Later this year we will notch up ten years of long term wandering about. This trip is the seventh time we have spent the early part of the year in Iberia. There are lots of reasons why we keep coming back to Spain and Portugal - epic landscapes, mighty rivers, beautiful coasts, alluring old cities and towns with a convivial vibe, interesting local gastronomy and viniculture, warm hearted and welcoming locals, uncrowded roads and plenty of places to park a motorhome. 'All good' as Gill is wont to say.
However, none of this is the primary reason why we return. The reason is - when our garden looks like this ( we have a Naturecam)...
....the south of Spain is much more alluring ...
Furthermore, it's easily accessible, 32 hours (two nights and one day) on the boat from Portsmouth to Santander, then an easy drive south over two or three days to reach Seville.
In truth, in January and February you do need to get south of the 38° parallel to guarantee regular tee-shirt weather, and even then you will get chillier days and changeable weather from time to time. Also, you need to be prepared for truly wintry weather on the drive south across Iberia's high central plateau.
Over the years we've seen snowdrifts by the side of the motorway in the Cantabrian mountains, suffered sub-zero overnight temperatures in Salamanca, thick fog in the Duero valley, been soaked to the skin in Merida, and buffeted by storm force winds as we traversed the Sierra de Candelaria.
Not this year. A gorgeous dawn greeted us as we sailed into Santander. The forecast mist never materialised, clear sunshine and blue skies followed us south.
We crossed the Cantabrian mountains and then through the Duero valley, past Valladolid, the road signs reading like a wine shelf - Toro, Rueda, Villafranca del Duero.
In past years Spain's central plateau has looked bleak, dusty coloured and arid, but January must have been unusually rainy, because the rolling low hills were verdant and the verges grassy and dotted with clumps of yellow sorrel.
We arrived at Camping Regio on the outskirts of Salamanca by late afternoon. It was warm, clear and sunny.
In winter, after sunset the temperature plummets, under zero overnight. I woke at 6.40am. It felt freezing. I got up, it was freezing, -3° outside, 5° inside, getting into the zone where the Truma boiler's frost protection valve kicks in and drains the van's water tank. I switched the heating on low and went back to bed.
By the time we surfaced around 8.30am. the sun was about to rise. It was still -0.4° outside and only 6.7° inside, but we knew from experience that as the morning progressed the temperature would rise very quickly. Nevertheless, though the shower block is heated, it has high ceilings and a cold marble floor, the facilities are functional if somewhat spartan. I had a swift, bracing shower, but minor privations are a small price to pay for a deep blue sky and crystalline light.
Onwards, the drive from here to our next stopover in the area autocaravnas at Aljucen will never cease to lift my spirits. South of Salamanca the A66 rises steadily towards the Sierra de Candelario and the severe looking hill town of Béjar. Big birds - storks, buzzards, the occasional vulture - circle lazily above the road.
It was Sunday, the road almost empty, I set the cruise control to 60 mph and settled down to watch Spain's wide vistas drift across the windscreen - the serpentine silvery expanse of the Embalse de Sta. Teresa; beyond Palencia, the eerie plain stretching east towards Portugal, strewn with flat rock outcrops and dotted with cork oaks. As you drop gently into the valley of the Tejo, grey in the distance the Sierras of southern Extremadura stretch towards the horizon. Are those the mountains of Andalusia in the distance or a bank of low cloud? We couldn't decide. The mighty river itself is hidden in a deep canyon, it comes as a surprise. As we crossed the viaduct the odometer notched up a pleasingly coincidental number - 56789. We took this as a good omen; Kathargo, the little known Olympian deity who controls the fate of vanlifers everywhere, was looking down upon us kindly.
We turned off the motorway and headed towards the area autocaravanas at Aljucen. Sometimes we've had the place to ourselves, this time there were half a dozen vans already parked up, but it's a big space with room for plenty more.
I jumped out of the cab and turned on the gas. The warm south enveloped me like a big hug. The thermometer read 21°, I swapped my tracky bottoms for a pair of shorts before we took a short stroll into the village centre.
Aljucen is nowhere special, but it's a pretty place with a beautiful old church surrounded by neatly trimmed orange trees.
I decided to take a selfie. .with oranges..
Then I took another one with both of us in it and some oranges ..
I wondered, "Are there different terms for selfies of more than one person?" If not, there should be. For couples - Selvesies, couplies or cuddlies? For a group it becomes even more difficult, 'groupie' has unfortunate connotations, so maybe a selfie of a bunch of people could be a huddlie or a huggie. I realise this a pedantic point, however this is unsurprising; the experience of living in my head for the past six decades has taught me one thing for sure, I am irritatingly pendantic!
Anyway, so far as our winter travels have concerned we have achieved our primary objective - tee-shirt weather! Now we are poring over multiple meteorological sites trying to figure out where the sunniest spots will be in the coming week. Rain is forecast for next Tuesday but more showery it would seem in the west. This bodes well for our plan A - a couple of days in Seville, a few more in Isla Cristina, then westwards to Sagres and up the Alentejo coast. It's a plan
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