Category: 2020 Spain and France
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NEGATIV
‘Are we being responsible?’ Padma asked me on the first day of our journey through France and Spain. I thought for a long time and tried to spin it so that I could justify our travels during a global pandemic. ‘No,’ I said. ‘Responsible people would stay home.’ But like tens of thousands of other
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PARTING SHOTS FROM ASTURIAS
In the end COVID won. We have returned home to Germany. We had hoped to keep travelling with no fixed return dates, but it wasn’t meant to be. When we started our journey during the first days of August, COVID was rearing its ugly head again but seemed somewhat contained. It certainly wasn’t stopping Europe’s
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LUNCH ON THE CANTABRIAN SEA
Visitors to Asturias wake up with a nice dilemma as they plan their day: mountains or the sea. From our base in Gijon, Padma and I could have had either within a few minutes drive. On our last day in Asturias we chose the sea. Our local friends, Terri and Juan, suggested we try Puerto
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RUTA DEL ALBA … WITH FRIENDS
Earlier in the year when Padma and I starting dreaming of a home in Spain, I joined a Facebook group of expats in Asturias. Someone posted a question about buying property and a local named Juan provided a detailed response. I clicked some links and found Juan’s website and figured he’d be the sort of
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THE SEA FOR OUR SENSES
Padma prefers the sea; I’m for the mountains. In Asturias we’ve got them both in abundance so we’re happy. Today we set out from our base in the port city of Gijón to explore the western coastline of Asturias, along the Bay of Biscay. We started the day with a hike down to the Playa
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FORTY YEARS OF SPANISH DREAMS
While in university, I took a travel literature course. I loved getting homework … I could do it while lying in bed and drifting off to foreign and exotic lands. My favourite assignment was to read Laurie Lee’s As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning. The author sets out on foot armed with a violin
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‘MENU DEL DIA’ IN OVIEDO
I thought I had never heard of Oviedo. But I was wrong. Years ago, I watched a silly Woody Allen called ‘Vicky Cristina Barcelona’. In one scene, Javier Bardem tells two American women that they will fly with him that evening from Barcelona to Oviedo and then make passionate love. The Americans rolled their eyes
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WHERE THERE ARE NO CROWDS
There’s a big problem of travelling in the province with the lowest incidence of COVID in Spain. Everyone else has the same idea as us. Asturias is packed with holidaymakers. Almost all are Spanish with a sprinkling of French. No Yanks. No Poms. And probably just two Aussies. The hotels and restaurants are bursting with
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WINDOW TO ASTURIAS
Earlier in the year – the pre-COVID times – Padma and I started dreaming of buying a holiday home in Spain. All of the land agent websites seemed to direct us to the south of the country … to the classical hot and dry Spain with abundant sun. One day as we were looking at
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