New Friends and a mountain villa.

New Friends and a mountain villa.

"Is that a Shnauzer?" I said as I approached this tall handsome looking man just up from the seafront in Xabia.

"No. It's a Shitzhu." He answered in perfect English.

As I drew close and Buster turned to see and smell Tanya I could see that indeed he was a Shitzu. A bit smaller and with different colouring but very similar to Mitzi the Shitzhu belonging to Doreen. my brothers partner,

Lenny and I stopped where we were on the pavement and chatted, as you do, for some time. It turned out he was in town with his partner Win and had clocked Sadie as they were driving past where she was parked. They had recently bought an older Hymer Motorhome themselves and Lenny was eager for hints and tips from an experienced fulltimer like myself.

Hmmmm! Not sure about that accolade but it made me feel good. We parted company after a while and that should have been that.

However; a short time later I was in Sadie experimenting with my wi fi aerial in a supermarket car park just opposite a Mac Donalds. I have to say without success. I am not sure whether it is something I am doing wrong but the aerial is a piece of junk as my laptop without the aerial plugged in was getting a better signal. Ho hum!

Anyway; there was a knock knock on Sadies door. Made me jump I can tell you! I opened the door fully expecting to see some sort of uniformed law enforcer ready to shout at me in Spanish about a local parking infringement or similar. No such thing. There was Lenny again offering me his card and phone number. Well that soon extended to further chat and to me being introduced to his attractive and charming partner Win with a follow up invite to visit them at their Villa the following afternoon.

Win loves cooking so a fair exchange was soon agreed of more chat and mutual viewing of motorhomes and Villas with in return an invitation to join them for an evening meal. Oh! And yes there was plenty of roadside space to park up Sadie for the night.

So the next afternoon found me wending my way back Northwards for about 20km to Olivia and thence directly up 'Suicide hill', aptly named by Win and, incidentally, a way I did not leave by. This aptly named zig zag of a hill was challenging even to Sadies admirable capacity to defy gravity as we slowly but surely found our way to Lenny and Win's stunning mountainside villa with magnificent views over the coastal plain and out to the Mediteranean.

Sadie was duly parked and levelled on the roadway just outside and just in front of their car. The villas own parking space was given over to their recently purchased in the UK older Hymer motorhome. It seems they had a great time collecting it from Hastings and driving it all the way home to Spain over the Pyrenees. No mean feat as they did not know it or motorhoming well. Carrfour supermarket car parks did them proud as overnight stopping places and Lenny coped well with the total loss of second gear in the Pyrenees and the subsequent removal and re-fitting of a re-conditioned gearbox once home. A very different kettle of fish compared to Sadie but ideal as a weekend away vehicle for them and it was obvious they both thought the world of their good looking and much improved since purchase, vintage Hymer.

Lenny and Win are a lovely ex pat couple and I feel very privileged to have met and spent time with them. We all shared a very pleasant Friday night and Saturday, with a Chilli dinner to die for, at their beautiful villa complete with turret and pool, high up in this stunning Spanish hillside 'Urbanization' (a development of 200 or more dwellings)

Tanya and Buster got on really well together too. I think Tanya was quite sad to see them all drive off to their Sunday Baptist Chapel service this morning. I guess I was a little sad too but it was time to move on. The mountains and warm sunshine were beckoning.

I needed to get my confidence back too. Lenny had been dubious about the mountainous back road route I was proposing to take over the next few days. His doubtful looks and dire warnings about the difficulty of some of the roads had eroded my confidence.

Until that is he said; "My motorhome does not have power steering and some of those bends are quite difficult."

That cheered me up some. Sadie is big but with her short wheelbase, rear wheel drive, tight turning circle and very good power steering she is a delight to drive on the majority of minor mountain roads normally deemed only suitable for the likes of Fiat Pandas. And even those have power steering these days!

That is why tonight we are indeed parked below the 'Embarrage de Beniarres' after a confidence building drive up the windy CV700 from Pego. Mind you the last bit was hairy.

We arrived at the dam and my intention was to find a track that led to the waters edge and park there for the night. Just before the dam was a little sign that I thought directed to a park and picnic spot. Well in a way it was; but it was down a ruddy long and quite uncomfortably narrow strip of tarmac. So much so that I am a wee bit nervous about how the hell will we get out tomorrow morning.

We had to come down this far, which is a very nice spot amid the mountains and a stream and some caves, before we could turn round. Ho hum and Ahhh well!  And well we are here now so we may as well settle for the night here. Tanya can roam freely which she loves.

We got down here by Sadie having to run one set of her wheels in the drainage channel at the side of the track. Guess if we did it coming down then we can do it going back up.

Hmmmm;  that is as long as Sadie does'nt start skidding on the gravel in the drainage channel as we try to get round those steep, uphill, hairpins that were not all that easy to steer round on the easier downhill run.

Oh I do like a challenge!! But I do have power steering and also lots of grunt under the bonnet.

NB - we did get out!