The long haul to Spain and not back..

[chrisuk]

Hi all,

Thought its time to let some of you guys/gals know how my trip with a twin axle caravan went.

1st off I left home as tergeted and made the tunnel with a hour to spare, but would the buggers let me on, would they....., anyway hit Calasis at just gone 00:35 and headed for Abbeville down that way somwhere and drove what seemed to be forever till I got tired, pulled into some fairly decent French layby and made myself cosey in the caravan after making a bacon sandwich, the 2 dogs seemed to enjoy idea too.

Awoke around 9 am and headed on to some unknown southern destination towards Spain, this continued for another good day until around 2am in the morning, I just simply drove every minute I was awake so as not to waste time.

The drive itself was challenging with a slightly overloaded van and caravan, I wuoldnt say by much but would guess by about 250 to 350kgs in total, its also very possible I wasnt overloaded as I had weighed every single item loaded apart from my 2 big tool boxses, we wont go there..

Roads were supurb through Franch all the way and cant say much against them, my Satnav kept me off toll roads for a very good reason, £290 to be honest, boy are those mountain passes long, step, winding and at times daunting to take on, at times I was in 3rd gear and been overtaken by fully laden artics going up hill.

Worked my way to Toulouse and then came the Pyrenesse pass into Spain and thats when the transit then decided it preffered 2nd gear, it thats where it had to stay for around I guess 5 to 7 miles, didnt go into high revs and just kept her going steady without labouring her, the secret I found was to keep her around what I thought is half of her full revs, none the less she just chewed up the miles withut a glitch.

Went through the border crossing and didnt even have to stop, what luck I thought as my main concern was the dogs, not that I was in anyway illegal, far from it, I wouldnt chance it.

A good tip for anyone considering doing Barcelona is to make sure you DONT do the coastal road out of the city with a caravan... you havnt seen twists and gradiants like it before and it goes on and on, trust me it just isnt worth the bother, set your sat navs to toll roads and pay for the honour of keeping away from the mentioned coastal road, brill for bikes but I was surprised to see how many trucks used this road and they wert going slow either.

Further along into Alicante I went via Toll road, its not exspensive like Franch and its worth the odd E30 to use or you'll find yourslf going throug towns of all sorts but I decided I wanted to go off the motorway, glad I did as I saw some brilliant scenary this country has to offer not to mention how the Spainish enjoy life with such a pleasant look to it all.

So here I am in Spain roughly 90km's inland from Malaga, when I arrived it was not pleasant, the skies were grey and it was chilly, after parking up and getting cleaned up we hit the village pubs, very welcomming indeed and I was promptly told that it was unusualy cold for the time of year, a week goes by and suddenly the cloud part and the sun hasnt stopped shinning since, I do feel for you guys/gals over there but Im here and your there and there's not much we can do to change the weather now s there.

The transit with 132,700 miles on the clock when I left didnt let me down one bit, in fact it surprised me in many ways up those mountain passes I know would get some people in a panic, the van used possibly a total of maybe under a touch of 1/2 a pint of oil, bare in mind she was loaded and towing a caravan, I think its bloody marvelous..... all in all would I do the trip again in a hurry...NO, not when you have a German Sheppard who is adament in sitting up front after sqeezing past the drivers and passenger set, hw she managed it baffles me even now when I look, oh lasty I managed roughly 400 miles per tank, after off loading Ive now managed to nearly crack 500 miles on my 1st semi unladen van and by is Spain a mountainous country.
I'll edit my pathtic spelling later, its past my bedtime.....

Cheers.

[rover]

Glad it all went ok Chris

Sounds like a great journey(better without a caravan obviously).

Rover.

[phil g]

Well done chris i know the road you mean from barcelona to sitges used it for a few years now not so bad when you know it (we stay at vila nova y la geltru when were down there ) hope all works out for you

[Valsheda]

Well done Chris , glad you got there safely in your trusty transit

That was great reading your description of your journey, sounds like it was a challenge but well done

All the best to yer mate

[FredTransit]

Glad you got there safe Chris. My geography is cr*p so how far are you from Barcelona? I only ask cos there is a chance we could be doing an exhibition there and might need some help (for money!).

[chrisuk]

Hi Fred, You didnt say where the exi will be, well Im near Malaga which is roughly 600 miles away from Barcelona, depending where the exhibition will be I'll be more than happy to assist, I owe you a few beers anyway, I'll PM you my mobile in case you want to get hold of me quicker, sending text is the best way as its not cheap to phone, I too pay a Euro a minute o recieve international calls, scary..

Thanks for the congrats on the trip all

[FredTransit]

Hi Fred, You didnt say where the exi will be, well Im near Malaga which is roughly 600 miles away from Barcelona, depending where the exhibition will be I'll be more than happy to assist, I owe you a few beers anyway, I'll PM you my mobile in case you want to get hold of me quicker, sending text is the best way as its not cheap to phone, I too pay a Euro a minute o recieve international calls, scary..

Thanks for the congrats on the trip all

Sh*t! 600 miles is a bit of a schlep! As far as the phone thing goes, would it not be best for you to get a spanish PAYG? It would be free to recieve any incoming calls and texts.

[phil g]

as fred says get a spanish phone theres loads about only about £21 new and they are unlocked i brought a few back in january sold em quick to people goin to spain

[critch]

just buy the moviestar payg sim card and put it in your old phone when you wana text 5 euros from phoneshop.recives text for free

[FredTransit]

just buy the moviestar payg sim card and put it in your old phone when you wana text 5 euros from phoneshop.recives text for free

I actually meant to say SIM card, not phone. Don't you mean 5 cents per text critch? If it was 5 euros, it would be like paying £5 for a text!!!

[MrMPuk]

5 euros for the sim card!

[chrisuk]

I do have a Spainish sim card, a text costs on average 15 cents, if someone phones me here from the UK on a UK mobile it costs the earth and I also pay 1 Euro a minute, I was warned about this. I've got a unkocked UK phone and just aswell, scarse as rocking horse **** here unless you buy new which s still very good value for money at 40 Euros including 30 Euros call time, if you buy just a sim card her its 24,99 Euros but you also get 30 Euros call time, my credit was blown in no time but I think someone sneakedly used my phone as I only just sent a few texts to my mum in the UK and ex GF in SA, Im with Vodafone as they are the biggest here and hence as we all know if you phone a different network it costs more.

Weather is great here by the way, sushine all the way and the shades are working over time and I've already forgotten what grey clouds and rain look like.

Fags a pack of 20s 2 Euros, beer in cans from 20 cents, quality of food out strips that of the UK in value and flavour, diesel is +- 93 to 98 cents a liter, Hardware stores have everything and then some more but I dont like the village I staying in or the house which Im part time sharing with the owner, country houses can be rented from 500 with a garage if you look around, if you want to know anymore just ask

Cheers

[FredTransit]

5 euros for the sim card!

Oh I get it! As far as the unlocked 2nd hand phones go, try buying a 2nd hand phone (don't know about spain, but in france there are cash converters as in the UK) and look on the internet for unlockme.com or .co.uk, they have free instructions on how to get the codes to unlock phones.

[phil g]

buenos dias sunshine boy lets have an update hows it goin

[FredTransit]

Good point Phil, I noticed a new post on this and though there might be an update.