Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition

Weather: sunny, thundery, muddy, humid..........but not cold
Pyrenees

Had a nasty moment this morning when David looked up from his iphone to announce that the Queen’s legs had dropped off.  Pulled myself together and realised that he was talking about the solar powered Queen that Steve and Margaret had given me.  On our last day at L’Escala a gust of wind had blown her off the table she was waving on and her legs snapped off.  I didn’t have the right glue to fix her and unfortunately the glue I used must have melted in the sun and she toppled off again this morning.  So until I can get the right glue she has had another temporary op and is off her feet until her joints heal enough for her to venture out again.

Anyway back to business.  After our interesting little campsite at Ripoll we ventured further west along the base of the Pyrenees and had a couple of days in the sun near a lake.  Would have stayed longer but there was building work going on which rather spoilt the rural idyll.  But we had a nice flat bike ride into a little town called Graus which the chap at tourist info cagely said might possibly have been where Tomas Torquemada leader of the Spanish inquisition was born.  Boring house with just a little plaque that said the main family came from Pamplona, but there was a fabulous Plaza Major in the old town and a nice walk up to a monastery with a lovely ramshackle observatory at the end of someone's veg plot.

 

We agonised over our next stop as it would be where we celebrated David’s birthday (we even swore off alcohol for 5days in preparation but gave in to a beer on the last day).  We chose a site called Gavin, largely because we liked the name but unfortunately a huge group of Dutch had chosen it for the rally point and after squishing into the 1 remaining pitch we lasted 5 mins then checked out.  Luckily we have ended up at a lovely little campsite near the National Park of Ordesa.  The lack of other campers (only seen 1 caravan and 1 hut occupied) makes up for the spiders in the underused showers! 

The only problem with this site is that it is on the way down to the National park from a pass in the Pyrenees so yesterday we had a lovely freewheel down for 5 km to a village called Torla but it was an agonising 5km slog back uphill.  Today we tried a walk down to another village but had to abandon it when we ended up walking down a stream at which point it was so humid that the sweat was running down our faces and backs faster than the stream was flowing.  So although we spotted a nice looking restaurant in Torla yesterday we have booked a taxi to get there so we can celebrate David’s birthday/fathers day without the thought of cycling back up hill afterwards!  It looks really nice and nearly as pretty as the butcher’s shop.

Had to get a photo of the end of the bar where we fell off the wagoin (with 2 tiny beers)  I think the word "eclectic" is appropriate here

P.S. Just v quickly scanned through the blogs from our L’Escala week and I don’t think we did justice to the wonderful restaurant that Steve and Margaret found and treated us all to a meal at.  David and I went back for our anniversary meal it was so good.  Just to whet your appetites; my first dish was a Carpaccio of figs with anchovies and balsamic vinegar, followed by cold tomato soup with marscapone icecream and at then end we shared a dish of vanilla soup with salted liquorice.  Yum .  Sorry if we’ve already talked about it but it was wonderful.