Hotel Arinsal

... ve got to give some credit to a city that gave Gaudi license. They might have lost that gamble, but no, tourists come in by the busloads to take pictures of the cherubim and seraphim and… themselves. The Arc is interesting, too, made out of brick, so not a copy of the French model like every other one I’ve seen. That’s something Spain has in common with Poland, I guess, the copious use of brick. They also have a ...

... days will get some entries soon.

Today, we started from France, and drove a few miles into Andorra. So we have now done 10 of the 11 countires!!

Photos to follow, I'll just go back and put some news on the other days, then get photos loaded up. That takes ages.

... the watershed and we drop into the Spanish frontier town of Bourg Madame. We continue east across a wide plane undulating over the Col De Llous (1345m) and the Col De la Perche (1570m). From here a unbelievably long descent takes us nearly al the way to our
hotel. Prades has a reassuringly Mediterranean feel about it, with lots of courtyard cafe's and
clay tiled roofs.

WHAT I EXPERIENCED:

... want me to take up a table intended for four people, but it didn't look like many people were flocking to the restaurant. Nothing else around seemed appealing, otherwise I would've walked off, but was tired of dealing with incompetent/rude waitstaff, and just waited to eat and be done with it.

The place didn't look all that great, but the pizza smelled heavenly, reminding me of a night in the Canary Islands (see blog entry entitled "Beautiful ...

It seems prayer has become a part of my life again. It really never left but when you are faced with hotels still closed for the season, chambres d'hotes not easy to find and nasty cold wet weather then, well, it is good to have prayer in your life. Our journey from St. Palais towards Lourdes found us happily ensconced in a hotel (with wifi) mid way along the route in Oloron Ste. Marie. It was so wet and Shane was so tired from driving that we fell ...

Probably like you, I had no idea there was a country located between France and Spain. Well, turns out there is - a beautiful little country located in the middle of the Pyrenees mountains called Andorra. Though the smallest European country, it has the second longest life expectancy of any country in the world and is renowned for ...

... car parks and dodgy looking hotels (I'm not personally). Eventually the bus pulled into the bus station at Andorra La Vella (the "capital" of this tiny principality) and I got off. After crossing a truly massive car park, probably their masterpiece, I got to a tourist information centre and acquired a map. "Are there any good places to try a variety of Andorran beer" I asked the bloke "We don't make beer in Andorra. Are you Danish?" "No, English" "Ok" I waited for a few ...

... go to school. Today I'm hitching with Andre, who took an extra day to get to Andorra but I figure it can't happen twice in a row. Our first ride takes us only 5km to the next village but it's good enough to get us started. Next we wait almost another hour for our next ride to take us 20km over the mountain pass to Pas de le Casa, where we were a few days prior. We can't remember exactly how far it was from here to the border so we decide to start ...

... a stray dog to play catch with. The downhill trip ended in a championship of downhill snow ball racing. Neil came out champion, surprisingly as we haven't had snow for a good few years I would have thought he was out of practice, but no he clinched the victory by a rather small margin from Andrei, who I would like to note was the only other competitor in the competition. Again the night finishes with cards as the kids have gone to bed and we hit ...

... skiing. Well, obviously there were 7 or 8 other learners in my class, but I didn't know them, so they didn't count. Besides, I may have been poor, but another, more mature lady, was pititfully bad, so she was an excellent decoy. Back in the bad old days, I only had the lolly for one trip a year and had to choose between skiing and sun. Boo. It was another 6 years before I got to ski again and by this time I was ...