Dan, Author at The Moho Diaries

Portugal

The Moho-Mojo – Falésia

July 1, 2018Dan5 min read

29/06/18 – 01/07/18 Falésia & Benagil Leaving Estoi, we were starting to miss being on or close to a beach, so our next stop (Thanks to searchforsites) would be on Falesia beach midway between Faro and Portimão. We had read about a couple of Moho sites in the town, but thought we would chance the free overnight stop directly next to the beach. We passed both sites on the drive in and soon afterwards the road changed from tarmac, to dirt track….roads in Portugal are pretty terrible but this was extra bumpy and dusty but we decided to persevere anyway. So, about a mile or so later and having a few fillings rattled out in the process, we arrived at the overnight stop on a section of the beach called Praia dos Tomates. (Perhaps because of the colour of the cliffs facing it). The carpark is now under private ownership, so we paid our €2.50 for the rest of the day and half expected we would get moved on at 19:30. There was only one other Moho on the land the other side of...

Happy Birthday to Me!

June 28, 2018Dan3 min read

27/07/18 – 28/06/18 – Tavira We were up early as we had the Moho booked in for some investigatory works on why the batteries didn’t seem to be charging, this gave us time to appreciate the area in the calmness of the early morning. Waking up with sea views never gets tiring, particularly when they are as beautiful as the ones here. By choice, I wouldn’t have booked the van in on my Birthday, but as it was the only slot they had for the next couple of weeks, we thought we had better take it. So off we trundled to Camperserv to get it checked out. We had a 10:00 slot, but due to being a member of staff down, we didn’t get seen until closer to 15:00. That didnt stop us going for a Birthday beer at a roadside cafe/restaurant. Lorraine and I were dubious at first, as at it looked a little run-down and untidy, we were the only people in there (it was only 11:00 though) but by lunchtime, the place started to fill up with locals. We both had our first taste of...

Dog Friendly Spain

Goodbye Spain :-( ……For Now

June 26, 2018Dan2 min read

25/06 – 26/06 Isla Cristina – Camping Playa Taray This was it, our last stop in Spain before venturing on to Portugal. We probably would have gone straight from Seville, but because I had messed around with the leisure batteries again, we needed to find somewhere we could plug-in and reset again. We found Camping Playa Taray on our app for 11 Euros/night, so off we headed. The site was fine, it felt slightly tired and a little uncared for, but it was cheap and good enough to spend the night. Cold showers though that you had to press the button every 3 seconds……annoying. This truly was a dog-friendly site though – no segregation this time and there was one of the biggest dogs either of us had seen! Over the road was our first taste of the Atlantic Ocean again – what a difference to the calm waters of the Mediterranean. Here the waves churned up a green layer of seaweed on the shoreline. There were loads of dogs on the beach, so Marley had a whale of...

Drinks Food Spain

My Watchtower is Bigger Than Yours – Cadiz

June 23, 2018Dan3 min read

22/06/18 – 23/06/18 Cadiz Do we, dont we was pretty much how the conversation went for a couple of days before we eventually said we do. (Visit Cadiz that is) and we are so glad we did. Having read about it, it was often compared as a smaller, more tame Seville or Granada, and having been to Granada recently and being en-route to Seville we very nearly gave it a miss. The drive into the old town was pretty uninspiring, and I remember saying to Lorraine, if this is anything to go by, then we wont be here for very long. We knew we could park in the port for a few euros, so we headed there half expecting to be back within the hour. The old town itself is relatively small and easy to navigate. Tall old buildings with narrow cobbled streets (just about wide enough to get a car down but certainly not big enough for a Moho) are arranged in grid patterns to the west end of the peninsula. It felt very different to other parts of Spain we had visited and you could certainly feel the...

England Food Spain

3 hours too long in Gibraltar

June 20, 2018Dan2 min read

20/06/18 – Gibraltar They always say, if you cant say something nice, then don’t say anything at all…..So, I’ll keep this one pretty brief. We spent the night in the marina on the Spanish side as it was much cheaper to do this and then walk over the border. It was pretty reasonably priced @ 10 euros for 24 hours. It was basic, but had the usual facilities (no Electric Hook Up though). The marina was tidy and well policed and we got to watch a nice sunset not long after we arrived. Heading over the border the next day was pretty straightforward with Marley – no questions asked. We were a little disappointed the they didn’t ask for his passport! Crossing the runway was fun but from that point on we didn’t really rate it. We knew we weren’t going to do the rock before we arrived, given Marley wouldn’t be allowed in the cable car, and we had read about the monkeys being particularly vicious towards dogs at the top. I was happy to wait...

