hi there, me friend and i have decided to buy a van or camper and head to spain next spring or summer. could anybody please tell us of some cool laid back places off the beaten track. by the coast, up mountains,anywhere. also what activities, we are keen hikers and also divers. would be very thankfull for your help.
hey, My girlfriend and I are going to buy a small camper van and catch the ferry from the uk to Santander in Northern spain next year, there is quite a lot by santander (Bilbao and Santiago de Compestella - a great pilgramage site and the Basque country), we are then going to head down the coast into Portugal. We might divert into Granada to see the Alhambra palace (very impressive moors architecture). We will probably visit RHonda - home of some amazing roman sites and the oldest bullring in spain. We may catch the ferry from Cadiz over to morroco and visit that area too. We are buying a small 1litre camper van to save on insurance costs and its diesel so should be cheap to run. Its a large itinery and we only have three weeks. I would love to do the whole of Spain but I work full time and so I am doing it in stages. Andalucia (southern Spain) is amazing - Seville ,home of Flamenco , sherry and the fruit basket of Spain. The east coast is good to Valencia, Barcelona. Where you travelling from - we are in Birmingham in central UK.
Another thought is that down by Rhonda there is a lot of Parasailing going on and also it is great hiking country,come to think of it that part of Spain is probably the most uncommercialised (from what I have seen). I was going to take my PADI liscence when I was in Spain in May but ran out of funds but there is diving all over Spain but from what I have been told it is not as good as in places such as Egypt but I have done a lot of snorkelling off the southern and eastern coasts of spain and seen lots of Squid , swordfish.
Head to Andalucia. Whenever you see a poster or travel foto of Spain, it's of somewhere in Andalucia. In southern Spain there is a region that centers around the town of El Bosque (on the map and has a web-site) that would be a good starting off point for you. Great hiking trails, camping spots, mountains, forests...all the good stuff. Tarifa is nearby on the coast, one of the premiere windsurfing centers of the world. Grazelema, Ronda, Gibraltar, Jerez, Sevilla, and Cadiz are all within that area. Marbella has a large British sub-culture there, and you can take a car-ferry from Tarifa to Tangier, Morocco for $50 r/t with daily service. The drive between Grenada and Cordoba is very picturesque and has many towns with castles at their centers on hills. Carmona, east outside Sevilla, is a great place to relax at. Tasting Moscatel near the lighthouse in Chipiona is a must. Sevilla is the Gypsy capital of Spain and home of the Flaminca. Around Easter time is the best time to be there. Go running with the bulls in Arcos de la Frontera on Easter Sunday. The processions during Semana Santa (holy week) are beautiful and unique. The local Ferias start at that time with the Feria de los Caballos in Jerez being one of the best with all the horses. If you go to Spain a beer drinker, you'll come back a wino. Bio-Desiel gas is $4.60 a gallon. Unleaded about the same. Driving over there is different than the states. Drivers adhere to a kind of unwritten code of driving etiquette that will get you honked at if you err. Lots of round-abouts. Incoming traffic yields and pedestrians will NOT be given way to outside a Peaton area (if you jaywalk you are a target). I had friends that had bought a converted VW combi-wagen and did what you're planning and they really enjoyed it. They traveled around Europe during the spring-summer, left the van with a reliable person they met over there for the winter, and then picked up again next spring. Did this for years and went everywhere. AAA is a good place to get an International Drivers License. Happy Trails.
Oh yeah, you mentioned diving. The waters around Spain are generally not the best for diving or snorkling. There are a few exceptions and there are good days and bad days when those exceptions exist. Where there are cool things to see underwater, like in Cadiz bay where part of the old city lays on the bottom after an earthquake, diving is prohibited to prevent looting (Cadiz is the oldest continuously inhabited city in Europe). Without exception, Greece and Turkey have some of the best locales for water activities. Ultra clear water, beautiful beaches. Windsurfing, sail-surfing, etc are big in Spain and many beaches have ideal conditions to enjoy it to the max. There is a magazine in Spain that caters to English tourism called LOOKOUT that also has a web-site that can maybe help you out in vehicle buying, insurance questions, etc. Spanish laws concerning foreigners buying vehicles in Spain are complex at best. You may find it very costly to buy a van in Spain because of taxes imposed on foreigners buying certain commodities, cars being one, real estate being another. My friends bought their van in England where such things were easier for foreigner to do. LOOKOUT magazine use to have a column by a guy that you could ask questions of about car buying and all that stuff. Check it out and any other source of info of that nature. Hey, I love your plan and it is do-able, just gotta do your homework and look for alternatives when roadblocks appear. Ciao!
