I never seem to get to bed early the night before a big journey and then when the day comes I still can’t seem to leave at the original planned time, even after the long night of preparation. It’s especially hard when you are driving because the car doesn’t take off without you. We had a nine-hour drive ahead of us and we left at 2 PM, driving out of Porto later than we wanted, but we had all day and Olivia had only just returned from Germany the night before, so no need to push it and I don’t drive. It’s always exciting rolling out into the world, especially from here. Leaving the city limits, we came to the hills and the terracotta roofs of North Eastern Portugal. At the closest point, it’s an hour to Vigo in Spain, but with our diagonal route to Sos del Rey Católico we weren’t in Spain till Chaves, a good two hours away.
As we hit the border we gained an hour which took our arrival time closer to midnight, but we had many hours of daylight left to gasp over the gorgeous spectacle of the Spanish countryside. The trees are different in Southern Europe, perhaps that’s unsurprising, but I don’t have a clue what kind of trees they are. I suppose I’m not the most knowledgeable about trees, but here I know nussink. Strange shapes, different heights, odd leaves, different colours and sitting in vast valleys between undulating hills with mountains in the distance. Sunflowers in the fields and a rich wheat-coloured landscape under a relentless sun.
You gotta be careful getting your petrol driving across Spain because the service stations are few and far between unless you want to go careering down another autovia. We managed to find one in the blistering heat 37+°C/99°F and put 40 euros in the car, the AC, of course, is on full pelt in this (doesn’t help the drain) and as it got cooler later, we managed to miss any hot food and were eating the last two bocadillos de queso they had in the place. We had stopped for a leg stretch in one of the rare rest areas where all the bins were spilling over with so much rubbish that it looked like a scene from a Dystopian tragedy.
We arrived close to midnight in the 15th-century village of Sos del Rey Católico and checked into a lovely hotel called Parador. The receptionist told me that this ancient village had been the birthplace of the catholic king, Fernando in 1450. I asked him if he was a bad guy or a good guy, we decided bad, haha.
All we could really think about when we got into the room was sleep, so that’s what we did, goodnight.
Music today has been Television – Adventure (1978), it seemed appropriate.