WEEK 3: San Pere Pescador, Spain to Castelnaudary – 326 miles
Saturday 6th April 2019 – San Pere Pescador, day 2
We like it here very much. We plan to spend the rest of the week here in the Costa Brava before starting our journey back north and towards home.
The weather this morning is better than last night. After the heavy downpour, we wake up to clear sunny skies. It’s only a short walk to the beach so we stick our shorts on and go for a walk.
It’s breezy today so despite the spring sunshine it’s still quite cold in the wind. We head back to the van and have a good game of mini-golf. Del wins, but really wins!
There is a nice little shop here so we get stocked up with some extra provisions, then a pizza and schnitzel at the camp restaurant.
Back at Jess, it’s nice in the sun and we get some shelter from the cool wind. It’s a lovely peaceful day. After a beer or two, we take another walk to the beach. The visibility is amazing, so clear, crystal clear and the Bay of Roses looks absolutely stunning.
Sunday 7th April 2019 – San Pere Pescador, day 3
We have a good long lie-in today, but once up we have a healthy breakfast, for a change, and we just potter around the van for the morning doing jobs that we have let slide over the past few weeks. It’s a cold wind blowing from the north, freezing but we are still in our t-shirts and shorts, but not the Spanish, they have their padded jackets and jeans on while huddling against the wind.
After lunch we get the bikes our and do a good long cycle ride from San Pere Pescador to St. Marti Empuries then on to L’Escala. St. Marti is nice.
It used to be a Roman enclave and still has lots of Roman ruins with the original mosaic flooring. Really good. L’Escala is a typical Spanish fishing town. A lovely place which has had some renovation work done along the front making it more pedestrianised, but other than that it’s still the same L’Escala. In total a 24km bike ride! Good.
L’Escala is famous for its anchovies so we are on the lookout for some, unfortunately, the best shop that does them is closed… No matter we head for the front and have a nice ice cream, sitting looking at the bay and the snow-covered peaks of the Pyrenees. It’s that clear.
A lovely dinner back at Jess followed by another walk to the beach to look at the spectacular bay.
Tomorrow we are moving on to another place that we used to frequent on the boat.
Monday 8th April 2019 – San Pere Pescador to Cala Montgo. 9 miles
This morning the weather has cleared up some more, but there is still a cool wind blowing.
After breakfast we pack up and service Jess with fresh water, empty the grey water and refresh the toilet. Today it is a staggering 9 miles, 20 minute drive to a bay that we used to anchor in called Cala Montgo. We used to go there and anchor in the bay in the hot sun, bobbing about, using the tender to go ashore to buy pizza and ice-cream to bring back to the boat. We had some lovely overnight anchoring there, so today let’s see what its like on land. Being April places are still closed, so it’s very quiet and cool. We shall see.
The campsite is nice and quiet, not many people here, we get a nice pitch and settle in. We go for a walk to the bay and have a beer and reminisce. It looks very different now, the weather, the sky etc. all make it look different. Still nice though. We are looking for lunch and find a restaurant doing a menu del dia (menu of the day). We find one doing a paella and sepia for 18 euros. It’s cold so we head back to the van to get our coats and head back out but Hayley decides to make her own paella instead. We have a delicious paella outside in the sun, sheltered from the cool wind. It was wonderful, really tasty and really comfortable.
We are visited by a bird, which we toss little bits of bread to. Tiny little friendly thing with one leg! Poor thing.
Tuesday 9th April 2019 – Cala Montgo to L’Estertit. 15 miles
Heavy rain last night, very heavy. The weather is not great today. According to the forecast, it will be damp all day. No matter, we have a lovely breakfast of coffee and pastries at the camp cafe and once we are cleaned up and packed we move on to L’Estartit. Another short drive.
The campsite is supposed to be a similar rating as the Aquarius campsite in San Pere Pescador. No way… It’s a bit scruffy in parts and some of the shower/toilet blocks are not working. The site is also at the scruffy end of the town which is a bit of a walk away. There are other like-minded Brits here, escaping the UK and its Brexit woes.
Once settled in we walked around the camp. It’s okay but nothing like the camps we have been to in Costa Brava so far.
