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When it’s a “Driving Day”, Dave is always keen to get packed up and be gone early so we bid farewell to Camping Caseres and initially popped Salamanca into the SatNav.

On the way (as usual) I Googled “Top 10 Things…” for Salamanca & Burgos – but after having O’D’d on museums, medieval towns, historic landmarks, Roman bridges, cathedrals, etc. especially in the last week or so (climaxing the day before in Caseres) – there didn’t seem to be anything wildly different in Salamanca. Dave was enjoying driving in the sunshine 😎; there was some cracking bits of scenery (check out 2nd piccie of the mountains & lake which reminded me of Switzerland 🇨🇭) so we decided to press on to Burgos (where our sister-in-law (the other Helen Miller !!!) had highly recommended the tapas…

We had noticed from time to time – as we were driving along – these huge black bull silhouettes looming over the motorways so I asked my bessie (Mr Google) what they were and they are known as the Osborne Bulls after the drinks company founded by a British family in 1772. They were first used to advertise brandy but today are a symbol of Spain known as the “Guardian of the Spanish Roads” as they sit on hilltops and roadsides watching over the passing traffic… (awww I luv a tradition, me 🥰 !!!)

After the piccie of the Osborne Bull, you’ll see one of a traffic cone (I can’t believe there’s no emoji !!!) and the reason for this is that the bleedin’ Spanish workmen had blocked off the right hand lane (fair enough) but had put the traffic cones on this side of the white lines and The Van is pretty wide anyway so it was a challenge to drive without running them over (actually I think Dave was just doing it for a laugh to wind me up… 😳)

We reached an aire in Burgos about 4:30pm (I think) and initially got the kettle & had a small snack of bread, ham & cheese as we wanted to save ourselves for the tapas later. I’d Googled a place but it didn’t open until 7pm so we got out the Rummikub – and the sherry !!!

A few hours later, we wrapped up well and trundled off on the bikes for the 11 minute (or so) ride into the centre. As ever, there were excellent cycle paths and it was an easy ride. The centre was fairly lively, lit up, shops open, etc. and we locked up the bikes in this massive square called “La Plaza Mayor” and made our way to Mesón Burgos. Dave had stipulated that he wanted somewhere “authentic” and this was a traditional small place with a long bar with bar stools & only a handful of tall tables and stools behind us but was very popular with the locals – who mainly just seemed to order the supposed speciality of the house – Patatas Bravas and a beer !!!

They “no hablas Ingles” so thank goodness for the Google Translate APP (!!!) on Dave’s phone so we had an inkling of what we were ordering which initially was:-

Patatas Bravas, Morcilla (Spanish Black pudding – see photo below), Chorizo, Stuffed Mushroom (delicious) and a really cute (again delicious) mini-hamburger – washed down with a Vino Tinto and a Vino Blanco.

We noticed the (Spanish obvs !!!) couple behind us were drinking something out of a martini glass and it was a Vermouth concoction so we ordered a couple of these to accompany round 2 of a battered bit of cod and a tasty pork skewer…

So for 2 wines, 5 vermouths and 7 tapas, the bill came to €27 – boom 💥

We then made our (chilly 🥶) way back to The Van, tucked up with a cup of tea, some Milka and watched “Olympus Has Fallen” (can’t beat a bit of Gerard Butler and Morgan Freeman !!!)

So after the (not brilliant) museum & gallery, the WRONG cathedral followed by the RIGHT cathedral, getting told to get lost by the staff at the Golfines Palaces and then the MAMMOTH trip around the Contemporary Art Museum, we abandoned my list as we were both officially “cultured-out” !!!  And starving !!! 

