Where's Bertie? He's in a parking area high up above some nudist beaches in between Almuñécar and Nerja (exact location: 36.74784, -3.77745)
Weather: Wall-to-wall sunshine and warm enough for shorts and t-shirt except when in both the shade and the wind.
Today has flown by! By our standards, we have been busy. I was out for a run before the sun came up...
Snaps from this morning's run - up the river, along the seafront then a detour up to 'The Rock Viewpoint' for a view of the less-attractive back side of the town.
...and by the time I got back Mick had Bertie ready to roll, so all I needed to do was to have a quick wash and throw my running gear in the wash bag, and we were off.
The first stop was all of 1.5km distant: a petrol station with a laundrette on its forecourt (one of the 'laundry in a glass container' rather than of the al-fresco variety). It seems frivolous to be doing laundry this early in a trip, but we hadn't got enough water to rinse the running gear through by hand, and we weren't parked in a place where I would have considered it acceptable to hang washing out, so the laundrette it was.
An hour later everything was washed and dried, and I had belatedly breakfasted (the glass-box of a laundrette had two reserved parking spaces right outside, so I could watch the washing going around whilst I ate in the comfort of Bertie). Lidl was the next port of call, to get everything on the list that I'd written for the intended shopping trip last Friday.
With Bertie's fridge looking much healthier (and finally with some fresh oranges in the boot; 4kg should keep us going a few days!), off to Almuñécar we went.
Our destination there was the main car park and we did have some concern that it may be full at noon on a weekday. It was certainly busy, but Bertie found a suitable space and after coffee, crossword and first lunch, we headed out to have a look at the town.
The seafront boasts an impressive array of stunningly ugly buildings, and at least one of the cafe/bars serves decidedly mediocre coffee, but the viewpoint at the end of the promeade was worth the climb.
The photo doesn't do justice to the glorious colour of the sea, nor to the ugliness of many of the apartment blocks.
Next was a walk through the old town and whereas our guidebook describes it as 'attractive' we weren't that taken with it. It's not unattractive, but it's not anywhere near as pretty and interesting as others through which we've wandered (such as Solabreña two days ago). We eventually found the top of the old town - a pretty square which was probably the best feature we saw in the place. What we'd expected to find up there was the castle, but it turns out the castle is slightly lower down. We soon navigated our way to it, but I've apparently not learnt my lesson about checking the opening times of castles before visiting them:
Is it going to become a theme of the trip: photos of closed castle gates?
There didn't seem to be anything left to hold our attention in Almuñécar and the main car park was the sort of place that we would have stayed had there been a reason for us to remain in the town, but it wasn't attactive and didn't look promising for a quiet night.
That's how we came to find ourselves in this large parking area just off the coast road. There must be a way down to the nearest beach from somewhere hereabouts to justify all of this marked-out parking in such a remote location, but I didn't find it when I went out to investigate earlier.
Looking down towards what Google Maps tells me is a nudist beach (talking of which, we espied some naked people at Almuñécar. They were secreted between some rocky outcrops on the beach and perhaps unaware that they were visible from the viewpoint above).
(*Just one last observation about Almuñécar: there are more estate agents in that town than I've ever seen in one place before, by quite a margin. There must be an incredible number of properties for sale.)
Weather: Wall-to-wall sunshine and warm enough for shorts and t-shirt except when in both the shade and the wind.
Today has flown by! By our standards, we have been busy. I was out for a run before the sun came up...
...and by the time I got back Mick had Bertie ready to roll, so all I needed to do was to have a quick wash and throw my running gear in the wash bag, and we were off.
The first stop was all of 1.5km distant: a petrol station with a laundrette on its forecourt (one of the 'laundry in a glass container' rather than of the al-fresco variety). It seems frivolous to be doing laundry this early in a trip, but we hadn't got enough water to rinse the running gear through by hand, and we weren't parked in a place where I would have considered it acceptable to hang washing out, so the laundrette it was.
An hour later everything was washed and dried, and I had belatedly breakfasted (the glass-box of a laundrette had two reserved parking spaces right outside, so I could watch the washing going around whilst I ate in the comfort of Bertie). Lidl was the next port of call, to get everything on the list that I'd written for the intended shopping trip last Friday.
With Bertie's fridge looking much healthier (and finally with some fresh oranges in the boot; 4kg should keep us going a few days!), off to Almuñécar we went.
Our destination there was the main car park and we did have some concern that it may be full at noon on a weekday. It was certainly busy, but Bertie found a suitable space and after coffee, crossword and first lunch, we headed out to have a look at the town.
The seafront boasts an impressive array of stunningly ugly buildings, and at least one of the cafe/bars serves decidedly mediocre coffee, but the viewpoint at the end of the promeade was worth the climb.
Next was a walk through the old town and whereas our guidebook describes it as 'attractive' we weren't that taken with it. It's not unattractive, but it's not anywhere near as pretty and interesting as others through which we've wandered (such as Solabreña two days ago). We eventually found the top of the old town - a pretty square which was probably the best feature we saw in the place. What we'd expected to find up there was the castle, but it turns out the castle is slightly lower down. We soon navigated our way to it, but I've apparently not learnt my lesson about checking the opening times of castles before visiting them:
There didn't seem to be anything left to hold our attention in Almuñécar and the main car park was the sort of place that we would have stayed had there been a reason for us to remain in the town, but it wasn't attactive and didn't look promising for a quiet night.
That's how we came to find ourselves in this large parking area just off the coast road. There must be a way down to the nearest beach from somewhere hereabouts to justify all of this marked-out parking in such a remote location, but I didn't find it when I went out to investigate earlier.
(*Just one last observation about Almuñécar: there are more estate agents in that town than I've ever seen in one place before, by quite a margin. There must be an incredible number of properties for sale.)
Your planning and research must make life easier (most of the time.) I wonder how other motor home folk less experienced or disinclined to do the research manage finding overnight spots, water facilities and the like.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, I have now lost several comments when pressing the "publish' button only to be sent to an error page with my comment then vanished. I go back, do it again, make a copy for pasting then try again and after a couple more goes or so it gets published. I'm just making a copy of this one now.
That sound rather tiresome with the comments. A few days ago I was getting email notififcations of comments, but they were all blank. The following day they were working properly again. It makes me wonder what Google is tinkering with in the background.
DeleteThe question of how others go about research isn't something I'd considered, but thinking about it now, I reckon that everyone with mobile internet access will be using mostly the same Apps and resources as I am. Those with just books as reference points must either do a lot of driving around, or (more likely) stay mostly at only official, listed, motorhome parking areas and campsites.