Portugal to Paris-New Years

After our wonderful Christmas ’break’ with Sharon we decided it was finally time to start heading back to England and the cold winter weather. To see a different part of Portugal and Spain we decided to go along the bottom of Portugal and then up to Salamanca. We visited a couple of beaches but found them unattractive because of all the development that restricted our camping overnight options. We did find one nice place with a big parking area and lots of other campers, internet and a beautiful long beach. As well enjoying the soft sand and nice walks we had to take some photos for selling the camper. We managed to transform our camper (by adding the carpets and taking off the covers we made in Scotland) and it looked brand new. We usually have all the fabric covered so seeing it out with the new carpets reminded us of how nice our little home is when we’re not all in it. We crossed over the border into Spain and drove all day along motorways back to Salamanca. We got stuck in the petrol station height restricting bar back in Salamanca and stayed in the same truck stop we had stopped on the way to Portugal.
During the drive we watched a few new movies which made sitting in seat belts a lot more inviting. The vast landscape was very sparsely populated but there were lots of plantations. Oranges and citrus in the warmer south and olives in the dryer north. There was also a lots of homesteads with crumbling sheds and collapsed tile rooves. One thing I really remember is having lunch in a gigantic supermarket carpark which felt deserted. It was warm enough for us to just wear T-shirt and Shorts while the locals were in Jackets. We played outside with tennis balls just to get a bit of exercise the few locals that were there looked side ways at us. Then after lunch we got diesel and the man running the station laughed at dad because he jumped out to help in bare feet. He was really nice though and gave us lollies and a Spanish newspaper which we couldn’t read so we coloured it in and did the puzzles.
The next day we drove from Salamanca all the way to Bayonne France. Some of the longest driving we’ve done on this trip. It was another long day. It’s amazing how the scenery and houses changed when we crossed back into France. We like the French camping facilities and Mum can understand the locals. We spent the night in a very busy Aire with lots of other campers. In the morning it was a beautiful sunny day so we went down to the beach and found that very busy too. Because the locals have a few days off.
We drove through lots of Pine trees looking for somewhere to stop for New Years because we weren’t going to make it for Paris (800km away). We looked at a few empty beaches but stopped at a large smooth lake. There was the most amazing sunset over the lake. The water was shallow for a long way out and would have been nice to swim in warmer weather. Thomas went ‘Paddling’ but it was freezing.
We transformed the back of the camper back into a Cinema and watched ‘Into the Wild’.
Thomas and Anneke went to the lakeside ‘beach’ and made a little mound covered in white corn flour. We saw lots of them on the Mekong river for Chinese new year in Luang Prabang. Ten minutes before we were going to go out and light a candle a group of eight or ten loud and drunk ‘youngsters’ walked past and we didn’t feel safe leaving the camper. We knew we had entered the new year when some unexpected fireworks went off across the lake.
New Year’s Day we went down to the beach and lit a candle on our mound. It took a while because of the wind. We drove further north and went walking on a beach near the biggest sand dunes in Europe. We didn’t climb the dunes. We stayed by a river with an old watermill, surrounded by the town’s Boulanger, Patisserie and Pharmacie.
We went to a Motorway rest-stop with fast-food restaurants and budget hotels. Mum spent a while on the Wi-fi internet at McDonalds trying to work out how to sell our camper and where to go for our last 24 days. We talked about listening to each other and respecting one another in such a small space. It was much colder after driving only a couple of hundred kms north. The pond where we stayed froze-over, overnight. We had fun smashing the ice and bouncing stones on top, making funny noises.
We drove past a town called ‘Angerville’ and soon we were on a busier Motorway to Paris. There were some huge powerlines to our right. We got further into the city past some big office buildings and a hot-air balloon. There were lots of vehicles on the roads. We were back in the Bois de Boulonge with the ‘Ladies of the Night’ vans. We walked towards the ‘Arc de Triomphe’ past lots of familiar things. There were fenced off pens for Christmas tree recycling. The Arc de Triomphe was lit up and bigger than we remembered. We took the underpass under the huge roundabout with 12 exits. We then walked down the Champs Elysees. The trees were sparkling with Christmas lights and all the shops had Christmas lights out front. Everyone was shopping and there was a waiting line for the ‘Louis Vuitton’. Looking through the windows we could see handbags and coats for hundreds of Euros. We turned right and reached the Seine river. There was the Eiffel tower lit up gold. There were two spotlights shining outwards like a lighthouse. We walked down the river past the river cruise docks. We walked under the tower behind the Army guys with big guns. There were lots of annoying vendors (some illegal immigrants), hassling us to buy the little tourist souvenirs and these light-up spinning helicopters. We turned around to head back to the camper then the whole tower (as well as being gold) was sparkling with flashing strobe lights. It was amazing but only lasted five minutes. We saw a man cooking in a small tent on the footpath. We walked past some cafes and green-grocers on the way back to the Bois de Boulonge. It was a little scary at night. We drove out of Paris to a place we’d stayed at before on the Seine river.