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Published: November 22nd 2010
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17.11.10 Windmills
First sightings of windmills on way to Campo de Criptana Monday 15th November to Sunday 21st November 2010
Monday 15th November 2010
Toledo.
Gaye went shopping at big shopping centre outside of Toledo. Tom went for a bike ride – about 18kms in 1.5 hours – some hills in Toledo and photo stops.
We met up at Toledo old town for lunch. Found a winter coat at long last – then did tour of Cathedral – like the Tardus in Dr. Who – did not look that big on the outside, but the inside was marvelous (it’s in the Toledo book we purchased). Too much walking for one day – caught a taxi back to campsite.
Tuesday 16th November 2010
Did a tour of The Alcarzar and it’s Museum. The Alcarzar was the Royal Palace. It was destroyed and rebuilt. It now houses the Army Museum. Took a few hours – sort of interesting.
Internet dongal not working this morning, so off to large shopping centre to see if they could help us. The female bus driver must have been hormonal – we were thrown around as she hard braked, then accelerated fast. What a trip.
At shopping centre the girl in Vodafone would not even attempt to help
– would have nothing to do with us –as we could not speak Spanish – no matter how hard we tried with the translation book – spoke over us to other staff member. Stunned we left the shop. As were leaving there were 5 guys from either India or Pakistan who spoke English. Tom went back and asked if they knew of another Vodafone shop. There was another one about 1km from the old Toledo centre in the new Toledo. Wasted space – both Vodafone and tourist information as even they could not speak much English – more locals spoke English to us then they could . So home and dinner – Tom went for a 40 minute bicycle ride – all up 12km – 4km up hill (9kms/hr) then 4km down (50/55kms/hr). Gaye made a great tuna pasta for dinner.
Wednesday 17th November 2010
Up and away and drove to ‘Campo de Criptana’ to see the windmills. These are the ones attacked by Don Quixote in ‘The Man from La Mancha’. We did see some on the way there and took some photos. Took some photos of sculptures on the roundabout at the entry to the town on
17.11.10 Campo de Criptana
Sculptures of Don Quixote on roundabout at entry to town the edge of the highway. Into town and found information office and given a map and off to the hill to see the windmills. There were 8 windmills. It was freezing. Gaye had on new winter coat and ski gloves. The wind reminded Tom of Jindy/Perisher. Then drove to Ciudad Real (City Royal) to see the Don Quixote Museum. It was closed for renovations – the website did not say it was closed as we had checked the night before.
So out of town and free camped on side of road for the night as there no campsites anywhere in the vicinity that were open.
Thursday 18th November 2010
Woke up early due to cars/trucks going past. It was COLD (freezing according to Gaye –who is not an ice bunny). Gaye dressed like she was in an igloo, so started up the engine to warm up, while we got ready to roll and off we went – through country side that reminded us of Canberra, Orange – frost everywhere. There was fog for the first few hours of driving. (Note – Gaye’s side of the car, with maps and books everywhere starting to look like Don’s desk at work
- :-) )
Left at 8am. Did a full day of driving as there was nothing of major interest for us along he way. Just out of Ciudad Real, we saw about 2.5 acres of solar panels in paddock. These we sighted all the way on our trip. Went through huge area of what appeared to be rice growing fields. Lots of aqueducts for the fields. We did call into a very nice winery by pot luck and they sold to the public, but you have to book for wine tasting. So we bought 2 bottles of wine and a bottle of olive oil. These were from their own farm –and they also belong to a wine corporate. The girl was very helpful and spoke good English. It was her father’s farm and she and her brother were learning to run the business.
As we neared Badajoz, we saw lots of birds nests high up in the electricity towers – thought they were hawks nests but as we got closer we saw that there were cranes nesting in them. Hadn’t seen that before.
Went across the border into Portugal.
Drove until 5pm when we arrived at Lisbon. Campsite is at Monterosa. Huge – 38 hectares – pool – 570 touring site/170 tent sites. 5 minute walk to the bus stop to go into town. It's half the price of Madrid pand twice as good.
Set up van – dinner – bed.
Friday 19th November 2010
Woke up to rain. So lazy day ahead – rest and recuperation. Tom went to shopping centre for some groceries and Gaye updated the diary.
Saturday 20th November 2010.
Into Lisbon on bus about 9am – 40 minute bus ride. Had a look around town for the tourist information office, but couldn’t find it. We eventually found it – it was in a small van down by the water’s edge.
We searched and finally found the ‘Puppet Museum’ – it was exceptional. www.egeac.pt The collection of puppets and marionettes that they have, are from many different countries.
Caught the bus back to campsite, got rugged up and then walked about 30 minutes over to the huge shopping centre. Went to the movies and saw ‘Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, Part 1’. They actually had an intermission in it – lots of us dived for the loo as we were not sure how much longer the movie went for, as it already had been going for 1.5 hours. After the movie we had some dinner and a bought a small Xmas tree and some tinsel for the van – only 4.6 weeks until Santa comes. It was 10pm and there were still thousands of people around. This shopping centre doesn’t close until midnight. Caught a taxi home.
Sunday 21st November 2 010
Tom went for a bicycle ride thru and around the huge park next to us it was a lot of fun as wet and slippery so made for a thoughtful ride only 16k’s in an hour 17min.
Lots of riders around, as Sunday.
After he got back we went into another section of the town. ‘The Dock of Olivier’. This was a monstrous shopping complex, a stadium (where Shakira happened to be performing), an Aquarium, an exhibition centre (like Darling Habour Exhibition Centre in Sydney), a huge bus depot and rail station, a Casino. We walked around and had a look and had some lunch. We did originally go there to see an exhibition on architecture in the Museum of the Orient, but the person at the tourist office in the campsite had given us a bum steer, it was not there but way back on the other side of Lisbon centre. So we hopped in a taxi and went to see it. Tom was inspired – Gaye thought it was OK.
Got the bus back home and had an easy dinner – soup.
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