Oldies On Tour

Wednesday 27th September 2023

After a quiet, undisturbed night we woke in this big carpark, all on our own, wonderful and let the two dogs out to do their business; we’ve definitely cracked it!!   Today we start the big “catch-up” in Campoverde.   Apart from catching up with friends etc., we have other important things to do, such as visit the dentist and get Christine’s nails done not to mention haircuts, but firstly we’re enjoying our carpark environment whilst having breakfast.

Driving through Pilar and up to Campoverde, not having been here for a year, we notice the changes, and there were a number that perhaps living here one misses.   

We had arranged to meet Paul Butterworth for coffee this morning and though it was great to meet up again, it was very sad as Paul had very recently lost his wife Sharon after a valiant fight against cancer.   We then met up with Mary Sturgess and had lunch at Juanita’s before returning to our “new” favourite campsite.

Again we could park in the same position where the dogs can just run out, do “things” and get back in, but first the beach.    Today the temperature is 30-degrees, so a trip to the beach and a swim in the sea is essential and again the moment the dogs were “unleashed” they were in the sea closely followed by Christine and I. 

Having been out to lunch today supper was a bowl of fruit!!! Followed by Christine taking the “two” out for another beach walk, but no swimming!!!

Thursday 28th September

Our plan for a good and undisturbed night’s sleep backfired; around midnight there was some unwanted activity in the car park so I closed the window rather noisily which unfortunately disturbed the the dogs who didn’t settle and about 0100hrs uncharacteristically decided it was time to get up and wanted to go out.   Once they had been let out they were “full of beans” and wouldn’t come back leaving poor Christine outside trying to “round” them up.   To compound the issue we set the alarm for 0700hrs as we had to be back in Campoverde in time to join the Crib group.

We rocked up to Jim and Hazel’s and joined in with the crib; it was as if we hadn’t left!!!   It was good catching up with everybody and even met a couple new crib players.   It is nice to know the weekly crib get together is still prospering under Jim and Hazel’s guidance; we will be back next week👍👍

After lunch and a trip to Mercadona we headed to meet up with Martin and Jackie, our old neighbours, again it didn’t seem 5-minutes since we said good bye last September.  Visiting them means driving is a no-no so planned to stop in the new part of Campoverde by the park rather than drive back to Lo  Pagan.   Whilst there  ChristIne went to “George’s” the Village vet to organise the dogs worming and complete the necessary paperwork to get them back into the U.K. 

After a very convivial couple of hours we left, tomorrow they both have hospital appointments so couldn’t drink and had early starts; hopefully we’ll meet up again before we leave.

We headed to our overnight stop and whilst Christine sorted dinner I took the dogs to the special “dog park” adjacent to us.   The mission is simple; “wear the buggers out”!!!!

Tuesday 26th September

Up early after another undisturbed night’s sleep, the secret is exhausting the pooches by the end of the day and throwing the ball into the pool certainly did that!!  Where Martin lives, it is on a very narrow, no through road on the side of the mountain with a big drop one side and overgrown individual “rocky” building plots on the other. When we arrived we drove Rosie in knowing we would have to reverse her out as there is nowhere to turn her, another reason to start early!!!

At the agreed time we reversed out, Martin marched down his steps and we were away.  Alicanté airport is just over an hour away by car but in Rosie and with people heading for work, probably a little longer.

A good run to the airport and we dropped Martin off in plenty of time to catch his ‘plane.  We now headed towards Guardamar, we seem to remember motorhomes parking up there and besides we know a “cracking” restaurant called “Canada” that do excellent “Menu Del Dia’s”; Christine even found a free place to park-up, win-win.

We arrived at the site, it’s not free, not in Guardamar, and nowhere near the restaurant and besides the site reminded us of the one we spent a night at in Peniscola, so we headed off.  After some consideration we decided we would head to the car park near Lo Pagan just outside “Puerto San Pedro” alongside the beach, amongst the San Pedro salt-pans. 

