Have just been organising the ferry trip for our journey to the UK, now the Boulogne to Dover ferry has stopped we are going Calais to Dover, I found that there is a discount of 40% on SeaFrance ferries available through a UK company called Astus UK Ltd, basically, you phone them, you tell them your preferred date and time of booking and they book for you and you receive booking confirmation by Email.
The ferry worked out about 20 pounds cheaper than any other fare I could get.
As we plan to drive up to the UK later this year we have part exchanged our Citreon Saxo for a Peugeot 306 estate, the citreon was getting a bit tired and was too small as we have items to bring back to Spain. We are very happy with the peugeot as it has lots more room, a bigger engine (2.0 HDI), and yet is as economical as the Saxo.
The company we did the deal with is Rayban Motors in Murcia, they have around 100 cars on offer, do all the paperwork, and offer a year guarantee for some vehicles. They are extremely obliging and speak some English.
THE ROYAL PALACE
PLAZA DE AYUNTAMIENTO, VALENCIA
We recently made a flying visit to Valencia and Madrid, Mary won 2 train tickets and two nights in a hotel in Madrid in a newspaper competition, the tickets were for the High speed train which runs from Valencia so we decided to drive up and explore the city at the same time. We have never been to Valencia before so we thoroughly enjoyed seeing the grand architecture and historic buildings. We parked the car at Victoria Car Parking for 4 days as driving and parking in Valencia is no fun at all, and got the very efficient metro to central Valencia where we stayed for the night before getting the AVE train around Midday. The speed the train goes is amazing, hitting 300 kilometres an hour at times and provides a comfortable and fast journey taking just 1 hour 35 minutes. Our Hotel in Madrid was on the Gran Via which is likened to Broadway and life never seems to stop, loads of people around all the time and the shops never seem to close. In our two days in Madrid, we visited the Royal Palace,the Prado Museum and the botanical gardens among other places. We did find nice Tapas bar with a terrace where with every drink was included a large tapas and found an evening meal was never needed after that. The time soon went and before long we were speeding back to Valencia to drive back to Blanca the following day.
Wow what a busy month, we have been very busy tidying up the garden and planning the layout since the pool has been finished and also have changed our car now for a Peugeot 306 Break, which is a little bigger than the Citreon Saxo, it was really a good idea as we plan to drive up to the UK in October/November and the saxo was getting a little tired to say the least..... The August weather has been typical and really it has been too hot to do much between midday and 17:00 the temperature being in the mid thirties everyday, though yesterday we had some tremendous thunderstorms Mary has been making ginger beer which well chilled has kept us well refreshed. We are off to Valencia and then Madrid next week for a few days to experience life in the Big city.
Last night i went for a walk to the statue of The Virgen of Blanca quite a rough walk up the track but amazing views of the area.
