On the road again
To resume our usual programming, Ellen and I packed our lives back into Noodle and hit the road on a sunny but chilly morning. Taking a sideline to the local Boulangerie for pastries and bread, we set off away from her parents' place and east toward the Mediterranean coast. Passing through towns and villages dotted around the valley that was once the border with Spain, the mountain peaks to our left crested with the remains of Cathar castles at their peaks. For those who don't know, we have visited this area frequently over the years and it's around this area that we got engaged back in 2021. So needless to say we didn't stop along this section as we have visited most there is to see already.
However, I must stress that you have to come down and see the remains of these castles in the Aude valley. They are very impressive and you do find yourself asking how they managed to build them where they did! Oh and Carcassonne has to be seen at least once. Situated at the far north western end of the Aude with good airport access with Ryanair and it has an incredible old fortress citadel perfectly maintained and still lived in. The 1991 Kevin Costner film 'Robin Hood Prince of Thieves' (a favourite of my mother's) even used the preserved Keep(Fr. 'Donjon') for some of the Nottingham castle scenes. I would suggest however that you avoid the area in the height of summer as it's absolutely rammed with people. Hey look at me going all travel guide writer!
Anyway, back to what we were doing.
We continued on through the Maury Muscat vineyards and decided to wait until we reached Spain to go food shopping. We had some left over Bourguignon from two nights ago that would do us for another meal or two, so we knew we had some supplies. So, we continued on past the French supermarkets preparing to close for sunday afternoon and pressed on to find somewhere to refill the AdBlue tank and then get some lunch. This AdBlue search took us off the main road and up through jagged hills and twisty narrow lanes until we dropped down into the next valley. As the valley opened up in front of us, the snow-capped Pyrenees erupted from the horizon beyond the vast open plane below, piercing the clouds and disappearing beyond. We were almost at sea level now, and so these mountains just seemed monolithic despite how far away they were. An epic scene, one of many on this trip to be sure.
We turned east again and continued further down the valley, mountains to our right, until we reached Perpignan and a truck stop to refill our AdBlue tank and Diesel. Now, a routine fuel stop normally wouldn't warrant writing about. But AdBlue is an interesting beast that led to a bit of a fiasco that looking back was somewhat entertaining. We've used AdBlue pumps in France before when we were here last year, its far cheaper and easier than the stupid plastic bottles. So we had chosen this place specifically because they have it. The problem is, its normally with the HGV fuel pumps or on their own near them. This time they were actually with the pumps. Getting the AdBlue was easy enough, we paid, filled up and all was good about £10 later. I then selected Diesel on the self service machine and lifted the diesel pump and tried to put it in the fuel filler. I thought "hmm, this only just fits, I swear this pump is wider, but it fits and it definitely diesel, so must be fine", I pulled the trigger...
It was not fine.
Diesel shot out, blasted back out the cap and down the side of the van onto the floor. I let go of the trigger almost immediately but the damage was done. Perhaps more to my pride than anything else, especially when I turned around and saw the huge red and white "no cars" sign next to the pump! I mean, we're not technically a car and we do use AdBlue, so didn't think anything of it. Whoops. We sheepishly moved round to the normal pumps and proceeded to fill up properly. But some lessons were definitely learned here; HGV pumps have larger nozzles, oh and that HGV AdBlue and Diesel pumps pre-charge you £1000! that was a fun number to read on my credit card after all that!
Anyway, our bit to pollute the environment done for the day, we continued to find somewhere for lunch. This is when we started to find that along the southeastern coast of France, Campervans are becoming less and less welcome. Height barriers have been installed in many places in the last few months and signs are now up preventing any day parking, let alone overnights. We did manage to find somewhere in Collioure thankfully. We've been here before too so we only went for a little walk to the fortifications next to the car park after lunch and then hit the road again.
