Rainy Day/Sunny Day - Walk to Alcossebre

 Wednesday 8 February

Today was a rainy day!  But was not without it's highlights.  We spent most of the morning in the van, but got out for some fresh air when the rain stopped for a while.  

Need to explain the layout here - where I took this photo is on the corner of the road with the campsite behind me.  Here, the road goes left and circles around what is usually a large area of sand and pebbles between it and the sea and continues on along the coast where the trees are.  The quantity of rain that has fallen overnight the last 2 nights has turned this part of the road and most of the sand into a huge puddle! 

A few cars (probably local people who know the lie of the land) have made tracks across the sand, but our little walk brought us to some entertainment!  Would you believe it, but a large (British) van decided to ignore the 'road closed because of flood' signs, skirted the barrier and had a go at crossing the sand.  Unfortunately it didn't go to the driver's plan, and he had sunk rather deeply into the sand.

But soon after we and various other spectators were wondering what he could do, the band of Tropicana chaps - they do all sorts of maintenance jobs on site with 'Staff' on their jackets - turned up pushing a cart laden with planks of wood, rope and spades.  Took them a fair bit of digging and pushing, but with all that beefy manpower, they got the van moving and the driver was able to get back onto the road.  We assume he then followed the signs avoiding the flood! 

After lunch, our friends Karen and Steve came round to us for a cuppa and a game of Triominoes.  They'd not played it before, but Steve won and Karen came second!  A fun afternoon.

Then another breath of fresh air - interesting clouds, but we'd rather they go away really.

We abandoned the idea of cooking dinner and wandered down to the site restaurant as we felt in need of trying their paella.  This panfull is for both of us!  Pretty good it was too!  While in the restaurant, we were following Flight Radar 24 on the phone as our lovely granddaughter Emilie was leaving from Heathrow to Kathmandu via Istanbul on an expedition with a group from her school.  (Bit more adventuous than her Dad's school skiing trips).  She will be doing some trekking, painting a school's classrooms and part of the time having a home-stay. 

Pudding was cheesecake with cream and a fruity sauce.

Another good day despite the weather.

Thursday 9 February

We were told by others this morning that the rain was horrendous during the night, but we were totally unaware of that - all we noticed when we woke up, was the return of the blue sky.  So a good day for the seafront walk into Alcossebre. 

We stopped in the town for hot drinks and a visit to one of the Chinese emporiums for a look around to find what we didn't know we needed!  We came away with a spanner, a mains cable for when we both need to charge up laptops at the same time (only brought 1 with us) and his and hers black bum bags for Rock Choir performances!

Carried on walking beyond the town, past the harbour, to the next bay that leads to the lighthouse

and sat on a seat to eat our lunch with this view.  The sea is definitly calming down, but still very choppy where there are rocks.

Lots of apartment blocks along this stretch - rather liked the look of this one.

There are countless cafes and restaurants along this 3 miles or so of coast but most of them are still closed.  But we noticed this one on our way back that was open.  We thought our coffee and tea were going to be rather pricey compared with the town as it was very smart inside, but no, just over €3 bought both drinks along with a surprise mini brownie with a blob of cream on top - each. (They disappeared far too quickly to photograph!)

Very pleased to enjoy the sunshine today, but expect it to get warmer from tomorrow.