tide is a vast expanse of hard packed sand.  Just as we were finishing our walk we watched a ewe with her two lambs trailing behind her wander down onto the beach.  She then just kept going.  And going .  And going.  She was on a mission.  She must have walked a mile or so to get to the grass on the other side of the bay.  Obviously ‘the grass is greener’ isn’t just a human thing after all.

Traigh Udal beach – that’s Tim in the middle above the seaweed line!

Later, when the tide had come in creating a vast expanse of knee deep water, the farmer with his dogs, rounded up his flock and walked them all down into the water where the dogs held them there for about ten minutes or so.  They were only in up to their knees so I doubt it was a swimming lesson. The dogs looked to be thoroughly enjoying racing around in the water making sure they kept together.  They then all ambled back up the beach to recommence eating grass.  Maybe the salt water stops them getting foot rot?

 

It was polystyrene but it was still quite heavy!

The final island before getting the ferry across to Harris is Berneray linked by a causeway to North Uist.

Berneray.

It is just a wee thing measuring two miles by three, with a population of just 140.  It is just delightful.  I think it could be my favourite island so far.  Mind you, that could be because the constant blasting wind we have had everyday had finally tempered down to a light breeze and we could actually hear the silence .  I even had a burnt face by the end of the day.  Sun burn in the Outer Hebrides.  Who’d have thought?

Restored Black houses.

The little museum run by volunteers tells the story of island life with hundreds of donated photos to peruse.  Seals bask off the rocks close into the shore without seemingly a care in the world.

Who couldn’t love a seal?

As our friend Chris would say………..happiness on a stick!

Time for a ferry ride to Harris and Lewis, the last island we’ll be exploring on the Outer Hebrides.

Feumaidh mi ruith!