Southern Spain to Portugal Trip - Part One

Lucy in Tarifa
Most southern town of Spain

Huge beautiful tree that caught
my eye in Sevilla

During our walk through Sevilla, Spain


One narrow street in Sevilla.
That is Lucy and I way at the end of this pretty street.


Entertainers at a Plaza de España in Sevilla

One of the many Plazas in Sevilla

Lagos, Portugal where Lucy did some cliff climbing

The Men who looked after the caravan
in Lisbon

Lisbon, Portugal
One Plaza we visited we munched on fresh oranges.

Climbing the rocks for our early morning hike

Lucy's last play near the beach
Big Smiles

Where Lucy was buried with many seagulls flying about
and the most gorgeous view of the Atlantic Ocean

Lucy's and my very last cuddle in
Cascais, Portugal

Basel and I left Nerja on a Sunday and drove along the coast of Spain going through the towns of Torremolinos, Fuegirola, Marabella, Estepona and ending up at the most southern point of Spain, Costa de Luz in a town called Tarifa. It is a small attractive laid back town which is a mecca for windsurfers. The beaches are clean with white sand and huge waves. Inland, there are hundreds of windmills on the hilltops because of the wind. My hair stood straight up the whole time we were there. The temperature was cool as well, about 20 celcius.

There is a strip of land with a beautifull walkway and this point is where the Mediterranean Sea meets the Atlantic Ocean. I haven't felt wind like that since the last time I was in Saskatchewan. You look across the Sea (left side) and Ocean (right side) and see Tangier, Africa. It is a 35 minute ferry ride to another continent, pretty cool really. Tarifa reminds me of Tofino, BC. I read that windsurfers come from all over the world to this little town just to catch the perfect waves. So André, this would be the place for you to see when you come to see your Auntie. We walked around this cute little town at night and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. By accident, we came across a flamenco show in the main plaza which was wonderful. Oh my, the costumes were so beautiful and the dancing was mostly done in groups. I thought of it as the Spanish version of "River Dance".

The next morning, we walked the dogs along the 2 km beach and watched the dogs play, run, bark with a whole bunch of birds. There was about 8 inches of water along this strip of land, kind of like a marshy area just next to the beach. Needless to say, the dogs had a hay day, the perfect playing conditions for any dog. The dogs played for almost 2 hours until a young man stopped to chat with us in Spanish and mentioned that our dogs were playing in a bird sanctuary! OOPSIE! No wonder we were getting weird looks from the 3 men with their fancy cameras with huge lenses. We thought they were taking pictures of our dogs having a good time, but they were actually trying to capture pictures of all the pretty birds ahah.

We continued up the east coast of Spain and travelled through the towns of Bolonia, Zahara los Atunes, and Cádiz. Cádiz is one of the oldest cities in Europe, 1100 BC and founded by the Phoenicians. Christopher Columbus sailed from this port on his second and fourth voyages. It was 37 celcius when we arrived in Cadiz and we just weren't into exploring so off we went to Huelva later that day. I had the most excrutiating toothache when we arrived in Huelva and our time there was spent trying to find a dentist. With no luck in that department, we drove north on to Sevilla and by this time my toothache was manageable.

Sevilla is the biggest Andalucian city of over 700,000 people, but we were totally captivated by the atmosphere. It is a quiet, beautiful, stylish, ancient city with many plazas, great shopping, loads of parking, and very easy to walk around and explore for hours. We sampled tasty tapas as we walked the narrow windy streets. The city's two great monuments to see are the Muslim Alcázar and the Christian cathedral where Christopher Columbus tomb is, but that is still a mystery, if his remains are really there or not. We parked next to the Rio Guadalquivir for the evening and the next day we visited the Townhall, Plaza San Fransisco, Plaza de España, and enjoyed a few beers in pubs off the beaten track.

We drove straight east and arrived in Portugal in the afternoon. Our first stop was the town of Lagos next to the Atlantic Ocean. We walked until we came across a sign for La Playa (the beach), which was a long hike down between cliffs. It was a small beach with the most beautiful terra cotta-coloured sand. There was a family of 6 and one of the little girls was pointing to the side of a cliff and saying something in Portugese. The whole family was enthralled with something on the side of this cliff. We wondered what they were all looking at and who should have climbed half way up this cliff, but Lucy. I noticed her fur was the same colour as the cliff and we almost didn't see her. Lucy was trying things in Portugal that she had never done before. It was like she had no fear.

