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Published: April 15th 2013
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We left home in Alicante yesterday to drive to the Parque Natural de Lagunas de Ruidera en route to Northern Spain. We are taking a slow route to the End of The World, as the Romans named the most westerly tip of Galicia, Finisterre. We shall probably take a week or so to get there and then several weeks to get back home, via the Picos de Europa in Asturias and Cantabria. The journey from our house in Orihuela Costa, Alicante to Ruidera took five hours including stops to walk dogs and drink coffee, just 317 kilometres to our campsite, Los Batanes. The campsite is right beside one of the lagoons and waterfalls in this scenic wonderland of water. We are camped on an island, with roaring rapid water gushing on three sides of us, down to one of the many falls and a tranquil lagoon on the fourth. The water is a constant roar but surprisingly it didn´t keep us awake last night, it lulled us to sleep. Los Batanes is an excellent site, we have it virtually to ourselves (the beauty of out-of-season camping). It has excellent showers and loos, a great little bar and restaurant and with our
ACSI discount card, it costs just 16 euros per night for the caravan, car, electricity, two people, two dogs, free WIFI and a massive pitch in an awesome location. Can´t be bad! Just one word of advice to anyone towing a van or driving a large camper, the access is a tad "tight". To negotiate a 90 degree narrow turn up a slope and on to the bridge to the island we had to unhitch and, with the help of four Spanish weekend campers man-handle the caravan over. Later on in the day, when several weekend campers were leaving, everyone mucked in to assist three or four more units to get out! Worth the hassle and a good way to make friends!
This is a very friendly campsite anyway; dog-friendly (handy fact when you want a nice cold beer at the bar) and the site attracts a wide cross-section of age groups; popular with young campers for the hiking, white-water, fishing and for retired couples like us i.e. gentle hiking 'cos we enjoy the "no rush mañana lifestyle" as well as families. Originally we picked this site as a one-night stop-over but we like it here so much that
we have booked in for four nights; might stay longer, we´ll see. Last night the sky was full of visible stars; we are far from any light pollution so the night sky is a magnificent sight when, like last night, it is cloud-free. It promises to be equally good tonight since right now it is gone 7 p.m. and there are no clouds, a brilliant blue sky and we are still in shorts and t-shirts in the sunshine.
We woke up this morning to find that our large cross Mastiff, Mutley, wasn´t asleep in the awning as expected. He had escaped in the night! Mad panic! We dashed outside to find him asleep under a tree outside. Someone had found him and tied him up there in the night. We don´t know who but are truly grateful to them! He could have gone over the falls! We shall make sure that he is kept in better tonight by securing the awning more effectively (we hadn´t bothered to peg down the door)! It is great camping with dogs. We walked all around three lagoons to see several waterfalls today with the dogs and wore them out, so hopefully Mutley will
not be inclined towards nocturnal adventures tonight. Our little dog Bella, who has camped before (unlike Mutley for whom it is a new adventure) had probably gone out as well but returned to her bed in the awning to pretend that she is a good dog. She isn´t! She probably goes out at night everywhere we camp but is always back long before we wake up. Crafty little madam! We worry less about Bella than Mutley. She is old (fourteen in October) but very agile, sure-footed and wise. He, on the other hand, had lived his whole life until we got him last August, in a tiny kennel in the dogs home and was completely institutionalised. He is a long way from being "street wise"!
Today was a walking day. Tomorrow we are going to drive to explore more of the area. The Lagunas stretch for several kilometres to both the north and south and straddle the provinces of Albacete, on the east bank where we are, and Cuidad Real across the other side to the west, in Castille y La Mancha. It doesn´t look like Quixote country here. We left all the windmills and wheat fields behind about
sixty kilometres back. Here it is lush and green (Mutley finds the grass a novelty, since we have none down in Alicante province). Enough about dogs! Right now, it is time to open a bottle of Rioja and a tin of olives and enjoy the evening sunshine. Hasta Mañana!
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Camping Los Batanes
Loved your blog. We had already decided to camp there but your blog endorsed our decision. We shall hopefully arrive 26th April and spend a few days around the area heading back towards Jerez for the Moto GP. Pity we couldn't have met up. We have lived near Malaga for the last 13 years and have spent many happy times camping all over Spain. We have just purchased a 24 year Motor Home and this is to be our first proper outing. Have a great time.