Fatima to Bensafrim

We went to Fatima-Another Pilgrimage site of apparitions of Mary and Flashes of great light. It was raining and there were no signs explaining what happened there. There was a (1940’s) Basilica which had two of the graves of the shepherd children that went back to see Mary in a tree every month, it wasn't as big or as old as ones in Rome. The was a part of the Berlin wall because they believed Pope John had done something to help remove it. There was a huge concrete space for the huge audiences that are there at the times of the apparitions every year. At the other end of the sanctuary was a huge round modren Basilica that was more like a cinema that what you’d think a ‘normal’ church is. There were more ‘chapels’ underground that were more like conference rooms. We spent most of our time playing with melted candles before they melted into a fiery pit below and lit a candle for Oma.
We drove to a Dam and arrived in the dark. We spent the morning talking to friendly German campers that had set up a little ‘wild camping’ community. We went walking around the lake which was quite low but the level rose dramatically from all the rain. We discovered that we were surrounded by cork-oak trees which dad had been looking for in Italy. One of our ’neighbours’ brought round a Petanque set and we played it in the rain all afternoon. We also wrapped some of our presents. We stayed another night at the Altar de Pego Dam. We past lots of Storks with big nests on top power poles while leaving the dam. The scenery changed from cork oaks to sand and pine trees and green farmland like NZ but without the fencing. All the houses are white-wash with orange tile roofs and blue borders around the doors and windows. We had lunch by an estuary and there was an old couple in a blue rowboat fishing. There were palm trees and white, orange, blue houses. We wanted to stay there but moved on to some rocky cliffs out on a small point. There was a spring coming out of the cliff and it was some of the nicest water we’ve had in Portugal and we’ve had some bad tasting water. We had an older dutch couple now living in Portugal for fresher air and an English musician called Steve as our neighbours.
We played in the sand, it was too cold to swim. Mum and Dad talked to Steve who had an armoured camper with cameras on every side and it’s the same length as ours but only for one person.
Lots of locals came to get water. We drove past some orange trees and soggy paddocks. We stayed at another ‘wild camping’, ‘snowbird’ place full of English campers and homemade ‘Gypsie’ trucks. Everyone was very friendly and interesting people to talk to. The coastline in southern Portugal is small cliffs so the only beaches are where small rivers meet the sea but usually if you get on the wrong side of the river you can’t get onto the beach. We were on the wrong side of the river and it was swelled and brown because of the rain so we couldn’t cross even at low tide. We still managed to play in sand and look in some rock pools. We met a couple that had really travelled the world- Dot and Jim. They were a 70+ from England and rode motorcycles and did competitions and rallies all over the world. They had travelled to NZ a lot and it would have been nice to stay another night some we could talk all night.
We drove past Ajezur-the town nearest to where we are going to Christmas with Sharon. We had lunch under a huge wind turbine. We drove to the town of Bensafrim then turned down a smaller road then parked at the start of a dirt road that we were afraid of driving down.

Northern Portugal

After driving into Portugal we stopped at a Petrol Station as a storm settled in for the night. We were fine and just got rain.W e found the next morning while trying to find a Goat farm in the mountains that it snowed higher up. We discovered the farm on HelpX and hoped to go learn about their cheese and lifestyle of self-sufficiency. The problem was, we emailed them and didn’t get any reply so they didn’t know we were coming and we didn’t know where they lived exactly.


In the morning we started our search. We drove west and got off the motorway and started going though some small villages on the smaller roads. We saw quite a lot of locals walking in there towns, something we don’t usually see. Some were even leading there little herds of sheep and goats down the road and though town which was neat. We stopped for lunch on an empty road and met goat Shepherd who we didn’t think really understood us but it was fun trying to talk to him. We then drove up to a pass which had lots of snow and ice on the road we wanted to take. So we talked to two men and then showed us where the farm really was but we still had to turn around and go around the mountain to the other side. So we did and the road was really scenic. It went along a river through a national park with lots of old stone houses and old dams. Just before dark though we decided to stop and maybe try looking in the morning but then a lady stopped and offered to lead us to the farm. The lady was the HelpX hosts ex-wife and Mum said our ‘Angel’. At first we were on the tarmac, which was fine but then we turned down a small dirt track not suitable for motor homes our size. It icy and had no barrier to keep us on the side of the mountain. We managed to turn around and park at a junction of driveways. Afterwards we all felt very shaken so we ate some chips and caught our breath. We were also hoping the lady would ring and warn Mr Thomas of our arrival. Have I mentioned he didn’t know we were coming! Then Mum and Dad took Tom and Anneke to see them, we didn’t want to shock them turning up as a group of seven in the dark.



