Livin' On A Prayer(Bon Jovi) - Cruisin' the N340 Pucol to L'Ampolla-7th May 2016

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The cool, moist weather system that has been spiralling off the west coast of the Iberian Peninsula for the last month is still there and now starting to affect the weather on the eastern side of the peninsula which earlier had been unaffected.

While we haven’t had any rain to speak of for the last few days it has been overcast and cooler than we experienced in southern Spain and that was continuing today.

We filled up with cheap petrol at Intermarche where at least the automated card reader worked not like the one down the road yesterday.

The N340 was the old main road on the eastern coast of Spain before the toll road was built and is in good condition and allows us to enjoy the countryside and small towns it passes through where you can’t really do that on the high speed toll road. Sure it is slower but then we aren’t really in a hurry.

Most of the river beds in Spain and in particular on the eastern side of the country are dry and we had been wondering just why this is so. A quick search on Google reveals it is just the way it is but apparently they can become raging torrents in heavy rain.

The dry river beds in towns are unattractive however and the one in Pucol township in particular with all sorts of rubbish gathering in the dry river bed. Perhaps the local authorities clean it up every so often but it does downgrade the sense of pride that local people should have in their surroundings. Generally it makes the area around look untidy.

We made good progress northwards up the coast and turned off the N340 to visit Peniscola right on the coast and have lunch.

The perhaps hadn’t appreciated the cool conditions until we got to the beach and opened the car door thinking we might have a boot lunch but the breeze off the sea, spotty rain and 16C meant another in car lunch looking out over a beautifully groomed beach with no one on it!

The old part of the town is walled but it didn’t look much different to others we have walked around and with the cool conditions we decided to drive on once we had finished lunch.

The town itself looked like a good place to holiday at when the sun was shining and it was a bit warmer.

Back onto the N340 we were again into ‘road girl’ territory again and even in the cool outdoor conditions they were every few hundred metres along the straight road. We even passed a chair with no one about. Perhaps there is not enough happening on a Saturday or was she engaged elsewhere? Most of the ones we spotted were warmly dressed.

For most of the drive the road has passed through citrus orchards and 10kg oranges sell here like we would see bags of that size of potatoes being sold on the roadside at home. The bags are so cheap at €5 making them 50c a kilo and we were tempted to buy a bag which would last us an age but storage space at times depending upon the amount of the rest of our food supplies.

At Amposta we finally crossed a decent size river that actually had water in it. It was difficult to imagine why this river had water whereas so many others haven’t.

We turned off the N340 and headed to the small seaside town of L’Ampolla where we have a mobile home booked for the night at a camping ground that is adjacent to the beach.

While we were checking in we asked the owner if there were any flamingos in the wetland just a short walk from the camp as we had read that they do frequent the area some years. Yes he replied there had been some spotted yesterday by a camper but he wasn’t exactly sure where.

After a good few hours in the car we were ready for a decent walk and so planned to search out flamingos.

Flamingos usually make their home in and around shallow water and the area just down the road from the camp looked ideal as it was being prepared for the growing of rice and all of the paddocks in view were flooded.

We walked initially along a road and then when we couldn’t see any Flamingos in that direction we headed off into the wetland itself walking along a narrow path made between the areas of water. We catch sight of a large wading bird taking off from the water but it wasn’t a graceful, sleek Flamingo.

Without finding any Flamingos this way we walked on to where there was a viewing platform and climbed up to see get a birds eye view. Unfortunately all there was in sight were some ducks and oyster catchers.

Our walk back to the camp was along the beach noting the usual ‘stuff’ that we have observed washed up and left on many of the beaches we have walked along in Spain. They just don’t seem to be interested in removing rubbish from places like beaches and dry river beds.

Back at the mobile home we agreed that the temperature seemed to have warmed up enough now that the sky had partly cleared to have pre dinner drinks under our thatched roof in the BBQ area and it was still pleasant enough when it was time for dinner.

With the fading light though it was time to go indoors and watch a bit of YouTube before bed to be ready for the drive tomorrow to Montserrat.

PS:the title is great highway driving music that our daughters remember.Available on YouTube

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