Food Spain

Malaga – So Much More than an Airport!

June 16, 2018Dan2 min read

16/06/18 – Malaga I’m not sure what it is about Spanish cities, but parking spaces are a real rarity – especially when you dont know where you are going, so our first impression of Malaga was nearly our last as we were about to jack it in after searching for what seemed like about an hour. Then miraculously, we found somewhere big enough for the bohemouth….. and it was free too…Happy days 😉 We didn’t know what to expect for Malaga. Like most people I suppose, we had already judged it before we arrived. We knew it was the gateway to the Costa Del Sol, filled with British lager lout tourists however, although the city seemed to have its fair share of Brit, it didn’t really come across that way. Granted, we only visited the old part of the town for a couple of hours, but we were left feeling somewhat surprised by what it had to offer. The old quarter is dominated by both the Alcazar and the Cathedral, but there are also many other interesting...

Spain

Candado Beach

June 16, 2018Dan2 min read

15/06/18 – 16/06/18 – Candado Beach Candado Beach was a brief overnight stop where we could make a plan to visit Malaga the next day. The free overnight was complimentary of a well used, roughly level gravel carpark approximately 5-10 km outside of Malaga. We arrived early evening and took a stroll down to Candado beach next to the marina. It was a pretty small beach, approximately 200m long served by one pretty relatively swanky bar, who didn’t really look like they could be bothered to serve us (We were the only ones there at the time probably because Spain were playing that night in the word cup.) We had one beer, before heading back for an early night. It was a relatively quiet night, apart from a couple of comings and going of cars during the night. One on which seemed to think it was OK to dump all of their rubbish under their car, and then drive off. The next morning there were lots of locals fishing along the rocks which made interesting viewing for about 5...

Spain

Glorious Granada

June 13, 2018Dan3 min read

12/06/18 – 13/06/18 – Granada All I remember from visiting Granada as a young teen was it was hot and there was lots of traffic. Well, those memories turned out to be pretty accurate, although driving around in a 2.4m wide x 7m long Moho certainly added to the spice. We arrived mid-afternoon in search of a free overnight spot recommended on searchforsites. Having taken a wrong turn, we were soon faced with doing a 3 point turn to get down a steep ramp into town, only to find there wasnt a cat-in-hells-chance of us ever fitting in a space if there was one free, which there wasnt. So, we spent the next half an hour or so driving around trying to find some on-street parking big enough to take us. Eventually, we found somewhere on Paseo de Europa. It was around 13:30, temperatures were rising. We decided it was too hot to take Marley out in the sun, so spent the next 2 hours getting hotter and hotter in the van – driving ourselves slightly crazy. Before long Lorraine had...

Spain

Castello De Baños

June 12, 2018Dan2 min read

11/06/18 – 12/06/18 – Castello De Baños En-route to visit Granada, it was time to visit a campsite to replenish the mohos batteries and do some chores….Castello De Baños seemed the perfect place to enable to do this – just inside the province of Granada, on the coast and about an hours drive away from the city. The site itself had about 50 pitches, some with shade, some without, all separated with small hedges (French style) and all pretty tight to get on. We were lucky in that the site was almost empty, but I’m sure in the summer, it would be extremely difficult to get parked up – particularly if you had a large Moho. We chose a quiet pitch with no neighbours under some trees for some shade. Perfect. Within about an hour, we realised why no one else had parked under them. The small, sticky fruits were getting stuck to our shoes, to the mat leaving a mess everywhere. Marley kept eating them, and we had no idea what they were, so he had to be...

Spain

Grumpy Grandpa – La Azohia – Murcia

June 7, 2018Dan2 min read

06/06/18 – 07/06/18 La Azohia – Murcia The drive across the hills into La Azohia was by far and away the best bit about this place…some stunning views as you drive through the valleys and catch the deep blue of the sea against the earthy tones of the scortched landscape. Having read some great reviews about the overnight stop on searchforsites, we arrived to find a rough gravelled carpark on a hill next to a small restaurant and shop. There were about 10 Moho’s on site when we arrived and although there were sea views from pretty much anywhere, neither of us liked the feel of it – probably not helped by the abundance of flies everywhere! We had a quick walk along the beach with Marley early evening, when we were followed by a local busybody for about 5 minutes before he started shouting, telling us to get Marley off the beach (A very rocky part where no-one would go anyway.) On our way back, we could see this guy had an apartment overlooking the beach...

Author - Dan