Got to be honest – Caseres didn’t have much of a vibe going on early evening (not your usual set of little streets with bars doing tapas, etc) and Dave had spotted a gourmet burger place earlier (which I had dismissed) but we ended up there…  I had nachos with all the trimmings (including COLD 🥶 chilli-con-carne but LOADS of sour cream, guacamole & American pouring cheese) and they tasted really good (but I WAS hungry) and Dave’s burger LOOKED lovely (AND they asked you how you wanted it cooked – rare, medium, etc) but he said the fries were soggy and the burger wasn’t all that 😐 (some peeps are NEVER satisfied 😂) 

But the music was good, it was warm (well not my chilli 😂), the waiter was nice (if not the quickest), I couple of nice glasses of Vino Blanco (on an empty tummy which ALWAYS helps 😂) and most importantly – I was with My Dave ❤️ 

And (amazingly) we managed to find the return bus stop home and (more importantly) after ANOTHER laughable interchange with a different bus driver – managed to disembark the bus at the correct stop and get home to The Van OK… 😴 

Caseres ✔️ 

Would I bother again in the winter ❎ 

So (particularly as website had shown the massive, fabulous lighty-up red thing below in the first piccie, I was intrigued and hoped that there would be MORE lighty-up things) we made our way to the next POI on the list – The Museum of Contemporary Art – which was also free 👍

There was an exhibition by Angel Duarte (?) upstairs but the 4 floors in the basement were the main event… 

It was all very reminiscent of the Guggenheim Museum which we visited in Bilbao back in 2011 when we were on a cheap Med cruise… But THERE we spent a fortune for 9 of us to get in and the highlight was a mannequin with a broom up it’s backside surrounded by loads of tins of spilt paint – and they call that ART 😂 (I know – I’m just a philistine from Scunthorpe who loves religious oil paintings !!!)

Anyway make your OWN mind up (examples below).  I DID like the “Roman Statue On A Blood Drip” and was EXPECTING (and almost but didn’t quite appreciate) the “Balloons”, the “Squares”, the “Shapes” and the “1960’s Black & White” effort, but I have to say that although I am no creative, I reckon I could do better the “Doodle” pencil drawing…

Plus the room dedicated to the axes and TV’s was just something else… (and very reminiscent of the Guggenheim spilt paint, broom up backside piece from 2011 – I’ve even Googled it to try & find a photo but for once – sadly – Mr Google has let me down 😔)…

It took AGES to go around everything and as we walked up the multiple flights of stairs to get back to ground level, Dave stopped to take a photo and said, “It’s come to something when I see a white IKEA bench and I’m not sure whether to admire it or sit on it !!!” 😂

And that just about sums up contemporary art – for both of US anyway !!!

When we finally arrived at “Ground Zero”, the staff (who were very helpful, lovely young Spanish girls) smiled at us and pointed to the lift !!! 😅

• Location: 39° 28′ 18.36″ N 6° 22′ 24.3″ W

As we came out of the “Nativities Around The World” place, Dave spotted (just around the corner) the REAL Cathedral De Santa Maria (so we had just been round some random church 💒 😂 but I’m SO pleased we did 😊 – and maybe (shhhh) I might have even enjoyed it more than the Cathedral…)

So we THEN paid us €5 (including an excellent audio guide 🎧) & explored the REAL Cathedral De Santa Maria which is actually known as the Co-Cathedral Church of Santa Maria.

{It is the most important church in the city as it was granted the category of Co-cathedral in 1957, sharing episcopal headquarters with the Cathedral of Coria, some 67km north of Caceres.}.  

As ever – see piccies below of the phenomenal mahogany altar backdrop (which I’ve just found out is called a reredos) and which took 4 years to carve – in the 16th century – and which is dedicated to The Assumption of the Virgin Mary depicting scenes from her life…

I also particularly liked the painting of the Virgin showing compassion to the souls in Purgatory… (as I know I’ll be there for a long time one day…)

We then wandered into the Palacio de los Golfines de Abajo.  When we asked if we could buy tickets (as this WASN’T free) an attractive looking Spanish couple announced that we’d missed the last tour, it was ages until the next tour and it was only in Spanish 🇪🇸 so we left…

• Location: 39° 28′ 27.74″ N 6° 22′ 13.51″ W

ANYWAY there was apparently a bus (and the reason that I’ve entitled this post “Mixing With The Public” is that my sister once worked with a girl (Amanda) who was married to a really rich, posh chap who would never go on a bus or EVEN go to the cinema because he would have to “mix with the public” 😂 so whenever Dave & I go on a bus, we call it “mixing with the public” !!!

