Category: Uncategorized
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L’Ametlla de Mar – Vertigo Enhancing Tracks over the Sea, Underground Poseidon Fields and a Real Fishing Town
Our first glimpse of L’Ametlla is not a postcard pretty one, the AP7 motorway and railway run against the back of the town and concrete apartments. But the minute we see Camping Nàutic we’re won over. The terraced campsite is shaded by Mediterranean pines and olives, and it looks out on a sea that deserves…
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Arnes –Catalonia’s Els Ports National Park – Biblical Thunder Storms, Gorges and Rushing Rivers
We drive beside the Ebro Valley’s green waters from Tortosa, but sheer drama builds as we climb up into the Alta Terra, the Els Ports National Park, on the border between Catalonia and Aragón. Rust-coloured cliffs are sculpted by the elements into obelisks, cones, and mysterious giant creatures. As we near Arnes, the mountain crags…
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Esponellà – Catalonia’s Hidden Gem
Our friends Mary and Martin recommend Catalonia’s Camping Esponellà near Figueres. We wind up into the Pyrenean foothills leaving the bustle of city far behind. Our first sigh of Esponellà is the pinkish rocks of the River Fluvia’s Gorge, our next, the honey stone village on the summit of the hill, the church tower…
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Villeneuve-lès-Béziers – Cycling the Canal du Midi to the Mediterranean and an Ornithologist’s Dream
We arrive at Camping Les Berges du Canal, and it does just what its name says, the canal with its green waters, barges and rampant wildflowers runs right outside it. The banks are lined with plane trees. Béziers lies 5 kilometres along the cycle track, and its cathedral comes highly recommended so why do I…
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Why it’s impossible to zoom through France – From Dieppe to the Med’s Béziers
The plan is to bomb through France to Catalonia for our Spring tour. The minute we park up in Dieppe at Aire Camping-car Dieppe, there’s the usual magic, with the lights from the narrow restaurants reflected in the port’s waters, the masts of the sailing boats, the ghostly chalk cliffs, and Notre-Dame de Bonsecours looking…
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Dorset – Abbotsbury’s Swannery, South West Coastal Path and Sub-tropical Gardens
I scoot across to Portesham’s farm shop and café from the campsite. It serves good bread, British cheeses, vegetables without a piece of plastic in sight, along with the kind of incongruous nick-nacks that are endemic in all farm shops – cow mugs, primrose and poppy tea towels. After stocking up, we’re off on the…
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Dorset’s Abbotsbury – Smugglers, Saints and Bouncing Bombs
The roller-coaster, coastal B3157 takes us from Dorset’s Bridport to Portesham, above the golden spit of shingle that is Chesil Beach. We drive through buttered stone Abbotsbury and on to our campsite at equally buttery Portesham Village, both gifted by Danish King Canute to his steward, Orc, in the 11th Century, evidence of how porous…
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The Pastoral Idyll of Rural Devon
We find ourselves on a bit of grandparent duty in Devon’s Exminster. But camping up in Crablake Farm is anything but a duty. Imagine rolling green hills; apple trees bent sideways; daffodils in lemon and gold. Just over the hill there’s the Exe Estuary in all its moods. We ramble along high-hedged lanes to Kenn,…
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Pocket Friendly ways to while away the time on the Euston Road and a traditional Italian Restaurant in Paddington
We always think of major cities as pocket heavy destinations. Euston Road bucks the trend. First there’s Gothic St. Pancras Station and hotel, which takes opulence to its extreme and is great for a drink, or to take in the poet, John Betjeman’s statue, or the giant soldier kissing his partner farewell. Free entry…
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Street Art, Street Food, An Independent Bookshop and the Driverless Ghost trains of the Postal Museum at Mount Pleasant
We double back on ourselves today so we’re whisked into Whitechapel again from Abbey Wood to hunt down Hanbury Street, which crosses Brick Lane, to trace the street art. Huge outdoor murals have us darting from one to the other. The most gripping for me being the close-up of a man’s sad face, lines like…
Campervan Therapy 