Southbound through Spain

Plan for the unexpected

Discovering Jaizkibel campsite, where we were intending to stay at is closed, Seán reverses, slaloming around motorbikes, cars and vans, accompanied by the enthusiastic gesticulations of a bar full of drinkers until, finally out, they applaud. The sat-nav then sends us up Jaizkibel’s winding road before directing us down a goat track. My partner in crime coolly informs me he hasn’t got round to downloading the app alerting us to narrow roads or, in this case, goat tracks. I’m convinced it’s just so he can execute a hair-raising three-point turn.

San Sebastián’s Camping Igueldo is on a bus route to the centre and on the Camino de Santiago’s pilgrim footpath. We walk the four miles of the Camino to the old town, with the Pyrenees as the backdrop, and goats scrambling in lush fields above Atlantic coves.

We feast in the Ambigú Bar, the food living up to the city’s gastronomic reputation, especially the banana crisp dessert filled with vanilla and apricot mascarpone. Constitution Square is breathtaking, with its intricate iron balconies, arcaded walkways, sherbet lemon walls – the old bullring’s numbers still on the apartments.

Mount Urgull’s summit offers up 360-degree views of port, beaches, mountains and ocean, but my technical companion is absorbed by the metal step ladder up the back of the giant statue of Jesus and the lightning conductor that tops it.

The next day we walk six miles west along the Camino to Orio, crossing heathland, woodland, nature reserves, trickling streams and meadows full of donkeys, horned cattle, pied wagtails and purple ragged robin.

Orio offers up colonnaded St Martín’s hermitage, and ashlar houses (a type of stone masonry), complete with wooden beams and arched doorways big enough for past owners to ride their horses into the courtyard. We lunch on salt cod stew, watching trawlers head out to sea and the long Basque rowing boat powering down the River Oria.

Driving south

The AP-1 motorway takes us towards the Douro River and medieval Tordesillas. The honeyed stone basilica, aristocratic houses and convents are impressively stuccoed.

A statue of Queen Juana I stands resplendant on a globe, marking the spot where the Spanish and Portuguese monarchs divided up South America. Plaza Mayor’s multicoloured lamps lend romance to the square, with its clock face and marble façades.

The N-403 to Ávila is a dreamscape of umbrella pines, blossoming fruit trees and dry stone walls. I rhapsodise over Ávila’s soaring ramparts (muralladeavila.com/en), my poor chauffeur steering around stray pedestrians, finally managing to squeeze our 6m-long campervan into a space on an impossible incline, but mere steps from the old town.

We cross the Plaza de Santa Teresa by the saint’s marble statue, before exploring the ramparts, enjoying a view of russet roofs, statues, belfries and castles, the Sierra de Ávila mountains in the distance. The audio guide describes gruesome Spanish Inquisition executions and explains that the rampart cellars were slaughterhouses, which explains why statues of Iberian pigs lurk around every corner.

We arrive at Toledo’s El Greco campsite as the setting sun paints the town’s tufa stone orange. In the morning we walk just under a mile to the centre. Glowering skies threaten as we arrive at the stone bridge, with its towers and Moorish arches, crossing the vivid green River Tagus.

The Don Quixote riverside footpath winds through the gorge with herons hunching, cormorants airing their wings and goldfinches flitting. Aloe vera and mallow cling to the valley’s sides and Chinaberry trees line the river. In town, Bar-Restaurante Santa Fe introduces us to the local speciality, carcamusa, a delicious pork stew.

We explore Toledo’s historic treasures: from the two-storey cloisters at the Monasterio de San Juan de los Reyes (sanjuandelosreyes.org/en) to Santa María Synagogue’s white and gold interior (toledomonumental.com/santa-maria-blanca); and El Greco’s handsome house museum (culturaydeporte.gob.es/mgreco/en/museo/museo-hoy). Apart from El Greco’s use of rich colour, I love the painter’s business sense as he built a roaring trade in altarpieces.

The A4 to Córdoba runs through windmill-dotted plains, by orchards and vineyards. In Córdoba we stay in Sierra Morena’s natural park, at peaceful Camping Los Villares, 11km (seven miles) from the city. We wander through woods of holm oak, strawberry trees, eucalyptus, Aleppo and umbrella pine. Cistus, myrtle, lavender, rosemary and camomile are everywhere.

