We were sad
to see the Dutch leave the site but as they left there was one key symbolic
moment. I have not mentioned this as the Flamingo’s take centre stage, but
everyday a large flock of sheep come down from the hills more or less in an
orgainised line, each one dangling a bell around its neck. Usually one or two
of the campers rush to the fence to observe it. Today as the Dutch rally, all
30 vans, moved off the site in one neat convoy, a couple of the sheep ran down
from the hills to watch and wonder…….”How come its only us that have to wear
these stupid bells”.
Anyway its
now about 11am we’ve paid the bill…another further reduction
she decided to give us the middle ACSI rate…14 euros a night. The flamingo’s
got spooked by a couple of planes this morning so we caught them all circling
around, about 150 of them and then landing again with their colourful wings in
full flight…great sight to see. Not sure when I can go online again. Not even
sure if anyone is reading this but we are only contactable on our yahoo
email mememex54@yahoo.co.uk
Would like
to hear from a few people if they are reading this.
Last
evening we walked past the Dutch encampment, they were all sat in a huge circle
whilst a tall grey haired man bellowed out questions to them all. Barbara
insisted that this was in fact an organised quiz night. I doubted this as in
response to one question I observed each and everyone of them raise a large map
of the island to there faces. Then another question, the…response was that each
one opened a diary? Now being a paid up member of the mental health brigade I
am all familiar with this sequence of questioning (first one being “where are
you?”, followed by “What is todays date?” ) however although I was uneasy with
this I could not overlook that on the third question I observed (which is
usually what is your spouses name) each person looked at their partner with a
degree of perplexity. I knew what was
coming next, and, not knowing the name of the Dutch Prime Minister I felt it
best to disassociate myself from this mass, collective diagnosis. Furthermore I
did not sign up for a Bus mans holiday!
Tonight will be our 13th night at
this lovely campsite. I don’t think it’ll be unlucky 13th as the
Dutch Rally has been considerably quiet. Most of them are in their 70’s and
looking quite stiff. Once they’ve had their Ovaltine and swapped a few ‘Holland
& Barrett stories they’re all in bed by 10. We’ll probably review the
situation tomorrow and consider a move south west of Cagliari. We’ve located a couple of Lidl’s and Carrefours in Cagliari so will probably stock up before moving to next site.
Most likely the next site wont have internet so we may not update the blog for
a few days
Monday 28th
May. The good weather continues. Went on a leisurely bike ride of about 15
miles, shopping and to the northern section of the beach where there are some
quiet secluded bays, had a swim and looked at one or two other campsites. The
site we’re on is easily the best and cheapest. After the Italian weekenders
went home the site was looking quiet with vans spaced well apart.
11am
Barbara comments “Its funny we haven’t seen many Dutch on this site”
11.30am the signs go up around the site with arrows pointing
for the “Dutch Rally”
1pm we’re back to Wagon Train again. Over 30 vans
so far with every driver trying to show off his manoeuvring skills. Tight in
there and tight against that …for some reason they want to park within inches
of other vans whilst there female navigators direct them into the gaps whilst
trying to dry their nail varnish at the same time. We’re ok as I’ve adopted the true traveller
people method of spreading all of our domestic items about on both sides of the
van…. car boot style. Been offered a good price for the spice rack!
As they are
dutch they’re in good spirits well behaved and only likely to stay 1 or 2
nights.
Sunday 27th
May. Good Day Slept Well.
Saturday 26th
May. Good Day. Slept Well
Saturday, 26 May 2012
Local Policeman stops traffic for English to buy Ice Cream.
Beach at Camping Le Dune, Costa Rei, Sardinia
Flamingo's in lagoon next to campsite
Beach at Lido di Orri (Sardinia)
Camping Tamerici, Livorno (site before ferry to Sardinia).