We arrived early afternoon and although the car park was fairly busy, we found a place to  stay; result!!   It was another hot day and the dogs had been cooped up for many hours so the first thing Christine did was take them down to the beach where they immediately took to the water and ran around like a couple of lunatics, but enjoyed themselves.  Later the car park thinned out so by “deduction” we assumed the beach wouldn’t have so many people on and headed on down.   Again the dogs took to the water but this time Christine and I were dressed accordingly so went in with them as well; we all had a great time and the sea was nice and warm, this was followed by a walk along the beach.

Back in Rosie Christine cooked a roast dinner tonight, quite a remarkable achievement in such cramped conditions.   Whilst enjoying the roast there was a beautiful sunset, we’d forgotten about these!    After dinner another walk along the beach; (we want another quiet night) before a couple of games of crib then bed at which point we turned ‘em out again for their last opportunity, and by which time they were “dead on their feet”, hopefully another good undisturbed night’s sleep🤞🤞🤞

Monday 25th September

What a good night’s sleep and thanks to everyone for entertaining Tom-Tom and Rosie yesterday; the ball thrown into the pool and them fetching it so many times did the trick, no disturbances until 07.00: wow!!!

Another day of leisure with no driving but first a quick trip down to Xalo for a few bits and pieces and whilst out, Martin and I took the opportunity to enjoy a tostada accompanied by a coffee and a brandy, my first Soberano in Spain since last September 😁😁😁.  I took numerous bottles back to the U.K. last year and “eked” them out but it never quite “touched” the right spot!!!   

The rest of the day was spent as before, by the pool, and again relentlessly throwing the ball into the water, over and over again to wear the “buggers” out!!    Another reason to “sort” them out is that Martin is taking us all out tonight, so we don’t want the dogs destroying his house whilst we’re out!!!   Being a Monday many restaurants are closed but there is a new one that has recently opened in Alcalali, so that’s where we are off to later, but first, keep throwing the ball and keep the wine coming!!!

Naturally the time flew by and suddenly it was all rush to get out in time.  The restaurant is in walking distance but the journey is down a very steep hill and of course you have to walk back up; fortunately Martin took the car so my knee didn’t have to suffer, mind you Christine did walk down!!

We arrived at Lulah’s, surprisingly on time and our table for 7 was all ready.  The interior of this restaurant was quite unusual and there was plenty of staff and reasonably busy.  We ordered a round of drinks which was fine but we also ordered a a couple of bottles of Cava  that seemed to “flummox” our young waiter; he got quite confused!!!    Still the evening progressed well, birthday boy was toasted and the food was nice so everything worked out well.   The youngsters headed back up the hill on foot and the oldies took to the car!!!!

Back at the house we said our goodbyes as the youngsters were no doubt going to party and we had to be up early to take Martin to the airport.

Sunday 24th September, 2023

What a night, as expected the dogs disturbed us several times during the wee hours; not much sleeping took place in Rosie!!!   So another early start with breakfast on the “hoof”; today we are heading to Martin’s house in Alcalali but first we had to extricate Rosie from this postage stamp pitch with a very narrow service road.   Going in last night was reasonably easy but we always knew getting out was going to be a bit of a “caper” with everything being so tight and having to go back the way we came, “and” to make things worse there was a nasty drop and a rather large tree came into play.   Anyway with much “to-ing and fro-ing” and the help of a couple of other motorhome owners, probably for self-preservation reasons, we eventually got out, and not a moment too soon; awful place👹

We couldn’t get to Martin’s too early as he was collecting his son Russell and his girl friend with another couple of his friends from the airport, so we took our time.   We stopped for a coffee break and a lunch break, all very civilised.

Russell is Christine’s great nephew and is 21 on Monday, so instead of having a party he elected to be at the house in Spain for a couple of weeks, hence our visit.   

We duly arrived, and before we got to the top of the steps,Tom-Tom and Rosie were in the pool, no pleasantries, just leaped straight in!!!   We spent the afternoon around the pool, swimming and drinking followed with a bar-b-q, a very pleasant and sociable time was had by all.  

This evening’s match is Wales V Australia and it’s on at 2100hrs, an important game as the winner would determine which other country progresses to the quarter finals with Wales.   So after much sun, wine, G & T’s and further wine we sat down to watch the game and I promptly fell asleep; I just couldn’t keep my peepers open, I was knackered together with much booze, at half-time we called it full-time, and headed down to Rosie for the night.