{"id":4982,"date":"2024-05-18T18:38:44","date_gmt":"2024-05-18T18:38:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=4982"},"modified":"2025-12-24T22:26:47","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T22:26:47","slug":"2-party-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/?p=4982","title":{"rendered":"2. PARTY, PARTY!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Early on in our stay two notable things happened.\u00a0 Firstly, we had a flying display over the caravan.\u00a0 A marsh harrier and an osprey in tandem.\u00a0 Later evidence suggests the osprey (fairly rare in this neck of the woods) was probably a black kite.\u00a0 I was too busy watching his big brother flying stunts in front of us to make an accurate identification!\u00a0 Later in our time at Oyambre, the harrier has been seen again.\u00a0 But no ospreys – although they have been seen here from time to time – possibly on their annual migration from A to B (or from B to A, I suppose).<\/p>\n

The second notable event was a trip from the campsite to the coast road via the country lanes.\u00a0 And, boy, these lanes are very “laney”.\u00a0 Meeting anyone would result in an interesting conversation comparing the distance back to the respective, nearest passing place.\u00a0 Fortunately, we had no such encounters.\u00a0 But we did get comprehensively lost.\u00a0 The third time we passed the Taberna de Valle, we decided we should stop for lunch in case we never got out of the maze!<\/p>\n

A super “find”, if you can have a “find” when you are actually lost!\u00a0 There wasn’t a word of English, written or spoken in the joint.\u00a0 Using pictures found on the web by the waiter (owner?) on his phone, we navigated to a very satisfactory chicken Caesar salad followed by a pork and chips construction.\u00a0 The pudding was dictated by us having “one of what he’s got”.\u00a0 This turned out to be a melting-chocolate-centred concoction – probably bought from the local Lupa supermarket.\u00a0 Importantly, the bottle of wine that came with the meal meant we emerged from the bar less concerned about being lost in the country.\u00a0 We were probably less than three kms from the campsite!\u00a0 And, in case you were wondering, we did emerge from the boondocks – well before dark!<\/p>\n

Saturday (11 May) srarted slightly damp but the walk along the prom at Comillas was OK.\u00a0 No sandy feet and, as the rain stopped, we walked into town.\u00a0 Under the road bridge.\u00a0 But in the end we back-tracked and collected the car.\u00a0 We parked in the last available space in town.\u00a0 And walked about as far back into the historic centre as we would have if we’d left the car by the beach.\u00a0 Still it’ll be closer if the rain starts again!<\/p>\n

The old market place is a quaint area of town with the\u00a0 Plaza Ib\u00e1\u00f1es, the Plaza de la Constitucion and the Church of San Cristobal.<\/p>\n

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Lurking on the skyline in some places you can see the towers on Gaudi’s El Capricho.\u00a0 (If you want to see our pictures of that amazing place you will have to go back in “blog-time” to one of our previous visits to the area!) (And that’s a challenge!)<\/p>\n

There is also a “palace”, the Palacio de Sobrellano, back near where we parked.\u00a0 Not a real palace, but a very fine, late 19th century residence.<\/p>\n

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However, these things are not for today.\u00a0 Glenda explores some little clothing boutiques looking for the elusive “perfect trousers”.\u00a0 Those that have so far not been located in any of the many trouser outlets visited to date!<\/p>\n

I’m off to investigate the source of extremely loud music!\u00a0 A lot less elusive!\u00a0 After two minutes tracking, I was standing at an open garden gate where there was a combined “sardine and birthday party” if full swing.\u00a0 Two minutes later we were swept in by the wife of the owner.\u00a0 He was busy with his sardines at the BBQ in the corner of the garden of the Bar Guadalupe!\u00a0 Once inside it was mayhem.\u00a0 Fancy dressed birthday party goers dancing to a loud, three-piece band with a very loud vocalist.\u00a0 Or at least loudly amplified.<\/p>\n

The plan is, you buy a drink (beer \u20ac2.50 or vino tinto \u20ac1.50) and you got a plateful of bread and hot sardines.\u00a0 We stayed for hours!\u00a0 Getting slowly pickled – MUCH more slowly than our new-found friends!<\/p>\n