This bus (the No 5) went into town and for €1.10 each we did the 6 / 7Km journey & after a laughable interchange with the bus driver over where to get off (as nobody “hablas inglés” and my Spanish/French was clearly not good enough 😂) we arrived in the centre of Caseres…

It was 4pm and (because there wasn’t a LOT to do & because it opened at 4pm) first stop was Caseres Museum (not our usual port of call) but which was free & presided over by a very bored looking woman.  However, it was very dark as they wanted to preserve their 1st-4th Century BC offerings of rocks, pottery & jewellery…

Also there was no English translation on the explanatory boards (which you could barely see anyway as it was so bleedin’ dark 😂) so we’re not much the wiser (and not sure any Spanish peeps would be either…)

There was also an art gallery – this time presided over by a very bored looking man – with a few pieces done by Picasso (no famous ones that I’D ever seen before 😂) and more pieces by other random artists – but sadly again – nothing to write home (or on this blog !!!) about.  Other than to mention that the central heating was on SKY high & it was roasting 🥵 in both the museum AND the gallery.  As it’s free entry & they have staff, goodness knows who’s paying the bills 😂

Stop No 2 was Cathedral De Santa Maria (or so I thought – well I’m out of data on my phone so Dave was in charge of Google Maps…)

We paid €1.50 each (instead of €5 which I’d read online) and went in…

… and it was completely dedicated to displays of Nativities From Around The World 🌎 (see LOTS of photies below – one of my favourites is the Indian one where Mary is in a sari, she, Joseph & Jesus are all wearing turbans 👳‍♂️and the ox & the donkey are replaced with an elephant 🐘 & a tiger 🐅!!!)

And there was even one made of Lego !!!

• Location: 39° 28′ 25.28″ N 6° 22′ 13.23″ W

As predicted, Tuesday dawned miserably – cloudy, rainy & cold…

Driving out of town past all the sights we’d done on the sightseeing buses in the previous days looked SO different when NOT bathed in sunshine… 😎

We popped Cáceres into the SatNav and – after “wild camping” outside Córdoba Zoo for a couple of nights, Dave had earmarked a “proper” campsite ⛺️ rather than an aire – Camping Cáceres.

We’d polished off the rest of the (excellent) Spanish omelette that I’d made the previous night – en-route – so needed to bib into a massive Carrefour hypermarket to pick up supplies…

The campsite was great – another ACSI “special” – it should have been €50 for 2 nights but with our ACSI card, it reduced to €38 including all services.  There was a little restaurant-bar on site, a small supermarket & a couple of pools (which I’m sure are fab in the summer but not now 🥶).

And we’ve never seen this setup before but EACH pitch had it’s OWN bathroom with shower & toilet !!!  And it’s own little table & chairs…

This very friendly French couple were behind us but Dave ended up chatting to Alan & Jean from Lancashire 🙄 whilst he was plugging in the leccy, etc.  And we were surrounded by British, Irish & Scottish peeps & vans….

I’d googled my usual “Top 10 Things…” and made the executive decision that – as it was still pretty grotty weather & Spain is always “Cerrada” (closed) in the afternoon that we we start our late afternoon of culture later on…

So – we got the kettle on, tucked into these MASSIVE muffins we’d just picked up at Carrefour & retrieved (for the first time since receiving our gift back in May from our good friends Mark & Julie) RUMMIKUB !!! (Or “Tile Rummy” as it’s also known)

It’s SO addictive (and I kept whooping Dave 🏆- it’s nice to be good at something for a change !!!). See photie of one of my winning boards !!!