Friday 25th
May. Took a walk into the nearby town but walked along the waters edge on the
shore, even at around 7pm the sun was still hot and lots of young
children were taking advantage of the weakening suns strength and were playing
in the water.. Took about 40 minutes. Found a nice restaurant and enjoyed a
typical Italian meal followed by a large ice cream. The stroll back along the
beach was taken just as the sun was going down and we could see the lights
coming on in the nearby villages up in the hills. The whole area looked
fabulous. The nearby flamingo’s were quite noisy throughout the night.
Thursday 24th May. Took and early bike ride into the next resort a couple of miles away. Nice place with lots of bars and restaurants. The hot sun came out early this morning and stayed with us for most of the day. The site is starting to become more popular, the site is mainly populated by Swiss and German tourists. We have so faronly seen one other English van and that passed us about two weeks ago. Will try and load more photies of our second Aire in the alps in France and some of Sardinia.
Wedneday 23rd May. After a couple of dull days with occasional showers the sun came out once again. However clouded over later in the day.
Sunday 20th May. I noticed that all my recent blog entries have been deleted. Maybe someone at ‘internet GHQ’ thought my penalty shoot out references were racist. Hopefully this update might correct matters. Great technicians and penalty takers them Germans also make excellent motorhomes. Weather disappointing dull and occasional showers.
Evening… went to watch the Chelsea v B. Munich final. Initially was quite neutral (dislike J. Terry) but as the match progressed and the bar filled up with Germans I found myself wishing for a Chelsea victory. What a delight an English side beating a German one on penalties. The bar emptied, lots of packamacs over heads and references to ‘returning next year’.
Friday 18th May, Settled on to site, its in a great location. 50yds from a lagoon where we can watch the pink flamingo’s feeding during the day, sometimes they fly over the campsite to land on the water. Beach is only 100yds away and it’s a beautiful long stretch of sand. A lovely location and an excellent site with a good sized pool and flat shaded pitches. There’s a camp shop and a supermarket a mile away. However we’re missing economy supermarkets like Lidl. Its also noticeable that the ‘resorts’ seem a bit slow to get going for the season with very few bars and restaurants open. Good day on beach.
Thursday 17th May
Reversed left, right, left, forward, left, back etc. Wasn’t made easy by the campsite workman who seems hell bent on digging a moat around our van. Still, he put down his tools and helped me negotiate past his wheelbarrow. Nice of him. Overall we enjoyed this site and its quietness and closeness to the beach. Headed further south past Muravera looked at three sites. First one was quite commercial, Canvas holidays had a set up there, lots of building work going on. Internet charges excessive and charges to take a shower (Camping 4 Mori). Second one ( Torre Salinas was nice but basic). Hit the jackpot with the third (Le Dune) in Costa Rey. Nice pool, next to sea, internet reasonable and the woman gave us 1 euro off the ACSI rates. Only concern is where are the shops!
Wednesday. 16th MayStrange morning, clear blue skies and bright sunshine but really powerful winds coming down the mountains. The wind dropped about mid day so a couple of hours spent on the beach.
Over the last few years we have become increasingly aware of our popularity with our European ‘friends’ this is clearly evident on this site. There is one other van on this site that measures 300metres x 100 m, however 2 separate German vans arrived today and immediately parked either side of us, each one approximately 10 feet away. This will make reversing out difficult tomorrow.
Tuesday 15th Maywas a lovely day, about 22c, spent a good 3 hours on beach and had a nice swim. Later we went to the supermarket. Started to worry when Barbara walked past the baby bottles and teats section!Returned to site about and cycled south down Lido di Orri. It was surprising to see that the road went on for some miles and all the way along there were small deserted coves and beaches each with its own bar. We spotted a German van ‘wild camping’ on a beach car park and we priced the motorhome sosta (equivalent to French Aire) which worked out at around 12 euros with electric and showers. Campsite at 16 euros still seems better deal.
Monday 14th May was quite windy and the wind was a bit cold. We managed to findour own cove, protected by the winds and spent a nice relaxing couple of hours there. Went for a walk with Pickles in the buggy, starting to worry about Barbara and this baby buggy thing…she’s started to put Pickles ‘down’ in it for his afternoon nap.