We walked past a rushing stream and could hear the whining of a hydro-generator. We got to some sheds with barking dogs and were about to go down through a manure heap (though we didn’t know this in the dark) but managed to find some steps to the house. Inside looked like Hagrid’s cabin off Harry Potter with a wood stove and cast irons pans hanging from the ceilings. Mr Thomas (the farm owner and help host) wasn’t as shocked as we thought and welcomed us in. We spent the next hour telling him our story of how we found him and asked if we could see how he made cheese. Mum and Dad drank home made wine. We almost forgot about the other’s at the camper and went back before they got worried where we were.



The next day we went down to the house to see the farm and see what was going on. It was interesting seeing everything now in daylight. When we got to the house Maxine and the boys (2 and 4) were home so then the ( our ) girls stayed at the house and the us boys went out to find the goats and Mr Thomas. We found him on top of a frozen hill heading back for a coffee. After chatting on the hill he showed us his simple little cheese room. Which was made from recycled materials and not in use anymore. Mr Thomas moved from Germany to Portugal 20 years ago and set up his farm here. But Portugal is changing being part of the EU government and it’s becoming too difficult to live the lifestyle Mr Thomas moved here to live. All the locals are leaving the villages and moving to apartments in the cities. So Mr Thomas and his family will probably have to leave so the boys can go to school. Maxine cooked us soup and rice pudding on the wood stove and we all managed to fit around the table. We had to decide whether we stay and probably get stuck in more snow or leave before we get snowed in for possibly weeks. The weather wasn’t normal for this time of year and area. We had to leave while the rack was clear so we went back down the mountain. It was an interesting 24 hours.

We drove to the coast past lots of apartment high rise buildings. We stayed in Figueria da Foz with 40 other campers. It rained hard all night and we were glad we didn’t stay and get stuck.

The next day we walked on the beach. The waves were very big and the beach itself was a long distance from the buildings to the water. It rained all day so we did more Christmas shopping in a huge shopping complex with double story parking and a mall out front. We liked the ‘Shop China’ because it had lots of little bargains and things. The road nearest to the carpark had a blocked drain and some police blocked the flooded stretch because it was quite deep. Some how, while we were inside ‘Shop China’ a car went past the barricade and got stck in the middle of the puddle with the water above his tires.

Spain

These last few days have been very cold and we have been doing a lot of driving. After leaving Lourdes in Frances we spent a lot of time at McDonalds on the internet. While at McDonalds it rained and snowed but melted as soon as it hit the ground. We got bored as we were stuck in the camper. We did have stunning views of the Pyrenees mountains out the window. Before we went into Spain we got some advent calendars. We crossed into Spain by the Atlantic coast so we didn’t have to worry about going over the mountains and getting snowed in or slipping on ice. Our first experience in Spain was accidentally getting on a toll road and we spent 150km guessing how much the trip was going to cost. It wasn’t to bad 12 euros and it saved us a lot of time and stress. The roads cut straight through every hill and there were viaducts over every valley. Looks like a big road compared to the ones in New Zealand.


After taking the toll road we found a little area to stay at but it was lonely with out other campers. We got up early the next day and took free motorways along with hundreds of trucks heading south west. It was like driving on the moon. There were zero trees and a whole lots of dirt paddocks topped with a thin layer on snow. Some of the towns looked camouflage. As we had run out of cornflakes we fried up some potatoes, tomatoes and scrambled eggs for Brunch at a truck stop in the middle of nowhere. Then went shopping at a supermarket in a big town. We stayed the night at a petrol station with some French, Spanish and Portuguese trucks. Today we went to a big shopping centre in Salamanca and started doing some Christmas shopping. We are all buying each other a small gift which not many other kids get to do because they don’t have 5 brothers and sisters. It was fun trying to find each other special gifts.

Then we drove towards Portugal. In the distance we could see white mountains. As soon as we entered Portugal it started to snow but melted when it hit the ground. The landscape changed again to rocky and tundra like with lots of small evergreen trees but at least now there are houses and farms.

Midi-Pyrenees

We left L’eau Salee and got back into the travelling lifestyle-On the road again. We picked up some new books at L’eau Salee and starting reading them straight away. We walked along the 2000 year old ruins of a roman aqueduct to the Pont du Gard. Thomas rolled his ankle and walked like a pirate with a patch and a wooden leg. We had a snack overlooking the Pont du Gard- a 50m high aqueduct built to supply Nimes with water. It had three tiers of arcades that spanned across the Le Gardon river. We didn’t wear enough clothes and were very cold. The museum was closed for maintenance. We drove further west to a Sheep’s cheese France passion and arrived at dark. We would have had an even harder time finding it if the host wasn’t going out the gate.


