Geoff & Sue's Travels are Here


Sunday, December 13, 2015

Malaga Lights





Before we head back to the UK on Monday, we pop into Malaga to see the Christmas lights.

They're simpler than usual but extremely effective with much admiration from the Spanish throngs. Family selfies seem to be the new thing.



Friday, October 23, 2015

Caminito del Rey

A three night trip to the the area around El Churro with our walking group. It's around a 1.5 hour drive from Nerja.

We finish with a walk on the Caminito del Rey, which looks far more frighting than it turns out to be... once we are on the walkway, that is.

so what is the Caminito?

A wooden walkway pinned to the sides of a deep gorge...

you might know this already...

The original Caminito was fitted to the sides of the gorge in 1906 to access a 3 km water channel that was constructed to generate hydro-electric power; quite some achievement back then. This followed the construction of a railway through the gorge by the creation of a series of tunnels, completed in 1865.
The walkway was originally known as Balconcillos de los Gaitanes but was given its current name in 1921 when King Alfonso XIII walked along it as part of the inauguration of the new El Churro dam; that was quite an achievement, too, because the original walkway was decidedly dodgy in 21st Century health and safety terms.
The new walkway was completed and opened in Spring 2015.

here we are trying it out...

You Tube Clip

now, the photos...

Looks very different from down here



Variations in height along the route


Approaching the bridge across the gorge


The old bridge alongside the new



Sunday, October 18, 2015

Nerja Notables

Back again...

Look what they've used as sunshades in Torrox Pueblo:


Saturday, October 17, 2015

Summertime in England


(need chilling out?! ...watch Van Morrison: Summertime in England)

Lots of time spent doing family things this summer because our daughters are now all in the UK.. and near to us with two in London.... which is great, of course.

What an interesting political landscape in the UK this summer... if interesting is the right word... Nationalists, left wing, right wing... what is the middle of the road person going to do now?

Anyway, this is our travel blog so, as we've spent a fair amount of time travelling around the English coast and more in the new 'van, have a look at what we've been up to:


Lets start our cultural tour with a visit to the Royal Albert Hall to see the, er.. Beach Boys in Concert


It's colour coordinated you know..


 Stone Globe near Bournemouth, where we see the, er.. Moody Blues in Concert..


Been here before, but too good to miss again as we head for Salisbury


A good original copy of the Magna Carta lies here..


 Then it's on to Stratford to see Othello at the RSC. Wonderful, actually. And here lies the Bard himself.

Anne Hathaway's Cottage..


In the RSC before we turn off the camera...




Jewellery making as it used to be.. the Jewellery Quarter, Birmingham


The wonderful North Norfolk Coast


The longest narrow gauge railway in the country at Walsingham, they say...


Geoff's birthday in a London Blues Bar... enough said...


High House, Stafford... wonderfully maintained... pity about the ground floor...


In High House there is this gem.....Look carefully: it's the death warrant for Charles the First and there is Oliver Cromwell's' signature on the left.


And sitting on Greenwich Hill, we reflect on a summer well spent...










Monday, June 8, 2015

Here at Last

Well, our Continental is here... about time you might say. It's worth the wait though.

There's a weird sense of deja vu as we sort it out for a trip.. it's only 12 months ago that we were doing the very same thing for Swift's almost identical Elegance in preparation for our Iceland adventure. Prefer this though ..it matches the Touareg, don't you think?


Sunday, April 26, 2015

Stone Age Man

Found in the Chillar Valley, above Nerja..



Now, where did they come from?

Sunday, April 12, 2015

Semana Santa

Here in Nerja again....

...and, of course, we couldn't miss the wonderful Semana Santa parades and celebrations.

Semana Santa Background & Info


9pm Thursday
 9pm Friday

 12.00 Sunday


They make my shoes look a bit ordinary, what do you think?

Ahhh!!

Friday, March 20, 2015

Travelling....Looking Ahead

We've been in the UK for a few weeks - doing house things, seeing friends, looking after daughter's cat, wondering why our new caravan isn't here yet.. and planning our next 12 months travelling ..kind of, anyway.

A decison though....   All being well, we'll be travelling in Argentina, Chile and Brazil next January, finishing up in Rio for Carnival.  Sue's planning that one and it's looking good.

The Iceland article in the February edition of Caravan Magazine seems to have gone down well and it's tempting to do another documented tour, this time through Scandinavia, for a number of reasons. We'll see. Or we might just do some more of the UK coast.
Caravan Mag via SwiftGroup link

We found time to do some of our on-going coastal tour in and around Rochester. Very nice, too. A town of two halves, I think. Wonderful castle and cathedral.

Back in Nerja next week.




Rochester Castle
rochester-castle link

 Rochester Cathedral
rochestercathedral.org/

Fascinating house sandwiched in a terrace


Thursday, February 19, 2015

Walking up El Cielo

Well, we tried, with no expectation of getting above the snow line...

Here's the track:




A great walk with the group, just 200m below the summit of the local peak, El Cielo, above Nerja at 1508m above sea level. That's not bad at all. The snow was mainly dumped the day before the walk unfortunately. Locals tell us they have not seen so much snow on the surrounding peaks for 30 odd years.

The leaders correctly judged that conditions were too risky above the snow line, so we marched back down again...

Perhaps we'll try again before the year is out.

So near...



That's why..



Monday, January 12, 2015

Africa, Christmas and Espana

Well, after our 13,000km motorhome tour of Southern Africa [summary HERE] we arrive just in time to have an unexpectedly good Christmas back in the UK...unexpected because we didn't have time to think about it I guess.

So now it's back to our Spanish life in Nerja for a while.That means music nights, film nights, meals with friends, history group, tapas, glasses of Rioja, and long, lovely walks in the Sierras with the walking group.  It's a tough life ..but you only get one*...

[*of course, I know this is only my view]

Not forgetting Carnival! Followed by the very sad death of the Sardine.
Truly Mad, Truly Wonderful.