On Sunday 13th May. morning a Dutch Rally arrived made up of about 20+ vans. They immediately surrounded us and plugged in to our electric box….everything blew. It was now getting like Wagontrain but good humoured. Everyone was friendly but we were reassured that they were only here for one night. Temperature today, Sunday, 30c. Took a swim in the afternoon (Pickles had a morning and an evening one). Then went off to Tortoli on bikes (Pickles in tow behind). Watched second half of the amazing ManCity v QPR game in a bar then returned to site. Elderly Dutch couple next door enquired about the Childs buggy outside our van? No internet access on site but man on reception believes I am very important and have to contact my office so has promised me 5 mins on his computer. Difficult to load photies but will try on next site.
Saturday 12th May.
We left Camping Tamerici on Saturday after 2 lovely days in temperatures of around mid 70’s. The boat trip to Sardinia was uneventful but interesting. Instructions stated that dogs must be put in the kennels provided and when these are full other dogs are allowed to go on the upper decks but must be muzzled. We followed all the other dog lovers and it was soon obvious that rules are there to be broken. No dogs were muzzled. The kennels were all empty. Dogs were in the lower decks sat in the restaurant and even sat at the bar ordering drinks! So much for the £9 muzzle we bought! There were no seats on the upper deck so we dashed back down to the van and took our La Fuma recliners up to enjoy the cruise. Pickles loved the boat trip, he’s been on lots but he’s usually locked down below in the car. He enjoyed watching all of the goings on.
We docked in Sardinia after 7 hours. We then drove about 120 miles to Tortoli mid way down the eastern side. There was hardly any traffic on the road, we stopped in Nuoro for some provisions but then couldn’t get back on the Tortoli road due to a deviation which we finally got around. The countryside looked green, with steep mountains and forests. The final leg to Tortolli was quite winding with lots of hairpin bends but fortunately all downhill. The actual campsite we chose is in Lido di orri. It is quite a big site and occupied by two other vans a Swiss couple and a German couple. It’s a lovely location right on a beautiful deserted beach. The only downside is the 3 amp electric which means we cant use most of our electric items.
Well after 2 fun packed, energy sapping nights at Camping Riva it was time to move on. In all honesty this was a nice site with lots of shade and a quiet location. Fun was not on the agenda for the handful of Dutch and German campers occupying the site however they were provided with a number of comical moments provided by the only two English campers on the site who pushed their arthritic dog around in a Mothercare buggy, bought on ebay for 99p. The climax to the event was when it came to fold up the buggy and put it away. It doesn’t matter how many thousands of miles you push your kids in one of these, or how you get them through schools and university’s whilst at the same time managing your own career……..you will never master the technique of folding one of these contraptions up.
So what of the two days here: as stated relaxing and quiet but not a real holiday resort. We took a bike ride to the nearest seaside town of Bocca di Magra. This reminded me of a very tiny version of St Tropez, a few bars and restaurants etc along with a 50yard black beachbut dominated by the huge expensive boats in the harbour. In fact the town is situated at the entrance of a river that has along its entire length numerous boat marina’s and boat yards.
We moved off towards Livorno, a sea port where we get the ferry to Sardinia on Saturday. The site we chose is called Camping Lago Le Tamerici and is unknown to anyone living near to it. We know this because we asked everyone who lived within a one mile radius of the site and everyone sent us in a different direction! A great site on the side of a fishing lake, the temperature started to rise to mid 70’s the holiday is really kicking in now.
I was intending to add photographs to this blog but for some reason the blog template and instructions are in Italian, this makes it difficult to work out where and how to make further entries to the blog. Perhaps as my Italian gets better I will find out how to include photo’s.
