Olot - Zaragoza- Bilbao and ...

A motorways day as we had a lot of kms to cover - halfway across Spain. Not much to say really but not a bad day as the traffic was pretty good. Our little home chugs along at 100 kph quite happily.

Spain is interesting in its changing landscape. Mountains, plains, forests, fertile fields, wine ... deserts.

We arrived in Zaragoza mid afternoon and got settled. Up to the restaurant for a late lunch and a beer, and then a swim. We weren’t going to explore Zaragoza as it was a ‘through’ town.

Interesting though: there is the city, and then to one side there is a treeless, desert-type area that has hundreds of apartment blocks. It looks weird. And amongst the ‘nothing’ are new roads and the campground. We guess that this is a whole new area to take pressure off the city.

We left early next day for a similar drive to Bilbao, all good. We passed through the famous La Rioja wine growing area - huge growing areas and also huge wineries.

We had found a camping car site overlooking the city so headed there - wow! This view is amazing- you would pay millions anywhere in the world for a view like this. We parked where we had the best view, next to some Dutch people (she reminded me of my Godmother Aunty Eve). A basic place, just a male and female toilet, power and water. The bus was every 20 minutes so off we went. E1.30 each for our half hour ride down the hill, calling in at urban areas on the way.

We wandered around the old town, narrow walking only streets, and found a bar to have a tapas lunch. Then a walk along the river to the Guggenheim. It was a hot day and not a lot of shade.

Fascinating building, in fact probably looks better in the advertising photos. We wandered around inside but not a lot happening. We caught the light rail back, wandered some more and found a supermarket before catching the bus up the hill.

And lots of photos as the light changed over the city. This view is incredible.

28th August. What a special day. We drove to Getaria, about an hour and along the coast for part of the way. We found a parking spot (turns out we shouldn’t have been there but the parking lady let us off as we were leaving) at the fish markets and set off to meet friends from Sydney for lunch.

Jennifer and I worked together in the ‘70s and we catch up every year, but how good was this to be meeting in Spain. They were staying about an hour away and the restaurant, Mayflower, was recommended and booked by their host. We spent a lovely couple of hours and had a beautiful meal of salad, calamari and then BBQ Turbot.

James and I carried on to a campground above San Sebastián for the

night and Jennifer and Ian returned to their BandB. So, so good.

Next morning down the hill into San Sebastián.