We left Camping El Astral at Tordesillas on Friday morning for a 4 hour journey to the coast. We had booked a night at Camping Helguero before our ferry crossing at 13:00 on Saturday. We arrived at Helguero campsite (near the pretty port of Comillas) early in the afternoon and the weather was warm and sunny.

Some cables under the caravan had worked loose so balancing the caravan on a grassy ledge, I sent Moe under the van to carry out repairs.

The break in the stormy weather didn’t last too long and by the morning, the campsite was a quagmire.

This set the scene for a very stormy crossing over the Bay of Biscay. Joe spent the first 18 hours lying on his bed!

Our arrival at Portsmouth was precisely on schedule at 20:00 and we were one of the first outfits off – before 9pm we had pitched up on our ferry pitch at Rookesbury park CAMC site. An uneventful tow back to East Devon and we arrived home around 2pm, Monday 24th March 2025.

Another great way to spend winter and the beautiful weather which greeted us in England was in sharp contrast to rather wet winter in Spain.

Hasta el proximo ano…

We are two thirds of the way back to Santander and our ferry leaves on Saturday.

We are camped at Camping El Astral close to the town of Tordesillas and after an early morning deluge of rain, the skies brightened up and we headed over the River Duero into this quaint old town.

First stop was the Tratado de Tordesillas (the Treaty Houses).

In 1494, the Kings of Spain and Portugal agreed upon how to carve-up the New World in this old house in Tordesillas. Apparently this is what world leaders do; in this case they started by drawing a line (pole-to-pole) intersecting the Canary Islands. Portugal weren’t happy about this because access to the Island of Mina would meaning sailing through Castilon territory. In the end, the line of longitude was drawn several leagues west of the Cape Verde Islands and land to the West of that line became Castilon and land to the east Portuguese.

This explains why the country of Brazil is Portuguese speaking whilst the countries to the east are Spanish.

After the cultural tour of this museum we head to the Nuestro Sitio bar / restaurant at the Plaza Mayor. Here we enjoyed a glass of local white wine (from the Duero valley) and some tapas. The Torrezno is somewhat like the Chicharrones dish from southern region of Cadiz..

And after cooking…

Yesterday we travelled from Conil de la Frontera to Tordesillas, a journey of around 450 miles which leaves just another 150 or so to the port.

It was a blustery but predominantly sunny day and this is our pitch at Camping El Astral.

This was only the second fully dry day we have enjoyed in March as named storm after named storm has hit the Iberian peninsula. Spain really isn’t far south enough to guarantee hot weather during our winter but it is the best mainland Europe can offer.

This March has in fact been the wettest on record. It feels like it has rained solidly for a full three weeks. In fairness, our journey yesterday was dry and we had a dry day around a week ago which enabled us to take down a dry awning.

An extract from “The Times” about Spain, 2025:

“Country is wettest in Europe with more bad weather to come after a month’s rainfall in just nine days

Heavy rain in Spain has ended a four-year drought, filling reservoirs, causing floods and making the country the wettest in Europe this month.

Images of dry, empty reservoirs exposing the remains of buildings long submerged have been replaced by video of sluice gates being reopened to release waters to prevent dams overflowing.

The latest rain in March, which will continue this week and next week in much of the country, has put an end to the drought in Spain, the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) confirmed. A shortage of rainfall led to restrictions in recent years on urban consumption, agriculture and hydroelectric generation in many areas.”

Reservoirs which have been empty for years are now overflowing; Lake Vunuela is approaching 50% full and Malaga has enough water stored to last for three years.

A landslide has closed the main route from Marbella to Ronda and this will remain closed until August.

Trains were suspended between Sevilla and Cadiz and traffic was diverted from the AP-4 due to flooding.

We have entertained ourselves with several meals out, daily petanque when there was a break in the showers, the Rosaleda quiz and several communal meals. Met some folks we haven’t seen here before including a couple who’s husband came to thank me for some travel advice I’d provided on one of the caravan forums! That was a really nice touch.

I think they enjoyed the meal at El Nautico but yet again the heavens opened and I’m not so sure the cycle ride home was quite the same experience!

These blog posts aren’t always in sequence. I’ve a long blog which I’m working on from our recent outing in Nellie, so this is a nice easy interlude.

Despite a rather mixed weather forecast, today turned out to be bright and warm if a little breezy on our cycle ride to El Nautico at the Port of Conil. Perhaps because it’s a Monday, and most restaurants are closed, El Nautico was extremely busy – or maybe the reputation of this fine restaurant is spreading.

Food and wine as always was excellent and every table has a great view across the harbour.

Our mainly off-road trail back to the campsite goes right by a new Autocaravana park, in a lovely rural location on the outskirts of Conil.

It is a mystical place. I’ve never seen the gates open and there’s only ever a couple of motorhomes visible above the high, closed fences. Today, there’s a large trailer parked next to the fence which appears to be some kind of luxury toilet block. Not bad facilities for a 5 place site.

Further along the perimeter wall there’s a little break in the fence and you can see that this five place park has ambition – it is akin to Dr Who’s Tardis.