Monday dawned beautifully sunny again (& Dave said we were in for some rain ☔️ on the Tuesday) and our 24 hour “Hop On / Hop Off” bus ticket was still valid and we’d only done the mini-bus smaller loop tour the day before. So we cycled to town, locked up the bikes and caught the BIG double-decker which does a larger loop tour covering some of the newer parts of Cordoba (but which scarily 😳 still squeezes itself down the narrow streets of the old town narrowly missing taking the heads of the pedestrians walking by on the paths either side – with it’s wing mirrors…)

I’m not generally a fan of cities – I prefer smaller places – but overall re architecture, etc. – I think Seville gets my vote… Although Cordoba certainly wins from a historical basis with it’s Roman Temple, Roman Bridge, etc. and the jewel in it’s crown – The Mezquita De Cordoba – the Cathedral-Mosque of Cordoba.

After the bus trip, we sat in one of the many eateries – in the sunshine 😎 again – and Dave tried a lovely spinach & cheese pastry and we had a couple of toasted sandwiches washed down with tea & coffee then set off for the cathedral…

The main tickets were €13 each (and we skipped the queue & purchased them from the self-serve vending machine) and we also paid  €4 each for the audio guide – which was excellent and which you absolutely needed…

The mosque began it’s life in the mid 6th century and was added to & expanded for a millennium up to the 16th century…

It was conquered by King Ferdinand III in 1236 which is when it was converted to a Catholic Cathedral…

The size of the place is VAST and the audio guide walked you around pointing out – among a great deal of other things – the red striped “double arches”, the different types of marble columns, the different types of ceiling, different flooring types, when the little chapels around the outside were built, etc. and it was just AWESOME !!!

The tour ended up in the “Courtyard of Orange Trees” with it’s beautiful fountains and where it was WARM in the sunshine again – as I couldn’t feel my extremities with it being pretty chilly inside 🥶

We then had a wander around town and Dave bought (yet another) t-shirt (!!!) and we finally decided to go into one of the (seemingly) thousands of “Ale-Hop” shops that we’ve seen whilst in Spain – and I’m hooked !!! I thought it was just over-priced socks & scarves but they have SO much more and I ended up with a lighty-up-10x-magnifying mirror !!!

I also hadn’t tried “churros” since we’d been here – and we didn’t want to spoil “us tea” (as I was making Spanish Omelette) so we bought some and brought them back. Traditionally they are sold with a cup of thick hot chocolate to dunk them in (they’re like a skinny plain donut consistency) but we improvised and had them with Nutella – and they were… OK 😐

We listened to 🎵 “da tunes” 🎵 whilst I made tea & drank my new fave wine this trip (Vino Rosado Penescal) then caught up on a week’s worth of blog entries – and I am now officially up to date 👍

• Location: 37° 52′ 46.59″ N 4° 46′ 47.71″ W

We woke up early and Dave decided (in his wisdom) to MOVE The Van (even though I said that we were OK until 6pm for our €23) – but he was insistent… He emptied the waste for free and then we roamed the streets and luckily found a place next to The Zoo on the Park4Night APP.

We drove in and were charged €5 by a parking “guerilla” (as everybody calls them on Park4Night) but it was flat land and Dave was happy…

It’s been RUBBISH in Europe on a Sunday for the last four weeks (as there’s never much going on and most things are closed…) so we were delighted to see that the “Hop-On Hop-Off” Sightseeing Bus Tour was operational & we bought our tickets (with 10% off as we’d used the same company in Seville and still had our tickets !!!).

It was a little mini-bus with no roof or sides and it went up all these tiny, narrow side-streets & was complete with audio-guide so we learnt some history re Cordoba… (see first piccie of us with our red plastic earphones plugged into the bus…)

We then had tapas in a little square and it was just SO “Spanish” 🇪🇸 (outside, warm, in the sunshine, some guy playing his guitar, families, etc.) – see (half-eaten) Russian Salad and Chorizo In Red Wine below…

Then we bibbed off on the bikes and took a few “classic photos” of Cordoba on & around the Roman Bridge with the city in the background and where – according to the lady on the bus tour audio guide – “East meets West”. There’s also one of me sitting in front of the “Monument to the Beauty of Cordoban Women” created by José Manuel Belmonte in 2003… and then we went down by the river (again) and had cocktails… 🍹

