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Published: April 22nd 2017
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Why it’s hard to leave Aguilas Hi Dot
OK so that’s your name sorted, done and dusted needs no more discussion, except of course any new readers who will be “joining the Dots” oops sorry, not sure this will get past the editor!
Now apologies for not having written before but was waiting for a change in the weather, to get worse not better, then of course when it changed I have to dedicate sometime to complaining about it before starting the blog.
OK so what have we been up to? Well, before leaving Aguilas on 29
th March, apart from the usual games of boules, socialising, visiting old favourite places like Cartagena and Carboneras we visited Caravaca de la Cruz one of the six most important places in the Catholic Church. A fascinating old town with winding streets adorned with a range of interesting buildings eventually leading up to the magnificent church with fortified walls which would be the envy of many a castle. Caravaca de la Cruz is some way north of Lorca and the journey left behind the dry arid land to see lush green fields and hundreds of wild poppies growing along the roadside.
Another first at Aguilas was a
visit to the wholesale fish market, which, as the Spanish are normally very noisy, we expected to be a riotous affair, but no, now fully automated with conveyor belts displaying trays of the various fish, large video screen to get a closer look and display boards showing who bought what and at what price, the whole event is very peaceful with the biding taking place via hand held terminals. Still very interesting to watch and to see which restaurants and supermarkets were buying locally.
The final item of note before we left Aguilas was the boats. As you know Dot, we try to save looking at boats for when Pete (son) visits but some things cannot be avoided. I will just mention two, one which had been abandoned for decades, and is in Aguilas harbour, is a cruiser given by Richard Burton to Elizabeth Taylor, which is awaiting refurbishment as a restaurant. In its day it would have been magnificent with varnished decks and a starched crew. The other we saw at Cartagena, a huge, ugly silver sailing yacht, the sort of thing you would not have as a gift, hideous, should have been scrapped while on the drawing
board, called A Hamilton, which, when Googled, turned out to be the world’s most expensive yacht, no accounting for appalling taste!
Following a great send off from too many of you to mention, but thanks to you all, our next stop was Catral, near Elche, to catch up with Jim, now on his 17
th winter in Spain. Catral is an interesting village catering for a mixture of northern European expats and the Spanish, while maintaining a pleasant old town around the main church.
The change in sites could not be greater, from a small 60 pitch site to a massive site with over 1,200 pitches, from erratic showers to state of the art facilities where every pitch had free piped multilingual TV, not that we had the right connections to use it.
Jim showed us around the local area including breakfast at Catral, lunch at Santa Pola and a market followed by a huge, three course, €7 Sunday lunch at Torrevieja, Jim knows how I like to eat! Also took time to look around Orihuela, with its great old buildings and churches, and finally a drive through Hurchillo where Allan (friend) has just bought an apartment, mind
you Dot we have no idea where it is in the village!
While Catral is less than 100 miles from Aguilas the countryside is totally different, gone are the arid conditions, the horticulture and endless cloches and replaced with fodder crops where they were taking the first cuts of hay.
Our next stop was Calpe again very different from Aguilas or Catral, back on the coast and into a serious north European holiday location, but better than its near neighbour Benidorm! We were in a central campsite just a few minutes’ walk to the promenade and beach. Here Claire (daughter) joined us for a few days, bringing with her the UK weather, fortunately not for long and she soon started to lose the white porcelain look. We failed to climb the rock, but did walk around the flamingo lake, got bitten by the mosquitoes and went to the old town which, while small, is an interesting contrast to the rest of the town.
Between Calpe and Benidorm is Altea, not to be confused with Altea Hills full of upmarket villas, but a pleasant seaside resort with a brilliant old town which is well worth a visit.
As Claire had an evening flight we also spent a day in Alicante which is so easily ignored, you know arrive at airport, go to holiday destination etc. Alicante is well worth a visit, with its modern marina beside the old town which leads up steep, narrow lanes and steps to a big park which in turn leads up to the castle, note the repeated use of the word “up”, not a walk for the faint hearted, but the castle is free, huge, interesting and the views are magnificent. We then took the free lift down which goes directly down under the castle and then you walk out through a tunnel to the beach and harbour. You can avoid the long climb up by using the lift but they charge for going up! Also as a bonus it was Palm Sunday and the start of the Alicante Easter processions so we managed to see a couple during our visit.
Finally, if you ever find yourself at Calpe, we would recommend eating fish at the harbour, a three course meal with the biggest grilled sole I have ever had, sangria on arrival, wine and all for €13.
And so,
on 11
th April we moved on up the Med to Daimus near Gandia for Easter, another story and another blog and so take care Dot.
Terry and Jane (long suffering editor)
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Allan
non-member comment
Smiling again!
Hi Terry and Jane, Once again I'm left smiling after reading one of your great blogs. Delighted your enjoying all these Spanish places... and delighted I can use your itinerary around Alicante later in the year! Sorry we Missed you in Hurchillo. See you soon. A