From Calais to Estepona

I am covering this section of our trip in one posting, mainly because every day was pretty well the same. Future posts hopefully will be on a daily basis.

Monday 4 January – started wet and miserable, and also dark, which set the pattern for the next few days. We decided that, as the weather didn't look promising we'd make the effort to push on with a view to getting into the sunshine as soon as possible. To save time we used the toll road as far as Abbeville, where the sun made an appearance and stayed with us more or less for the rest of the day. From hereon we used ordinary roads on our usual route through Rouen, Evereux, Chartres and on to Chateaudun where we've stopped several times before.

We had had concerns about Jamie being cooped up in his travel cage all day but, bless him, he was no bother, just asking to go out whenever we stopped.

A chat with some Funsters who were on the Aire as well then our usual pattern of tea and a chat before an earlyish night.

Tuesday 5 January – bright and clear (once it got light of course) so away as quickly as we reasonably could, stopping off in Tours for a baguette then later at an Intermarche for fuel and lunch. Later passing Poitiers it started to rain with occasional quite heavy showers and a strong headwind, which played havoc with the fuel consumption.

Overnighted at an Aire at Montguyon, a place we had been before but not Colin and Tina. Again free with water and waste disposal – we just love French Aires de Service.

We heard that one of our party had had their Portsmouth/Santander ferry crossing cancelled due to weather at short notice and were transferring to Eurotunnel. Another couple were due to use the same crossing in a couple of days time but we've heard nothing from them.

Wednesday 6 January – again wet, windy and dark but with the decision made to press on we decided to use toll roads again although there was actually only one which took us into Spain avoiding the havoc that is the roads around Irun on the border. Rain stopped shortly after crossing into Spain and the traffic was unexpectedly much lighter too so using toll roads , which are much cheaper than in France, we pressed on to Vitoria-Gastiez, again where we stopped last year. Found parking places okay but it filled up shortly afterwards.

Noticing a Mercadona supermarket across the road we walked across to find it closed – then it dawned on us, today is Epiphany and a public holiday in Spain which was why the roads were so quiet! Confirmed later by fireworks.

Thursday 7 January – when we went to bed the outside temperature was 7deg; when we got up it was 17deg, a good sign? Our first priority was again fuel, glad it's relatively cheap; we're paying around €1 per litre which is 74p. Then back onto the motorways, using the toll this time although it doesn't seem to make a lot of difference, the main roads generally being excellent. Lunch taken on a parking area just off the motorway then on to Madrid.

Like most capital cities Madrid has an extensive ring road system which, though very busy, was well signposted and we had no holdups getting onto our southward road taking us to an Aire on the edge of the small town of Puerto Lapice. Newly constructed, it had all facilities and we shared it with another Brit who was homeward bound, telling us they hadn't seen any rain since November! Shame then, that it chucked it down overnight!

Friday 8 January – refueled yet again. For practically all the trip so far we have had strong headwinds which make a real difference to a vehicle our size. Coupled with frequent long climbs – most of Spain is on a plateau over 2000ft high and several times we were over 3000ft – the fuel consumption has been quite poor. But today hopefully was the last leg to the Mediterranean coast so we headed for Granada.

Clearing the pass at Sierra Madrona the weather finally improved quite dramatically so a side trip into Granada to find a hypermarket was in bright warm sunshine with the windows open! Height barriers and heavy traffic caused us to abandon our search so onto the motorway for Malaga, lunching at a service station.

Our destination was a wild camping spot just outside Marbella. Needing some supplies we hopped off the autovia a couple of times but failed to find anywhere – then a bit of a fright when Jamie suddenly vomited a nasty black substance and was crying and whimpering. Fortunately we were close to our destination but by the time we arrived he seemed to have recovered and on inspection the mess appeared to be old engine oil. We have no idea where he managed to pick this up, maybe at the service area as there were a lot of lorries, but he seemed to be okay so he was watched for several hours. Apart from a black poo later there appeared to be no further ill effects and he soon returned to his usual self. Puppies!

The place we stopped at was a large hardcore carpark where motorhome stopovers were tolerated, just outside a golf complex. A new Aldi had opened across the road and there was an Asiatic restaurant adjacent where we decided to treat ourselves, having more or less finished all the hard driving. All in all a fine ending to an “interesting” day.

Saturday 9 January – a lie-in! Jamie didn't bother us until we were up to a bright warm day. After breakfast we wandered around the market that sets up here every Saturday, making some “spur-of-the-moment purchases (as you do). Then after lunch a half hour run took us to a campsite just outside Estepona where we had booked 8 places to meet up with the other Funsters going with us to Morocco. Despite us being 2 days early there was no problem and we also found one of the group already here, as well as being joined later by yet another Funster also Morocco bound, though not with us.