It’s just over a mile to the bus, which will whisk us to Córdoba. Once there, we walk from the train station through parks of palm trees, fountains and white doves to the Jewish Quarter’s cobbled alleys, white houses and hidden gardens. We step through the pages of history at the Guadalquivir’s Roman bridge, the Alcazar and the sixteenth century Moorish house, once home to Europe’s first cotton-fed paper mill. But the Mosque-Cathedral (mezquita-catedraldecordoba.es/en) robs us of speech, with a tall bell tower and orange tree-filled courtyard, and an interior that is huge and filled with repeated arches. It is easy to get a taxi from the station to the campsite in Córdoba – it’s quite a long uphill walk otherwise.

On the coast

Andalusia’s Almuñécar is a favourite of ours. Our pitch in rustic Camping Tropical overlooks avocado and custard apple groves, the old white town on the hill, plus the Med beyond, and the hoopoe’s whoop fills the night.

We stroll along the palm-fringed promenade, by mosaic benches and the roundabout’s giant, ceramic octopus, before stopping at a white obelisk dedicated to Gloucestershire’s Laurie Lee, the memorial marking how he helped Almuñécar’s rebels resist Franco’s troops. Our favourite bar, Mesón El Corzo, serves a mango and anchovy salad, on the house, with our glass of wine.

From the rocky crag overlooking San Cristóbal Beach, we survey the incisor-shaped islets, gannets dive-bombing the sea, and the bronze statue of Abd al-Rahman I, who landed here and founded Córdoba. The Sierra Nevada’s jagged peaks provide a backdrop to the labyrinthine old town clustering beneath the castle, once home to Phoenicians, Romans and Arabs.

The Roman era comes to life on the northern outskirts of town with the perfectly preserved aqueduct surrounded by wildflowers and in the botanical park, with its fish salting factory’s ancient vats among the tropical trees.

The coast-hugging A7 east soon becomes battle-scarred, covered in plastic greenhouses. But at the Cabo de Gata Natural Park, the plastic citadels fall away. Majestic mountains plunge to the sea; gorges slice deep into the land, and broom and acacia bloom.

Following Alfaix’s ancient trail through orange and lemon groves, wild flowers riot at my feet. Sparrows compete with the buzzing bees and a tortoise shuffles across the path.

A thermal spa since Roman times, Murcia’s Baños de Fortuna is an oasis in a lunar landscape. Towering palms and eucalyptus trees surround the elegant pastel nineteenth century buildings. Lounging in the campsite’s thermal pool, a buzzard circles overhead. The water comes out of the ground at 58 degrees Celsius and is cooled to 36 degrees.

At 10pm locals flood to the Café Teatro, the floor show beating Strictly any day. Cool dudes worthy of Levi jeans’ adverts tango with their grannies – it seems to me being a Spanish granny has a lot to recommend it.

It’s not worth cooking at La Fuente, with its €11 menu. A German group decide to have whiskey-doused cake for dessert. Smiling, the waitress plonks down a whole bottle of whiskey. Much jollity ensues as those cakes swim in the amber nectar.

The AP7 takes us to La Vall de Laguar’s mountainous Campell village whose campsite looks out on mountain terraces, dry stone walls and the distant sea. The historic wash house is a place to sit and dream – lemons shining through its arches and water burbling.

We follow the trail from the campsite to the old leper colony, San Francisco de Borja, at Fontilles, taking us through juniper-scented pine forests and lemon, orange, carob and olive terraces.

We smile at the quirky sign, ‘No Hunting of Drag Queen Minotaurs’ with its illustration of a minotaur in lipstick, high heels and painted nails.

The leper colony’s two-mile wall ranges along the mountain’s ridge. Through a rusted iron door, we weave down the pine-clad valley, past the farm, cottages, church, theatre, and bar to the colony’s heart and its faded, elegant buildings. At its centre, the statue of the founder looks down on a kneeling leper. It’s haunting as mist descends, a chainsaw moans and a young tree surgeon hangs in mid-air.

Homeward bound

We’d already noticed there were no other British cars in Hazebrouck. Flanders seems to have remained below the tourist radar, still the sort of place everyone passes through quickly, on their way to somewhere else.

Our campsite continued the theme. Admittedly there were few motorhomes, mostly statics, but there was not a Brit in sight, and no one spoke English.

Everyone was very friendly – the madame in charge was lovely and, when I couldn’t understand her rapid cascade of words, she just upped the volume. We were definitely off the beaten track.

Suggested campsites

All campsites listed are all open all year

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