{"id":344,"date":"2018-10-03T19:38:39","date_gmt":"2018-10-03T19:38:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=344"},"modified":"2026-08-18T07:39:41","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T07:39:41","slug":"euro-travellers-2018-03","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=344","title":{"rendered":"EURO-TRAVELLERS 2018. 03"},"content":{"rendered":"

3\u00a0 SANTILLANA DEL MAR<\/strong><\/p>\n

We are really amazed at the neatness and tidiness of the countryside, the houses, the gardens and the towns.\u00a0 It really <\/span>is soo much bet<\/span>ter than we were expecting – and it’s sooo green everywhere.\u00a0 The meadows are filled with long and lush-looking grass.\u00a0 Everyone has a cow or a horse or possibly one of each!<\/span><\/p>\n

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Oyambre beach<\/span><\/p>\n

And, while we may be being a bit selective in where we visit, there are some really lovely old buildings in the towns.\u00a0 We hit Santillana del Mar on our third day (that would be Thirdsday!).\u00a0 It’s known as the town of three lies.\u00a0 It has no designated saint (Santi); it’s built on hilly land (not flat as llana would suggest); and is located at some distance from the coast.\u00a0 But the best story about its name is that it was derived from the name of Santa Juliana whose remains are (allegedly) housed in the Romanesque Church in the magnificent historic town centre.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Of course, like Postman Pat who will be called Pat when he retires, Santa Juliana was plain Juliana before she became famous.\u00a0 Apparently, and it was before my time so we have to go with stories here, young Juliana was married off to a Turk but was tortured to death because she refused to renounce her religion.\u00a0 There’s a rumour that she also refused to give up her virginity to the old man.\u00a0 So she had to go.\u00a0 Posthumously, she was awarded a sainthood for her troubles.\u00a0 So there you have Santillana.\u00a0 There were some lovely restaurants there too.\u00a0 We just need to crack the combo offers – so far we have had them by random chance when we order a coffee and get a continental breakfast thrown in!<\/span><\/p>\n

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Views of Santillana \u2013 Town well with Saint Juliana church behind, main street and tapas which come with a drink (maybe).<\/span><\/p>\n

Afterwards, we headed a bit further east to Suances to check out the beach and sea-front dining options (actually, we restricted ourselves to coffee and an icecream).\u00a0 The beaches here are superb.\u00a0 Good for walking on at low tide when masses of hard sand are exposed.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Dining with a view at Suances beach<\/span><\/p>\n

We also found a small cove (Playa de Tagle) about 5 kms down a single track road with almost no passing places.\u00a0 Good parking at the end and the cove had built-in accommodation.\u00a0 There’s masses of easy and free parking everywhere – although today we did see a sign which indicated that summer tourists were going to be hit with a \u20ac3.50 charge to park at a beach near our site.<\/p>\n

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Seaside B&B at Playa de Tagle<\/span><\/p>\n

Now it’s Friday.\u00a0 Friday is the day that the road to Potes in the Picos opens after a week-long closure.\u00a0 There are huge improvements going on during the week.\u00a0 At least two bridges are being replaced and the rocky outcrops on the roadside are being removed.\u00a0 This is really the only way into the hills for big vehicles from this end.\u00a0 And it’s only open from Friday midday to Monday lunchtime.\u00a0 So we head in by the long and tortuous route over the mountains in the morning and plan to leave by the “fast” road which follows the river down the gorge.<\/p>\n

At one junction, we made the mistake of not taking up the kind offer from a coach driver to let us out of a side road in front of him.\u00a0 Sadly, at that point, we didn’t know which way we should be going.\u00a0 Very disorientating these twisty roads.\u00a0 And very frustrating following a coach for miles round zillions of blind bends!\u00a0 We eventually got past him in time for Lunch in Potes.\u00a0 Then we wandered round the town with a coachload of pensioners from mid-Northumberland!<\/span><\/p>\n

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Potes.<\/p>\n

Onwards and upwards into the clouds.\u00a0 To the cable car at Fuente De.\u00a0 Every now and again the top of the telegraphique came into view so I decide to go up to the snow.<\/p>\n

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Fuente De – Bottom and top of cable car<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s \u20ac17 return.\u00a0 I was a bit miffed to be offered pensioner rates without asking for them.\u00a0 Still, saved best part of \u20ac3 there!\u00a0 The cloud came and went – but mainly came!\u00a0 I had half an hour walking in patchy snow and met a lad struggling up-hill with a pair of skis and what looked like a para-glider in a huge rucksack. He spent ages getting his skis on at the start of the snow.\u00a0 I hadn’t the heart to tell him that it petered out about 20 feet ahead – just round a bend in the track. I’d just walked past there so I knew.\u00a0 Having had enough of intermittent drizzle, I then took the return trip to meet up with Glenda (and about 40 pensioners from Northumberland).<\/p>\n

The trip home on the “fast” road was anything but fast.\u00a0 Less winding than our trip in, but still almost a continuous series of bends and very narrow in places.\u00a0 And we were accompanied by all the supply vehicles which were making their once-weekly deliveries!<\/p>\n

….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

3\u00a0 SANTILLANA DEL MAR We are really amazed at the neatness and tidiness of the countryside, the houses, the gardens and the towns.\u00a0 It really is soo much better than we were expecting – and it’s sooo green everywhere.\u00a0 The… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-portugal-2018"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=344"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8103,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344\/revisions\/8103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}