This then led us onto some incredibly windy roads that ran along the coast through many tiny towns and up through the hills and cresting over one we passed the border and entered Spain. We continued winding down not far from the border and came across a tiny quiet beach where we could pull up outside the car park height barrier and go for a walk along the beach. I would have gotten a picture when we pulled up, but an older couple just down the beach in front of the van stripped off completely and ran into the sea! I mean, fair play to them, but it taking a photo wouldn't have been pleasant for anyone involved!
A walk along the beach to dip our feet in the Mediterranean sea and for Ellen to collect some sea glass and then we set off once more further along the winding mountain and cliff roads. Next stop, Roses.
Pulling into the town of Roses we kept seeing people in fancy dress and eventually came to the port where we were to turn left and there were floats, people in costumes and fancy dress everywhere! We didn't think too much of this, just that there must be some sort of carnival or parade today. We drove another 5-10 minutes up the coast to the next cove and found ourselves a lovely spot on the beach parade for the next couple of nights. After a walk down the beach and a relaxing dinner, we hit the hay. The next day was meant to be nice in the morning and then rainy in the afternoon. Ellen needed to jump in a meeting back home for the afternoon so that worked well and would be an easy start to our time in Spain.
However, after a 45 minute walk along the coastal path to the port of Roses, we soon realised that everything, even the public toilets were closed and there was barely anyone around. We weren't sure if this was just a cultural thing in Catalonia where they didn't work until late on a Monday? Ellen checked online...
Somehow, we had managed to arrive at the end of Carnaval! A famous 4 day weekend of parades, floats, food and festivities that we had completely neglected to consider when we set off the day before. We even knew this was Carnaval weekend back at Christmas when Ellen's parents had bought us a Lonely Planet guide to "Best road trips Spain and Portugal". I'd read it and even mentioned "we're going to be there for Carnaval!". But we'd forgotten and arrived at the end. Doh! lesson learned, we'll plan a bit more now we think.
Anyway, we walked back to the van and I started on this blog whilst Ellen jumped in her meeting. Then that evening we went down for the end of Carnaval festivities in Roses. We set off along the coastal path in the fading light and reached the main part of the town beyond the port. This was where everyone actually was! We wandered around and watched the procession of "King Carnival" (A Guy Fawkes-esque dummy) along the street and down to the beach bonfire where an extremely loud firework display took place and the fire was lit. Well, it had to be relit after the display as the wood was so wet from the rain in the afternoon.
We wandered back to the van and sort of wished we had moved to the port front road rather than do this walk again, but hey its good for us right?
The next day the weather was glorious. We hit the road, out of Roses and toward Barcelona. On the way we pulled into Empùries (Em-pur-ri-ass), the site of a both ancient Greek and Roman town, the only one of its kind in the Iberian Peninsula. The remains of an Ancient Greek (Phoenician) port town close to the sea and the Roman town slightly up the hill. Now it's easy in our minds to think that the Romans came after the Greeks. However, the two did exist at the same time for a while complimenting each other's economies. However they didn't survive for more than a few hundred years for multiple reasons, including better, larger towns elsewhere along the coast and the Via Dolmitia which went through these other towns but not Empùries. This was a fantastic few hours and the roman town is amazing even though only 20% has been excavated yet. We highly recommend coming here, not bad for €7!
After lunch and some van chores we headed further south via the beautiful, quiet Medieval village of Peratallada for a quick wander around. Ellen bought herself a bird from a local pottery and we got to have a good leg stretch before heading on.
This afternoon was spent weaving through some of the most windy roads we've ever driven the van on, for an hour and a half. Through the coastal hills and cliffs until we finally made it down to Camping Barcelona near Mataro. Well, this was after trying to get to somewhere free near the beach, but again, the restrictions have changed yet again! A great little campsite, if a bit cramped in. It did have it's own bus service into Barcelona though, so we booked onto that and prepared for a day in Barcelona the next day.
Oh and it was pancake day so obviously we had to have pancakes that night!
