The rain clears and we go to Denia

I nearly had good reason to be glad I'd recently listened to The Ark Before

Dave plays chicken with the sea at Xabia 

Noah as we had a couple of days of such heavy rain here over the weekend that I was becoming a bit concerned about potential flooding. It started with a couple of minutes of gentle patters on the caravan roof, almost like the sparrows jumping about. Then within a few more minutes, the sound resembled ostriches! After the previous strong winds, we lost another night's sleep to thundering rain. It's amazing how much louder sounds are when heard from within a caravan or motorhome compared to from within a house. Bailey has double glazed windows and all the modern insulation, but we are still effectively in an aluminium can! You wouldn't know about the rain from the look of the Rio Gorgos which is still resolutely dry, but it was unusual enough to be chatted about in the local supermercado. We took a wander down to Arenal seafront on Monday and the sea looks very different to before the weekend. It is now an ominous dark green in colour with galloping white horses on the crests of all the waves. There is also lots of standing water on the beach and a coating of a white foamy looking substance. We weren't sure if this was drying salt or pollution. I've put some photos up on Facebook.

Tuesday saw us taking a trip out to Denia for the day, partly to discover the town and partly because our Devonian friends, Chris and Marta, are currently staying at the Los Llanos campsite about 12k outside Denia. We saw half a dozen fabulous yachts moored up in Denia marina. Most were flying Caribbean flags and looked dead posh!! The town itself is very Spanish and doesn't have the Anglification of Xabia although there is a hint of a Germanic influence. One thing we are learning on our travels is to make sure that the Austrians have got there first as they open up wonderful cafes with good cakes. We stopped for a coffee and spot of people watching outside a nice cafe called Denou which is on a pretty square not far from the municipal market. This market is a bigger affair than Xabia and there were easily a dozen butcher stalls from which we failed to choose our barbecue offerings that afternoon. There is some kind of Medieval Fair in Denia this weekend coming. It will coincide with two national festival days on Saturday and Monday and is an annual affair so we are planning to return to see what all that is about and to spend more time exploring.

We got lightly lost when trying to find Los Llanos and I was glad we didn't have Bailey on the back when u-turning as the road ended. The campsite is down a roughish track and does look run-down from the approach. However, it has good sized pitches with a more rural feel than the car parky set up here at El Naranjal. The shower block is decorated with fun green and white harlequin tiles and does have toilet paper which we don't. We have doors that close snugly against draughts though and they don't! The site seemed to have fewer people in residence although there are several currently uninhabited permanent pitches, as there are here too, so was quieter in that respect - until our wine got flowing anyway! - but there is constant distant traffic noise from the N332. We thought it was mostly swings and roundabouts as to which campsite is 'better' and the only real downside to Los Llanos is its physical distance from Denia. There's no casually strolling into town as we can do here.