Well Autumn has arrived, creeping in on tiptoes for a change. The leaves are turning to golden shades, and amber and red hues cover the paths like a carpet. The heat is getting turned on in the vans, and thoughts turn to hot toddies and cosy nights in.
With the changing season, I've decided to temporarily change the way Helga puts out her info on our travels. Facebook has been pissing me off for a while, but really only on the Helga Hobby page. I'm in the process of deleting her page, a bit reluctantly, but I'll not have fb tell me how to run my pages.

After our Autumn leaves trip, and the great meet at Donagheys, I'm on the wagon for a few days, just to ease my liver back to life.
Autumn leaves was a wee twelve day tour of the west. Starting in the lovely Shannon side town of Carrick on Shannon, some fine days on Achill Island, a couple in Dunfanaghy and meeting some other well travelled visitors in Patsy Dans pub. Good craic was had there, but it was only a prelude to the big event.

The Motorhome Craic and Donaghey's weekender, where we joined around a hundred other motorhomes for a fun filled weekend, where old friendships were rekindled, and new ones founded.

A quiet night to recover at Fahan, with a meal in the Firebox Grill, good company, and a sound sleep beside the waves.

So, no more Facebook, just the original, and I hope you call by to see it.

Woke up this morning to the sound of sheep bleating and cowbells, or maybe the sound of sheep bells. I looked out of the window and saw that the Helga was surrounded by sheep. They were in the field adjacent to us just last night and somehow they made a successful attempt at freedom, if only to munch on the verdant grass surrounding our new home, for a few days. As I sat and watched the beasts, eating contentedly on the forbidden grass I made a mental note. We’ll have barbecued lamb for dinner tonight.

Casares and Cala de Mijas are forty eight miles, and worlds apart. La Cala is close to the beach and all the tourist trappings you expect from the Costas, while Casares sits perched on a rocky outcrop high in the Sierra Crestellina. The farmer, man in his seventies has now arrived and is running after the sheep, trying to regain control. The sheep are having none of it, and the elderly man’s patience seems to be evaporating. Oh such a start to the day. Maybe I should go out and help. Well thats another first, me stand-ing waving my arms by the side of a road at nine am, wearing my dressing gown and jammies, and the farmer muttering something that sounded like hallelujah. I thrive on this motor-homing lark.

Anyway, as I was saying, the two destinations are poles apart. Mijas is busy, very busy, dusty and ageing, whilst up here, the air and roads are clean, people are very sociable and even the sheep say buenos dias. The air is crisp, and traffic noise is replaced by the sound of livestock getting on with their lives. There are even some new lambs in the fields, being January this is surprising to us.

Yesterday we went up to the ancient castle, which is reached by walking through pretty streets, a little more than a car width across, and steep. The views are to die for and the Griffon vultures, who have made this area their home, swoop and soar high above, much to the delight of all the visitors.

After our slog up to the castle we called in to a restaurant in Plaza Espana, the main square, for a quiet beer, we had picked up a stray tourist, John from Cheshire. He was a bit older than us but had a much younger, I think, outlook. A wise man and ever ready to share a story.

Back to Helga, we gave John coffee and we parted company, and we enjoyed a DVD and waited until our poor legs had eased before heading to bed. Where we slept like the dead and dreamt of sheep and younger joints!

Maroc. 2

Day 2.

I turned the key and nothing worked. The battery was as dead as the African Queen. How the hell did that happen? I wondered.

I let it sit to see if the rising sun could coax into solar power in to refs it, just a little, but it was too late. Helgas’ battery was sound asleep. I phoned my insurance company, Dolmen, to ask for breakdown assistance, and that’s where I learnt the dreaded truth. My incurs covers damaged etc in Morocco, but there is not a breakdown element included. Probably because we’re outside the EU. anyway, I was able with google translate, some gesturing, and good fortune, to find a mechanic with a set of jump leads in his car. He was able to start us no problem, but decided he should go under the engine with two spanners and re emerge asking for 300 dirham. Around £25. Normally I would have queried this but we needed to move so I happily paid up and boogied.

Getting out of the port onto the road south is remarkably easy. The king must realise a good infrastructure is required if he’s going to draw in the much needed tourists. The toll road is £11.70 for driving the first 170 miles or so. Of blissful roads that afford very little road noise coming up.

Here’s the very important bit. Make sure your e maps are all up to date. Our sat nav doesn’t have Moroccan maps, and and Apple and Google need to be updated as well. Although we have a paper map, we found the Michelin one to be too large a scale to be useful, and here’s why. 

We got Campercontact to show us the route via Google maps, inputting coordinates. It pinpointed the location almost, but there were no roads, so for my wife the navigator, it wasn’t easy.

