Hello Spain (oh my Spain 😱) or also midway through: 183 out of 365 days off

Last night we had the "midway point", it is the 183 out of 365 days off. On April 1st our time off officially started and our booked flight to the USA (to Washington) was supposed to depart at 1:10 pm (on March 12th we wanted to drop off the camper at the port for shipping to the USA, so that we could start our one-year US road trip after arriving in the US). But as you may know, it was supposed to be different...

From May 18, 2020, we were allowed to travel within Germany for the first time and from June 15, 2020, within most of Europe (Norway was added on July 15, 2020), so we started our Europe road trip in Belgium on June 21, 2020 (after the last workshop stay in Nuremberg), which has so far led us through eight countries and hopefully will continue until the end...

The eighth country was added on Monday, because we dared, we are in a risk area Spain and yes, for a long time that had a strange aftertaste for us 🤔 But, we were already in a (high) risk area with France last and the risk is increasing everywhere in Europe, new risk areas are constantly being added. And if we want to go to Portugal, we have to go through Spain.

No matter where we are, it seems to depend on our behavior or our caution. For weeks, if not months, we have been avoiding (urban) cities with many people and hotspots where you can't avoid each other 😏. We don't go out to eat, drink coffee or go to bars, we don't go shopping unnecessarily, to markets, etc. 😕 (it may sound excessive for some of you, but we don't want to risk a corona infection or quarantine in the camper and then also abroad!).

As long as the borders remain open and no curfews are introduced, we will continue to try to travel along the coast, isolated as a couple, always with Triene (and no, we are not getting on each other's nerves, after all, we have tested being together for the past 27 years 🥰).

In Spain, the obligation to wear masks is even stricter, because they must be worn EVERYWHERE in public areas, indoors and outdoors, (so not only in cities/places and at hotspots where many people could gather, as was the case in France recently)! So even when you are the only person outside 😷

Since the Spanish city of 'San Sebastián' was only a few kilometers away from our last French campsite, we already sniffed Spanish air on Monday, through our mask, during an excursion. Well, we have a convertible, in which we don't have to wear a mask (as far as we know) and so we only looked at the places with a lot of people from the open car (that's how we have been doing it for the past few weeks). Small and agile as it is, you can almost go anywhere and in 'San Sebastián' there is no large pedestrian zone 😄

It's strange to drive a few kilometers, cross a bridge (there wasn't even a sign indicating the new country) and suddenly all license plates have an E, you are in a different country and everyone speaks a different, foreign language 😉 Since Thomas learned French in school, he could at least understand a little in France, but that's over in Spain.

We did like the city, but after it was often recommended to us and you read on the internet how 'great' it should be there, we expected even more from it. But that's often the case when expectations are raised and tastes are different. But it was beautiful anyway 👍

We also went to 'Parque de Atracciones Monte Igueldo' without knowing what it is. Suddenly we stood in front of a barrier and had to pay money 🙂 All attractions were closed (end of the season or corona protection measures), but the view of the city was great and since there wasn't much going on, we could take off our mask for a selfie 😊 Besides the view, the park is also a small amusement park, as I looked up later in the evening. Now that we see what would have been possible, it's a shame that we couldn't experience it 😉

On Tuesday, our road trip through Spain, towards Portugal, started with the camper. The first destination, a parking space in 'Mutriku', about 70 km from the French border. Although it's only a few kilometers, the landscape has changed a lot here, for example, it's much more mountainous.

The extremely stormy weather was luckily over on Monday, but it's still changeable and cool. Today, Wednesday, was supposed to be the nicest, sunniest day of the week. From tomorrow (Thursday), the rain is supposed to come back for many days. We'll see, because we can't change it anyway 🙃

As always, warm greetings to all of you 🤗