The next day we bought some of his cheese and the son told us about the time he spent shearing in NZ. They let us have a brief look at their cheese making set up. They bought the milk because they didn’t have sheep. We drove to a canyon similar a little bit like the grand canyon but a lot smaller with trees. At a look out point we could see over Millau- a town famous for making sheep’s leather gloves. In the clouds was the Millau Viaduct-the tallest viaduct in the world. We drove down into the canyon and to a ‘epace’ info centre about the viaduct. There was a great movie about the building and design of the viaduct. The has seven piers holding up a 2km long deck. The tallest pier in 340m high 40m taller than the Eiffel tower. It was an amazing feat of engineering. We then drove to a tourist information office below the town of Roquefort where it was really cold. We walked up to the one street town looking for the ‘Roquefort cheese caves’. The town of Roquefort has about 5 different companies making Roquefort cheese. Roquefort cheese is a unique sheep cheese made from Lacaune ewe milk and special penicillin made from mouldy bread that gives it its recognizable blue dots . The cheese is only allowed to be made in a small part of the town. We decided to go to the ‘Papillion’ company because they did a free tour of the caves. We went into these ‘caves’ which weren’t really caves more like a sealed hole in the ground. The reason why the cheese is stored in the caves is because of cracks in the hill called ‘Fluorines’ which connect to the top of the mountain like a shaft. They act as natural vents that kept the cave at 8-12 degrees and 96% humidity all year round. The caves we went into weren’t used anymore so there were empty rotting oak shelves. The tour guide spoke French and tried to speak English but we ended up understanding mostly everything. We tried the deliciously creamy/salty cheese. There were different cheeses without the mould that were supposed to be mild and more for the liking of kids but it smelt very strongly of sheep .Thomas didn’t like it he thought it taste like a woolshed. We bought a special knife used to peel the skin of the cheese in the 1920’s but it cut cheese as well. We got some original Roquefort cheese too. Our guide and the man selling the cheese were very kind and gave us each a pin shaped as a butterfly-’Papillion’s’ label. We walked further up the town’s hill to a crumpled chapel with a view of the valley and hills glowing in the hills. We lost Anneke when we went ducked into a church on the way back but luckily found her again. We moved on driving in the dark. It’s getting very cold so we’re trying to move south to a warmer climate. We stayed in Albi and went in a giant catherdral the next day, there was a funeral going on inside and it was raining.

Lourdes wasn't any warmer which is where we went next. On the way we tried to find a gas brand at the supermarkets to change our bottle but we happened to have the brand that nobody sells. After lunch we walked in to town rugged up with all our clothes on. Lourdes is special because it is where there was the 18 apparitions of Mary. We walked through town to the sanctuary. The streets are lined with tourist shops but it felt like a ghost town with no people in it. First we visited the most important site in the sanctuary The Grotto. It is kind of like a cave in the hill where Saint Bernadette saw the 18 visions of Mary 152 years ago. Now there is a lit up statue. Silently we all walked through the grotto. Next to the Grotto are the candle burner which a little metal sheds full burning candles that people have of offered they burn all year round and symbolise the candles continuing people prayer and also light. We were quite late so the baths were shut but it is where you can wash in the special water from the Grotto. Back at the Grotto they were doing the Rosary in French. We went to the taps and filled a special bottle of the special water for Oma at home. Then we went into the three level Basilica the was built pretty much on the top of the Grotto. We went into the crypt of Saint Bernadette and in the next door chapel they were having a mass. Then we went in the top storey chapel and then the low level the biggest. I think the bottom is the most impressive. Above the alter was a cross that looks like it was floating and around the walls was the story of Jesus illustrated in amazing mosaics. It was dark when we walked back through town to the camper and stayed there for the night. The next morning we went back into Lourdes to go the visitors centre and find out about the conditions on the roads to Cirque de Gavarnie. The weather and roads were good so we decided to go up. We walked back through town of Lourdes which is different from around the sanctuary. There was heaps an heaps of dog poo everywhere! Which was unpleasant and because William was leading the way home without a map and trying to do a shortcut we took a while to get back and at one time we were almost lost. Back in the camper we drove up the beautiful road to Cirque de Gavarnie.

We followed the river with mountains on either side and passed lots of little hydro power stations. As we climbed the snow got thicker and at the top we decided to park and walk the last few hundred metres because they looked slippery. The Cirque de Gavarnie was stunning but us kids were more interested in playing with the snow and getting the longest biggest icicle which Johanna found. At the town fountain which was almost all frozen. William dropped a huge sheet of ice of the edge onto the snow below and it made a wicked sound. Sadly we had to leave quickly because the sun we about to go and we had to get past a wet part of the road before it froze. We stopped at a village half way down for lunch and us kids went outside and made snowballs and tried to hit Johanna who was standing against a stone wall. After mum and dad got back from there walk we drove back down to Lourdes and went back in for a last time. Then we had hot soup for dinner.