To Spain and back Part Two

I left the first part of this story Mataro, but what I forgot to tell is the story of the Ladies of the Road.  After we had crossed the border into Spain and left the small town, which straggles it, we started to see at every patch of land at the side of the road, which would take a vehicle, a lady rather scantly dressed sometimes with a chair but always with a parasol or umbrella.  The description scantly dressed has to be taken literally as passing one lady on our left who had her back to the road, had as Barbara quickly pointed out saying “She’s got no knickers on”.  Too late for me to take a second or even a first glance, we were past and she was gone, but then on my side as we came up a hill and round the bend at the top there was another one, sat on a chair parasol up shading her from the hot sun, I will remember this apparition to my dying days.  Never have I seen in all my life a more ugly woman certainly age wasn’t on her side granted, but neither were looks.  I have seen better looking masks being sold at Halloween than the face she was damned to wear.  How she made a living I have not the faintest but she was out there trying god bless her.  The ladies kept on showing their wares for the next ten to fifteen miles, then, there were no more that part of the show was over.

At Mataro we booked in at Camping Barcelona for two nights using the ACSI card as normal, we were now becoming used to just turning up and booking in for how ever many nights we required.  This site however was not as good as the ones we had stayed on in France, it was grubby and not well kept, and the pitches were to say the least rather cosy.  But hey, we were only there for two nights.  We had a wander down to Mataro on the following day for a look round, not too bad a town and the promenade was like most Spanish Costa’s.

We were heading for Denia as our next destination, so decided to use the AP7/E15 toll road to try to speed this along little, A little way past Castello de la Plana we came to a service area and pulled in to have a brew, as Barbara busied herself sorting out the food and drink I had a wander round the outfit checking nothing was a miss.  Oops!  Puncture on the drivers side caravan tyre, I had not felt a thing, luckily the wheel rim wasn’t damaged but the tyre was starting to shred so it was a very fortunate timing that we were ready for that brew.  One thing I had done before we had started out on this trip was to tackle taking out the spare from under the van.  If you have never had to do it, then, do it at the very first opportunity you get because it can be a pig of a job.  I had also invested in a trolley jack curtsey of Lidle, not the lightest item to carry but big and stable enough to lift a laden caravan.  Three quarters of an hour later we were ready for the off, wheel changed and a call made to Red Pennant for the address of the nearest tyre repairer south of our position.  Once more as in Bicester they more as much use as a chocolate teapot and gave me the address of repairer in Castello de la Plana north of our position.  A look at the map showed a town called Moncofa which in the ACSI book had a campsite.  Off we rolled at junction 49 into Moncofa to the site of Touristico Mon Mar.  We explain our problem of needing a tyre fitter at the reception desk, we were over heard by a fellow Brit who explained exactly where a fitter was to be found because he had been in a similar situation the previous year.  The next day found us lugging the wheel into the workshop of the fitter, to be told by a very nice man that the tyre was kaput and that we needed a new very bouncy tyre to take the weight of the caravan which he could supply at the earliest next day at a cost of 96€ fitted and balanced.  We accepted and repaired to the nearest supermarket to purchase a couple of bottles of wine to while away the time back at the site and also do a spot of sunbathing. 

We can recommend this site and given the opportunity I would return without hesitation, I believe the C & CC run winter holiday rallies here if any one is interested it maybe worth checking out.  The cost per night while we were there was 13€ using the ACSI card.

The following day we collected the wheel complete with new tyre, inflated to 50 psi or as our new best friend the tyre fitter insisted on calling psi, pissy, much to his and our amusement.

As we hadn’t made Denia as intended we decided to give it a miss having lost a day due to the puncture and instead headed for Cartagena and the site of Los Midreles at Isla Plana.  This looks to be an interesting area, the campsite is mainly used by German and Dutch but is on a very steep hill with terraces off both sides of the road and the pitches are more than a little cosy, the only way to site the van on the pitch was to use the mover as there wasn’t room to reverse on to the pitch.

The story, if you’re interested will continue in part three, the journey to Coin.