All posts filed under: Camperstops

Stopovers 6 – Peniscola to St Chinian

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#51 Camping La Volta, Peniscola This stop was listed in Camperstops Europe as a five euro stopover but was actually a campsite with campsite prices (albeit very reasonable ones). Peniscola seems to have lots of cheapish campsites and although it’s an established beach resort, is not without its charms. There’s an absolutely huge stretch of sandy beach and a very pretty old town complete with hilltop castle as well as the usual resort distractions. We didn’t expect to love it, but we were surprised by how much we liked it. #52 Camperstop at La Casa de Fusta, Ebro Delta  This was a totally unexpected find and turned out to be a real highlight. The Ebro Delta is a fascinating place and the visitor centre, complete with camperstop, has plenty to offer everyone; a fantastic restaurant, punting, museums, wildlife watching, boating, cycling and plenty more. The camperstop is fully catered for and costs around 5 euros a night. There’s plenty of space and you can spot rare and exciting birds from the comfort of your van! …

Stopovers 5 – Velez Malaga to Alcossebre

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#41 Hotel Cotijo Bravo, Velez Malaga A rare treat made possible by the grandparents: marble baths; champagne at breakfast; gardens full of the scent of jasmine, lemon blossom and lavender along with helpful and patient staff made this an oasis of calm, comfort and cleanliness in the midst of our otherwise chaotic, cramped and crusty existence. All hail the splendour of Pam and Colin’s generosity! #42 Dave and Annie’s land – Posada Edith, Espino, Andalucia Yes it was a bit cold and grey while we were there but, as I said in this post, when you’ve got gin, movies, a log burner and fantastic folk, you’ve got the ingredients for a good stay anywhere. We were able to plug in Colin and the land was level, which made for perfect camping conditions. With Vera the Airstream for a neighbour, a misty view down the valley and a gang of waggy dogs to greet us each morning we could want for little else. Thanks Dave and Annie! #43 Camping Cabo de Gata, Almeria This place is …

Sky Mirrors – The Ebro Delta

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(if you’d like to hear a soundtrack to these pictures, go to the bottom of the page and click the You Tube vid.) Due to a bit of a mix up on our part, we found that we had longer to hang about after Bicorp than we thought. We’d arranged to go and visit a friend at Finca Slow, a permaculture/regenerative olive farming operation, but  somehow we’d got it into our heads that it was much further away from us, close to the French border. In fact, it is not far from Tarragona, south of Barcelona and only a couple of hour’s drive away. When it dawned on us (hanging about doing very little on the coast at that point) that we actually had about five days to kill, we were forced to do a bit of a re-think. In our usual haphazard manner, we looked at the book, and just picked a couple of places in the area to stop at. One of these places turned out to be the remarkable Ebro Delta. Allowing the …

A Magical Place called Bicorp

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Europe is well charted territory so it’s always exciting when travelling to come across a place that feels ‘undiscovered’. Bicorp was one of those places. We’d decided we wanted to move inland as we passed Valencia heading north and Camperstop Europe suggested there was a cheap place to stop over at Bicorp. We looked it up and saw that there were possibly some cave paintings and reckoned it would work out. A little while later as we drove up the side of a wooded mountain through a series of hairpin bends, I knew we’d done the right thing. Woods and greenery had not been a feature of our Spanish explorations up until that point. Dry, brown and somewhat barren had been the general trend and the experience of suddenly being deep in green was thrilling. I continued to be thrilled by Bicorp and its surrounding area. Although the town itself isn’t quaintly beautiful, there was something about it that gave me butterflies. It sits on a little rise of land surrounded on three sides by …

Stopovers 4 Merzouga to El Morreon

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#31 Kasbah Hotel Jurassic, Ziz Gorge We stopped here on our way north from Merzouga as I was insistent that we needed somewhere to break up the hours and hours of driving. I’ll be honest, it felt a little odd as we pulled in. There were no other motorhomes and the young man who moved the barrier seemed a bit bewildered by us being there at all. I wouldn’t be surprised if they hardly ever saw a motorhome, so eerily unaccustomed they seemed to having people stay at their campsite. Having said all that, the showers were amazing and the landscape too. It took me a while to realise just how stunning our surroundings were which made me worry we were starting to take it all for granted. We only stayed one night and when I went to pay the next morning they weren’t able to give me any change. It was a small amount so I said it didn’t matter. Then as we were driving out, the bewildered looking young man came out with …

Stopovers 3 – Essaouira to the Sahara

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#21 Fertile Roots After camping at the very peaceful Esprit Nature our next stop was at Fertile Roots. Quite apart from the terrifying drive down the track to find the place (I doubt any other motorhomers would have been daft enough to try it!) the land we were offered to camp on was itself a bit of a trial. The ground was uneven – so we constantly felt like we were on the wonk – and the wind blew dust into the van whenever we opened the door. Then the sand and cement dust that had gathered on us throughout the day got transferred into our beds making it all feel a bit gritty and grimy. On the upside, we were with some totally ace people helping them to achieve their permaculture vision which definitely outweighed the discomfort. My recommendation? If you fancy going to help Mark and Ajelen, unless your van is very nimble and agile, perhaps leave it somewhere else and walk down… #22 Cathedral Point, Imsouane This campsite is pretty laid back …

Stopovers 2

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Time has run away with me and I have not been keeping up with our stopovers! So here are the next ten as far as I can remember… 1. Camping Monfrague This was the first campsite mentioned in this post, that converted us to a more luxurious way of travel. It was positioned in a natural park and although in high season I imagine it might get a bit crowded, it was almost deserted while we were there. Great facilities and beautiful surroundings. Also horses, trees, azure winged magpies… If we hadn’t been trying to get South so quickly, we’d have stayed longer. The boys obviously found it such a relief to not just be parked in some bleak urban car park, that they danced and ran around singing ‘oh what a beautiful day! Everything’s going my way!’ 2. Camping Merida Not our favourite, but perfectly fine. We’d stopped in Merida as there were lots of Roman remains but unfortunately many of them seemed to be closed or not terribly easy to see. The bit of …