The first night in Portugal, we camped on a strip of land near the town of Sagres, with huge cliffs on either side. It was so windy the caravan rocked all night. It was like being on the water and getting sea sick. I didn't think one could get motion sickness in a caravan, but you can. When we went out with the dogs that night, we had to bundle up like it was winter because of the wind, the ocean mist, and the temperature dropped to about 15 celcius. Geesh, I didn't think I would be wearing a toque in the middle of summer, but it was fun even though it was the first time I had jeans on in months.

The cliffs were so huge and a little scary as Lucy would put her nose to what looked the like edge, and watch the seagulls. Basel and Foxy went climbing on the rocks a bit, but Lucy wasn't allowed to go along ahah. The next day we woke up with a woman knocking on the door to say that we were parked in the middle of their Sunday market. We laughed like heck, as this has happened to us before and also we were in the middle of nowhere and thought a market is going to be set up in this wind. Well the stalls was set up in about 15 minutes with all the venders dressed like there was going to be a snow storm. Of course I am a sucker for poking around markets so I got geared up myself and ended up buying some beautiful postcards and the best honey from the cutest elderly Portugese man.

From Sagres we travelled through the towns of Aljezur, Odeceixe, and Sines. Then we drove over a beautiful 12 km bridge into Lisbon and our impression of the city is that it is clean, well-off, and impressive with beautiful city parks with tons of trees. We found the perfect park for the dogs to run and for us to study our Spanish next to the University. We drove to the city's centre and came across a small park where we met some interesting people. We believed some of these folks were homeless with their belongings strung up in the palm trees. But there was this one man that we paid 5 euros to in the parking lot and he promised to keep an eye on the caravan. All the men got a kick out of our dogs. After talking with the men for a bit, we actually felt comfortable going off for the day to explore for the day. We arrived back to the caravan, still in tack and the men said there was "no problemas." They even let me take their picture for my blog. A few of the men could speak Spanish so it was nice to chat with them for the practice as we could only speak one word in Portugese, "bem vindo", which means "welcome".

August 22 we went east of Lisbon to Estoril, a beautiful little seaside city where we stayed the night. The next day, we got up with the sun and drove to Cascais. We took the dogs down to a very rocky area and the dogs ran their butts off for an hour and a half. We came back to the van. While Basel was making our breakfast, I was feeding Lucy and Foxy on a legde facing the ocean. Lucy was so cute sunning herself as she ate, then all of a sudden she hopped down (left her food which she has never done in her life) and ran across a really busy road, I think to chase a bird. I called her to come to me, but she was on a mission, running around, ears a flappin' and smiling the whole time. I saw a red city bus coming and stopped calling Lucy hoping she would stay on the opposite side of the street. She didn't, and my sweet little Lucy died that morning.

I lost it and a Portugese woman came to me and was talking a 100 miles an hour. I didn't have a clue what she was saying but Basel figured out that we were to follow her to the Vet's office. The Vet came to the van and said that Lucy died instantly and how sorry she was for me. I asked Basel to see if we could bury Lucy ourselves, something I felt I needed to do. Yes, said the Vet. We went back to the beach we were at an hour earlier but went further down a bit where the area had rocks, beautiful sand, flowers and shrubs. Basel and I dug Lucy's grave but I had to go back to the van as I did not want to see Lucy not herself. He was so gentle, as he laid her down and buried her. Then he placed 4 beautiful coloured rocks and flowers on her grave and he said his goodbyes. I also went down to say goodbye to my little Lucy. We found a spot to sit as it was hard to stand up with the heavy winds. I really wanted to just leave, but now I am glad that I stayed to talk about what I loved about Lucy and how much I will miss her.

Lucy came into my life when things weren't so good in my life, and she helped me get through some real crappy stuff. She made me smile, laugh every day and was the most cuddly dog I had ever had . She helped me get out of my house when I only wanted to hibernate but needed fresh air. And then moving to Spain, she was my little "ray of sunshine" from Canada that truly helped me meet tons of people from Nerja and around the world. I was a wreck for a week and didn't even want to go back to my flat in Nerja as I knew everything would remind me of Lucy. But that was days away yet.

Portugal...
While driving through this country we would often see forests with bark stripped off the bottom part of the tree trunks. Then we later saw huge areas where the bark was stacked and tied together. So when I got home I Goggled 'trees in Portugal' and did you know.............. Portugal is the world's leading producer of cork? Cork currently represents 2.7 percent of their exports and the cork industry employs about 14,000 people. Cork oak trees play a key role as they are naturally resistant to fires. Maybe BC Forestry needs to start planting Cork Oak trees.

When we travel, I keep a running list of questions about interesting topics, questions I want answered and various things I want to learn about. I have found a wonderful site that has always filled my curiosty. The site is www.wikianswers.com and it is awesome.

Adios for now. L-A