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That’s us NOT in fancy dress!\u00a0 And I can confirm that Elvis Aaron Presley is indeed still alive and kicking!\u00a0 Apparently, he will be 90 next January.\u00a0 I can report that he’s aging very well!\u00a0 The only odd thing is that as he’s got older, he has learnt Spanish and forgotten American!<\/p>\n

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Me and my new best friend!\u00a0 Rock on Elvis!<\/p>\n

We had to go for a sit down after all the excitement – but we were the oldest couple on the dance floor – oldest by quite a bit.<\/p>\n

Back to the land of (relative) normality.\u00a0 \u00a0Sunday lunch.\u00a0 Luckily we had booked – else we might have missed out – we might still have been chilling!\u00a0 El Remedio – beside the church on top of the hill with the really snappy name of Ermita de Nuestra Sen\u00f5ra de los Remedios.\u00a0 You can see why the restaurant has abbreviated the name.\u00a0 However, it appears that this lady was very popular and has dozens of hermitages, churches and even the odd cathedral named in her honour.\u00a0 Her remedies must have been very good.\u00a0 Or maybe, once given the tablets, you still had to pray hard for them to work!<\/p>\n

Anyway, the food was very tasty, if totally devoid of any veggies unless you counted the three desiccated vegetable crisps!\u00a0 And fairly enthusiastically priced!<\/p>\n

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But it was a good opportunity for Glenda to wear some of her posher clothes after a week of beach-walking gear.<\/p>\n

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(I hate it when people fail to get the subject’s feet in the photo…)<\/p>\n

The next morning was another lovely day for a walk on the beach at San Vicente de la Barquera.<\/p>\n

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And then into town which is a bit disappointing.\u00a0 It’s almost impossible to park here, even at this time of year.\u00a0 And then there isn’t that much to the town.\u00a0 It is a working fishing port and there are lots of tourist shops and hundreds of restaurants.\u00a0 Oh, and there’s a castle high up in town – the Castillo del Rey.\u00a0 Constructed in the early 13th century for the king (?), this medieval, defensive castle now houses the town museum.<\/p>\n

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Moving on, we select a tiny village at random on the map for a surprise visit!\u00a0 Luey!\u00a0 It’s south of the autopista in the foothills of the real foothills of the Picos de Europa.\u00a0 And it sounds just ready for a visit.<\/p>\n

As we arrived, we were a bit worried as most of the houses in down-town Luey looked ready for a visit from a demolition team rather than from two slightly elderly campers!<\/p>\n

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But, true to form, there were two intact buildings on the main square.\u00a0 One was an old people’s home and the other was a bar, cum shop, cum restaurant, cum general meeting place for the folk from across the street!\u00a0 We fitted right in.\u00a0 We started with a beer and a wine, both at \u20ac1.20 as I recall.\u00a0 That brought out little bowls of olives and potatoes in garlic sauce.\u00a0 We then moved on to a plate of, what was advertised as, mixed cheeses.<\/p>\n

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If you look closely, you can see that the only thing mixed about what arrived was the size of the slices!\u00a0 Hey ho, I must check my translator friend, Mr Google-translate-camera-thingy!\u00a0 We had another \u20ac2.40’s worth from the bar and were immediately offered flat 26 across the road to buy, or to rent, or something.\u00a0 Everyone here seems to speak a different sort of Spanish than that with which we are already struggling desperately.\u00a0 Maybe it’s just all the false teeth and the amplified hearing aids causing the problem!\u00a0 Anyway we smiled, possibly invested another \u20ac4.80 at the bar, I can’t really remember!.\u00a0 Then we beat a hasty retreat without signing any documents (that we can remember)!<\/p>\n

It’s sooo exciting when you haven’t a clue about anything that’s going on around you.\u00a0 We call it, “Living on the Edge!<\/p>\n

Drat!\u00a0 We’ve just run out of water!\u00a0 And it’s raining.\u00a0 That’s the perishing “Edge” for you!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Early on in our stay two notable things happened.\u00a0 Firstly, we had a flying display over the caravan.\u00a0 A marsh harrier and an osprey in tandem.\u00a0 Later evidence suggests the osprey (fairly rare in this neck of the woods) was… <\/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":[53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spain-and-france-2024"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4982","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=4982"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4982\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5430,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4982\/revisions\/5430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappstravels.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}