Dave ALWAYS has a Pina Colada but as there was no “Pornstar Martini” (my standard go-to), I skimmed the ingredients of the remaining offerings then ordered a Cava Sangria which SAID it was rum, cava, passion fruit soda; however when it arrived, it tasted of CINNAMON !!! (Check out the photos – you’ll see why…) I HATE cinnamon 😐…

Unimpressed, we went to ANOTHER bar for ANOTHER cocktail & ordered 2 x “Sex On The Beach” but it was sickly sweet due to the added ingredient of blueberry puree…

Thus we have decided that Cordoba can’t serve a decent cocktail to save it’s @rse !!!

Let’s hope Pink Beach can do better this season with our new cocktail & tapas chef !!! 🤞

• Location: 37° 52′ 51.42″ N 4° 46′ 49.01″ W

• Location: 37° 52′ 33.98″ N 4° 46′ 37.77″ W

So we said farewell to the family (& Nerja) and made the 211KM journey to Cordoba stopping to make some lunch in The Van on the way (as we were a little hungover…)

We WERE aiming for this “Autocaravanas De Cordoba” place – which is basically like a French aire (i.e. has water & electricity but usually you’re pretty rammed in); however on the way I read some reviews & it was €23 for 24 hours PLUS €2 for 100 litres of water PLUS €2 per hour for electricity – WHICH IS SIMPLY ABYSMAL – most proper camp sites don’t charge anything like that much INCLUDING water & electricity – so we decided to go elsewhere… (Except NOT a proper camp site as there weren’t any close enough to the city…)

Dave has this APP (!!!) on his phone called Park4Night & we found this street outside a park which was pretty close to the sights then we got the bikes out & headed off to town – a couple of kms away…

Cordoba is famous for it’s CATHOLIC cathedral which is inside what was originally a MOSQUE… We’d decided NOT to do the tour that day as it was late in the day but got a snap of me sat outside on the wall with the Arabic door behind me – an unusual backdrop for a Catholic place of worship…

We then went to the “Roman Bridge” (which was the only way to cross Cordoba for centuries) and where there were 3 different buskers – a (very loud) accordion player and 2 guitarists playing Spanish music… Also – in the middle of the bridge – one of the many statues of Archangel San Rafael who is the “Guardian of Cordoba”…

We took a photie of the “Bridge Gate” at the end of the bridge and then ended up at a bar – & had a couple of drinks – adjacent to the river because it is the equivalent of their “esplanade” and the evening sun lasts the longest there…

BUT when we got back, Dave decided that we WOULD go to the €23 for 24 hours place as we would feel safer (and I have to be honest – when we “wild-camp” I always expect some thugs to bang on the door in the middle of night and rob us 😱 not that they ever do !!!)

And that was fine but do you know what ? We watched half of a film then settled down to go to sleep and there was 🎵 MUSIC 🎵 !!! It was like a free concert in the park – and if we weren’t so hungover from 12 nights in Nerja with no rest from alcohol – I’m SURE that we would have gone along & joined in – it was really good music !!!

So we wandered down to the beach and took a few snaps & (interesting ?) fact of this post is – there seems to be VERY LITTLE TIDES as there’s actually a house built into the rock on this little bay (see photo 4 below) and I kept saying to Dave that nobody could possibly live in the house as it was 6 feet from the sea but apparently there is (piccie 3 is taken from outside the house) !!!

Then we caught up with Sue, Paul & some new friends (Dave & Jane who’ve been coming to Nerja for 42 YEARS !!!) & had some lunch overlooking the sea and then we had a wander around the shops & Dave got a couple of T-shirts but I still didn’t find a leather jacket 😔

In the evening we went to “La Cueva” – the “on-site” pub – The Cave Bar @ El Capistrano – but (for once) I concentrated on ALL the family & friends that we’d met and didn’t take any photos…. (and it was a bloody lovely evening)…

• Location: 36° 44′ 40.39″ N 3° 52′ 31.79″ W

• Location: 36° 44′ 42.57″ N 3° 52′ 29.85″ W