After driving down to East Midlands from Sheffield we were on the 17:45 flight to Alicante. Just over two hours later we were touching down to a temperature of 13°.
With the hours time difference, and by the time we picked up the van from Victoria Parking it was getting late so we returned to Santa Pola beach, back to the wild camping spot where we had spent the night just before flying back to the UK. We had a peaceful night with all the other motorhomers that were parked up including two British vans.
Santa Palo Wild Camping: 38°13′32.04″N 00°30′38.72″W
31 December 2016
After waking late and having a lazy breakfast we packed up and headed south. We stopped at La Marina where we had considered staying when we have the grandchildren in February. It's a big site but the vans are packed in like sardines. There are some good facilities for kids but we left with a negative impression and are happy we have booked somewhere else.
We headed further south with guidance from Sean the sat navigator and called at Lidl in a place called San Fulgencio. The Supermarket was reasonably close to three camper stops.
Once we had stocked up with the necessities of beer and wine and a few other provisions we headed off to the first camper stop which was all of 100 metres drive. Like the other two sites it was fully booked and bursting at the seems. There were vans parked up on the road outside.
We tried one more spot before returning to Santa Pola and our beach front location. The spot we tried was off a roundabout with a resident hooker. She even had her own little exit where cars could pull off for a pull off. We passed her going out to the camper spot and on the way back to Santa Pola. Our own little spot was still there so we set up and headed out for a good walk before the sun went down. When we got back to the van we ended up chatting to another Brit who was parked up just across from us. He was pointing out how a lot of single men park up and then stroll off into the dunes for a clandestine rendezvous with one of the occupants of the other cars. It's surprising what you don't notice until someone points it out. The hooker on the roundabout was obvious but the single chaps going walking was a bit more discreet. It kept Val amused for the evening till it went dark. She kept saying "ho look, there's another one".
We spent the rest of New Years Eve grapes ready in the Spanish tradition waiting for the fireworks. We watched an old video of Rebus which kept us entertained till about 11:30 and then it was out on the beach for the fireworks and grape eating at midnight. One grape for each chime of the clock. There were two firework displays close by and we could see some more fireworks going off across the bay in Alicante.
1 January 2017
Happy New Year. We woke late on the first day of the year and had a lazy morning before packing up and after much deliberation we headed north back into Alicante. Our first choice of site in the new year was closed, a good start and we were very low on fuel. Sean then directed us up a dead end which we managed to get out of and happened on a fuel station just round the corner. The Zendogs luck hadn't completely deserted us.
Rather than head for another site that might be booked up Val found us another Wild Camping spot on our Dutch Camping app and we pitched up early afternoon to get the last spot with a sea view. We ended up racing another van who had hit the beach at the same time as us for the prime position. Platja Altet: N 38˚17´21˝ - W 0˚31'15˝
After some lunch sat out in the sunshine we headed out for a walk along the promenade. We were quite close to the airport and planes were coming into land with the flight path just above our heads.
Back in the van it was time for me to catch up with the blog whilst did some research for her trip to New York. We had dinner watching the sea lapping up onto the beach about 25 metres away and then settled in for a quiet evening. Hopefully the Spanish will have gone back to work tomorrow and there will be some room on the sites again.
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