The Carmargue

Ruth says: The Camargue, the area famous for white horses, bulls, rice, wine and flamingoes. We stayed in a town called Les Stes-Maries de la Mer, a very Spanish type town with whitewashed buildings a bull ring and flamenco dancers. We walked through the wetlands Bill Odie style trying our best to take photos of the thousands of bright pink flamigoes. The second photo down is our best effort. Every time we got anywhere near close enough they decided that it was time to leave, so you'll just have to use your imaginations- there were thousands of them, and they were pink!

As you can see we also sampled the local wine, and checked out another species of wildlife when we stumbled upon a film shoot with actors in soldiers uniforms, and then after some confusion when we were hurried on, realised that we were on a naturist beach.

Bob says: The Carmargue is one big nature reserve and we were interested to see the area marked Zone Naturiste for more flora and fauna. Unfortunately this turned out to be a nudie beach, who'd a thought it. Anyway, I was about to leave in disgust when Ruth stripped off, started sun bathing and insisited that mini-bob make an appearance. Well the wife's always right thats what I say.

Carnet Plage

Cooking with Bob

Ruth says(Bob is sorting out visas hence me writing): Helen this is for you! Here are a few pictures of Bob's Lamb with anchovies garlic and rosemary. There are many more pictures including the hot sizzle stage, then the barbeque oven stage, and then the de-glazing of the pan, but he reluctantly agreed to withhold them. So the top are the raw ingredients (all local of course) and the finished ingredient, and then a very satisfied boy. It was really delicious and i'm afraid we did eat it all. Bob even had the dutch people ( behind him in the picture) coming over to ask about his cooking, he was quite pleased. So there you go. There have been a lot of Bob's culinary delights on the trip so i'm sure you will hear about some more soon.

France again! Collioure

Ruth says: I was very happy to be back in France. Spain is very nice and all but not as nice as France, in my humble opinion. We stopped at this little town so that we could buy some anchovies (not my idea), the local speciality. It was really beautiful with a little castle and a lovely beach and people that spoke French! I even managed to eat 2 anchovies. Bob was very impressed.

Volcanoes

Ruth says: this was a volcano park that we visited in Northern Spain. The volcanoes haven't errupted in over 1500 years but they are still considered dormant rather than extinct.

Barcelona

Ruth says: I relunctantly agreed to go to Barcelona instead of staying on the beach. I was really amazed though by all of the Gaudi architechture. It was pretty unbelievable. It was the first time too, out of three visits in total that Bob has seen the buildings above- something to do with stag dos.

Sitges

Ruth says: this is the gorgeous town of Sitges, just south of Barcelona. After our stay at the Villa Walker we made up our way up the coast to this lovely chilled out town. It was like the Brighton of Spain, full of ageing hippies and skater kids. They were even playing Fat Boy Slim at the beach bar.

Ray and Jan's place

Bob says: Home to the best bar in Spain where your drink is never allowed to get empty and the barbeque is plentiful. Cheers Ray and Jan.

Cross Country To The Villa Walker

Bob says: As we left the Sierra Nevada and dropped down into the semi deserts of Andalucia it was strange to look back at the snow capped mountains . Top picture is the villa walker aka paradise as I am constantly told by Ma and Pa. Spent a few days being mothered and generally looked after. It was great. Cheers Mum and Dad see you in Oz.

More Granada

Granada

Bob says: During our stay in Sierra Nevada we went into the beautiful city of Granada where we visited the famous Alhambra. The pictures above are all from the Alhambra with the bottom picture being a view of the Cathedral. Ruth and I also went into Granada for a Flamenco night out unfortunately we forgot the camera and for those who appreciate the female form this is a great shame.

The Sierra Nevada

Bob says: The main reason for our detour into spain was to meet up with the expat parents. We suggested a highly rated campsite in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada for our initial rendez-vous which happiliy coincidedwith a visit from Uncle Andrew from Australia. Mother Walker booked the luxury cabin, we camped and all was well set for a few days family fun. Unfortunately the definition of luxury in the cabin description seemed to be a shed with two bedrooms and a WC designed for contortionists. Amongst other things overlooked Father Walker was only issued with a standard bed . This led to a rather unfortunate incident, when under the sheer strain the standard bed gave way leaving the hapless Father wedged between the struts of the camp bed. In an operation of beached whale proportions Mother managed to extract poor Father from the standard bed. This harrowing event led to a fitful first night's sleep in the luxury cabin.
In the morning that followed reports were made to the owners and to their credit they acted swiftly. Apologies were made about the oversight about the bed and a new bed The Yankee was put in place. The owner assured Father would have no problems with the Yankee as it was specially designed for American guests, also adding that it testament to the structure of his new luxury cabins that the Englishman's momentum did not take him clean through the floor. By pure coincidence, around the same time as the bed incident a small earthquake was reported in the surrounding area.

Ruth says: as you can see we didn't have the best weather. The first morning on the mountain we found ourselves floating on a puddle of water. By some miracle the inside of the tent stayed dry, but we did have a bit of a waterbed effect going on.

A day's travelling

Ruth says: We spent a day travelling from Seville down to Marbella (in search of the Marbella Belles), through beautiful countryside. We stopped for a picnic near the stunning little town of Grazelema, and then onto Ronda which is perched on a 300 ft gorge : the bottom picture. We didn't manage to find the Marbella belles and ended up staying in the worst campsite in history.

Bob says: Our trip down to Marbella brought back memories of a cultural expedition i did with a pal of mine 'round the museums and churches of Spain. Folowing a tiring day taking in the historical and architechtural sights of the town of Fuengirola we retired to the local hostellry for a sherry and a rather interesting debate on the Spanish Rennaissance. Unfortunately our sherries were spiked by some rather unsavoury tourists with 15 pints of lager. This led us to spend all night in what can only be described as an English pub chatting to young ladies of dubious reputation from Essex. ( For clarification, this event was pre-wife). Unfortunately for my pal who for confidentiality, data protection and privacy shall remain nameless. Let's just call him Jonathan Houldsworth. This night of debauched drinking resulted in severe illness. Due to the shame we had to leave town and head for Ronda. On the way our discussion on Surrealist art was repeatedly interrupted by Jon (Gidds) vomiting out of the hire car window. On our arrival in Ronda we noticed the contents of Gidds' stomach had coated half the car leaving a pizza effect that was baked on by the hot sun.

Seville

Ruth Says: We stopped off in the beautiful city of Seville for a night out. We tried and failed to find some live Flamenco but did manage to find a bar where people took turns coming up to play the piano or guitar. At one point it looked as though a couple were going to dance but it never quite happened. Seville was really beautiful in the day but even better at night.

Storks

Ruth says: This is just a little picture of some storks and their nests. We saw them all over the place in central Spain, on telegraph poles and churches and schools. I got very excited because it was like a book from when I was little. So, here is the picture that we had to take.