It’s a long wet walk to the town as we get the odd shower of rain. It’s cold too. We walk to the marina at the other end of the town and have a beer before doing the walk back. It starts to rain again. Oh well.
Wednesday 10th April 2019 – L’Estertit to San Pere Pescador. 20 miles
We are going to do a part turnaround today. Not far though. We are going back to the Aquarius campsite, the good one, the nice one. We have quite a pile of laundry building up so it will be a good place to get that done. It’s sunny but with good wind. We will probably do another day or two here. We shall see.
We get a different, quieter spot this time, with lots of space to get our washing line strung out as we take turns going to the washing machine. We will get the washing dry today. It’s windy today, very windy. Oh, and a pigeon manages to drop a poo on some of our clothes. Nice.
Thursday 11th April 2019 – San Pere Pescador, Spain to Castelnaudary, France. 141 miles
The weather is not good this morning, it’s very windy, fierce. The skies are grey and threatening. Not what was forecast? During breakfast we make the decision to get some miles under us today and move on, the weather is not great. The campsite is great, but there is only so much you can do here, so we say goodbye to the Aquarius Campsite. We liked it here. A very nice place.
Hayley gets the maps and books out and sets us a route to leave the Costa Brava and make our way north again, back through France and towards home. We have only been here for a week, it took a week to get here but it has been worth it.
The wind is fierce as we drive over a bridge that is exposed to the wind straight from the coastal town of Leucate which is wide open from the sea and the wind funnels up to the road at high speed. Nasty. It’s so strong that Jess is getting really pushed about on the bridge.
Del is at the wheel and doing a good job of keeping Jess in a straight line. We are heading to the town of Castelnaudry that is responsible for giving us a tasty French dish called cassoulet, a nice hearty stew, probably something that we need.
We are using another Camping Car Park, which uses a card an a barrier, very neat, very simple. We first met this system in Capdenac. By the time we get parked the weather has turned cold and grey. We are having a bit of trouble with the alarm showing errors, so we start to swap out door sensors and have a phone conversation with he manufacturers, Vanbitz. After a while and a bit of fiddling we are all up and working and Jess is secure again. All done in the rain.
We set off, it’s cold and damp, but we brave the weather and set off. We are located in a town which has France’s biggest canal basin located on the Canal du Midi. It’s massive and we are really close to it, but it’s so so cold. We have had enough and go back to Jess, we are soaking wet and cold. We get the heating on and soon thaw out. It’s not nice out there. Hayley looks up the best restaurant in town so that we can try some of this cassoulet. The best in town is closed but the second is open, Restaurant Chez David.
At 7:30 we step outside again, it’s stopped raining, at last, but it’s still chilly. We arrive at the restaurant which is small and cosy. It all looks very charming but has a small twist in that the waiter is a big skinhead with tattoos and the music playing is death metal, it’s not loud, but they are playing it all the same which is unusual. Hayley has a flambeed camembert,
Del a salad. We both have the cassoulet which was brilliant. Very rich, very heavy, so much so we can’t eat it all and we are offered a doggie bag (sac de chien?) to take the rest home. There was a little room for a Del to have a creme Catalan! Hayley is not sure about cassoulet. It’s a bit ‘meaty’. She says.
The walk back to Jess was cold and wet. By the time we got back to the van, the rain was heavy. We got back just in time. We are tired now and full…
Friday 12th April 2019 – Castelnaudary to Caumont-sur-Garonne. 143 Miles
Finally we wake up to sunshine. What a relief, the rain was getting us down a little. Today we are going to Caumont-sur-Garonne, we are going to a free aire there. We set off and after many hours of driving and some dodgy roads, (that’s what you get if you avoid the expensive motorways) we arrive at our next stop. It’s a long day but the drive is very pretty.
We drove through lots of lovely countryside, vast expanses of bright yellow rapeseed fields, green pastures and tree-lined roads. The French countryside is beautiful.
Once we get parked up we need some exercise after being sat down driving all day. It’s nice, the sun is out, it’s cool but the fresh air and the cycling brighten our day. Dinner tonight? The doggie bag from last night with a salad…! Yum…
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