Its , we’ve slept for over 8 hours. We reel in the electric lead and take one final look at the view. Back down the zig zag road to the motorway that will take us to the Mont Blanc Tunnel where a young toll booth attendant asks us for 51 euros to go through the tunnel. There’s lots I want to say to her, like those stupid jokes…..”Oh and can you still get a mortgage in France these days?” or do the comparison thing “Our tunnel only costs two quid and that takes us under the Mersey…..the artery of England”. But this would be wasted and after heading into the tunnel I suddenly realise why it was so expensive. I should have realised that they’d actually closed the tunnel to all other users, we were being treated to exclusive rights to use the tunnel, no one else could go in until we’d gone through. That’s why it was so expensive. So we drove through the entire tunnel alone. Another long drive gets us to River Village Camping near Bocca di Magra on the coast of Liguria. I notice that the campsite has a promising motto… “Here everyone has fun” . Pickles yawns on the backseat and I wonder about the Italian equivalent to the Trades Descriptions Act?
Such a peaceful night, not one noise. A quick tidy up, but we feel we should wait to pay when the reception opens between and , however no one shows up so we hit the road. Again its quite cool so we aim for the Italian border. At around we leave the motorway at Cluses, just before the Mont Blanc Tunnel. We fill up with diesel at the local Carrefour and fail to come to any decision on where to spend the night. Barbara remembers an Aire in the book at Les Carroz D’Arches, so we head there. It’s a difficult steep windy road and we question our decision. When we hit Les Carroz we struggle to find the Aire despite getting directions from the Tourist Information. We go even higher above the town and as we turn into a big car park we see the 5 electric point and the water taps. Its basically the parking place for the ski lift across the road and I wonder if the campsite owner from Kent learned his towing skills here. There’s no one around, the electrics free Yippee! and what a view! After settling down we take our evening meal looking across to the snow capped mountains of the French alps. Although we are new to this motorhome Aires thing we couldn’t have picked two better locations for our first Aires. Whilst nodding off in the chair we finish off the first bottle of wine of the holidays. Maybe it’s the altitude thing but we’re fast asleep in bed by …..its stll light.
…..All ready to go and yes …..the motorhome is stuck in the mud. At I knock up the campsite owner who arrives at the door in a very elegant silk dressing gown. He promises to bring his 4wd and tow rope. After a short wait he arrives. He’s a nice man who is very optimistic and experienced in such matters, even though we’re the first. He hitches up gives me instructions as to how I should drive “smooth,with little acceleration, I’ve seen this done in the French Alps in the snow on ski holidays”
Eventually we set off, the motorhome glides across the field, slightly swaying from left to right, we move, we stop, we move again. All the time the motorhome wheels spin and rip into the muddy earth. Eventually just as he gets me onto the safety of his pebbled drive, the tow rope breaks, but we’re safe on firm ground. After untying the tow rope we both look back to survey the two perfectly parallel mud tracks spread across his neatly manicured field………”Trailblazers” I say!
We thank him sincerely for all he’s done and I promise that these events wont stop us from returning next year. Off to the port where we make the ferry with minutes to spare. Meanwhile the campsite owner eats a well earned breakfast wondering what he’ll do with the 6 tons of stone he’ll order on Monday and how he’ll prepare the field for the return of The Trailblazers next year.
After driving off the ferry at French time we drive about 275 miles. Its very cool so the quicker we get to the south the better. With the motorhome we’ve been looking forward to using the French Aires and we find a real gem.A place on the canal bank at Froncles about50 miles south of Reims. There is also a river behind us. There is electricity to plug into and showers and toilets available all for 3 euros. A great location, a great price.
We left home at around , travelling south along with the thousands of Liverpool fans heading for Wembley for the cup final with Chelsea.
When we finally arrived at our campsite of choice just, outside Headcorn in Kent, I was reluctant to take the motorhome on the field as it looked quite boggy. However the owner reassured me that everything would be fine and that no one had ever got stuck He also pointed out that we were the first people he knew who were heading for Sardinia…..”Trailblazers” he called us. We then headed to the nearest pub, The White Horse, to watch the match. A forgetful match! A forgetful pub! So as soon as the final whistle went we left through the side entrance with packamacs over our heads muttering something about returning next year. I hope they don’t think it’s a return to The White Cow!
A quick evening meal and early bed to prepare us for the early morning ferry.