We found our way into two cities, this on a very busy Saturday afternoon. There had been torrential rain and strong winds all the way down, but a lot of the city streets were flooded, with filthy brown water. The taxi drivers were like dervishes, kamikazes in the extreme. Not a place to be shy and reserved, but we got out unscathed and found site number one.

Not so much a site, more an oasis in a sea of mayhem. We were shown into a parking lot, secure area, gated and fenced only to find we had no neighbours. Still, there was water, discosal, and electricity, all for free! 

We got Helga sorted, she was a beige brown colour from the ride through Rabat, in brown water up to a foot deep, she was a sorry sight, but not as sorry as some of the sights we saw. People so poor, they had only a sheet of polythene for a top coat, and those who had even less. 

Our world my friends, is poorly divid. 

Morocco 1

The crossing to Tanger is simplicity itself, let me tell you a story. We got to Algeciras early, because we’d no idea what the system was. We found Carlos’s ticket shop up behind or beside Carrefour, down a little side street. The two girls are so well experienced in their jobs we were in and out in no time. €200 later and clutching our tickets and a cake and a bottle of wine, we descended on Lidl to find some refreshments for our visit to Maroc. Oh, and a bit of food. We chose not to go to Carrefour because we find them a tad more expensive.

Followed the signage to the port, no problem there either, and joined a queue of not too many others. A few kiosks with ticket collectors in them relieved of us all of our tickets and we were on our way. The boat was forty minutes late departing, it all seemed so “Spanish time”.

Up on board we found ourselves on Deck 7 where a small queues had formed to get their passports checked. Seems to me, the truckers went first so they could get their heads down, so really its best to leave it for a while. You have to fill a form in, that you will get from Carlos, it’s a bit like one you would fill in to enter the US of A. This proves to be a total waste of time. We sailed through, pardon the pun, the police check points in Tangier and we thought that was a piece of er, cake. But no. The Customs men had other ideas. Such a cock up, if you’re crossing, this will be the single thing that will baffle you. We were lucky enough I think, the jobs worth we got, was a Liverpool FC fan, but that didn’t stop him from sending me to another booth for another passport inspection, this one done on a computer. Anyway he asked me to open the garage door, he glanced in, for maybe a half seconds then went into the van. He asked me what we had! I told him food, tons of alcohol, and two beds! He asked, almost jokingly, if we had any guns!!! I put my hands up and he bade us farewell. We were stopped slightly further on, just beyond the gates and proffered sim cards. 4 gbs for five euros, we took two and they work. Called in to the bureau d’change and got dirhams for 12.35 to the pound. When we pulled in we were the first ones there, we’ve been joined by 9 other vans and staying the night for an early start down the road in the morning. Thank you for reading, if I can be of any help, just say.

The Pousada  Palace hotel and back to the Aire.


Well the eagerly awaited visit to a palace is now here. We are leaving the Aire to stay in a luxury hotel for four days. It was a Christmas present to the two of us from the two of us.
We arrived at the hotel, after asking to have open parking available for Helga. She hates being on her own in strange places, a bit like a lot of motor homers I believe. We had to park in an out of the way spot, which was fine until we needed to get out. But thats another story.
We had to pay to upgrade our room as we were in a garden room, which might have been fabulous in the heat of summer, but not December, no sun on the balcony don't you know.
The hotel is in two parts, the original palace which is seriously nice and the rooms, which are seriously functional. The beds are too firm and the pillows, while feather, were over stuffed. We were definitely not over stuffed. The food was a disgrace, we had booked Christmas Eve dinner and Christmas Day lunch. We cancelled the lunch after the woeful experience of the dinner. We never paid for the food nor the wine, and the night of the dinner we went out and fund a nice restaurant a couple of hundred meters from the hotel. Sorry, another mistake. We found the restaurant the previous night and enjoyed it, but it was closed on Christmas day so we just had a box of chocs and more wine in our room.
Christmas Day we had steaks and veg in the van and enjoyed it immensely.  Boxing night we had dinner in the we restaurant again, clean plates told the story. We met up with four lovely people from Surrey, and turned their heads all night. Good times.

We visited Faro itself on this trip, but because it was Christmas Eve, it was as dad as Hector. To be honest, the two of us couldn't wait to get back to normal living in Helga.
With great joy we went back to the Aire. There was a vacant spot beside our friends so we slipped in there. Oh yes, time for some real craic.
The beach, Praia de Falesia, which is a matter of ten minutes walk from here is marvellous. Goes for miles, one direction takes you to Albufeira and the other to Vilamoura. The dunes and rock formations are special, the sand soft and golden, and the sea, baltic.