Hotel Magic Canillo

... cheap. What you save in duty you’d make up in European rent, easy. The US is cheap, pure if not simple. Still Andorra is okay, easily dissed without cause. The only thing I can’t handle is the smoke, the man-made kind. The new regs haven’t reached here yet, so Andorra may soon become the place where smokers flock to light up in public, the anti-Amsterdam. That’s a claim to fame they can probably do without.

we've had some problems getting to this stage, and so haven't been able to keep the blog up to date. So far everything is now working out fine, and we have arrived on site to be able to set up in the light, and the campsite has electricity, so we are ok to get written up today. Hopefully ...

... 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:

Annoying new Aussie girls in the room last night ... they showed up around 1 AM, and made a huge racket unpacking and getting ready for bed. The night receptionist even came up, asking them to be quiet because they were disturbing the other sleeping guests in the room, to which they replied "They're not sleeping, they're talking to us!" Uh ... most were either sleeping, or trying to sleep, until you came in ... The funny thing is they were nice enough, but ...

... Now.... 37 years ago Shane, Jerry and I thought we were in this village. We all have memories of being in Andorra da Ville but.... it weren't anything like what we see outside. Totally confused we spoke with a local today and discovered that all those years ago we were really only in a ski village near the border. We never did come this far in. Tomorrow we take that highway out of the country to France. Hopefully our fuzzy memories will be become clearer.

... Festa Brava hotel. I seriously considered going snowboarding, but it was just too late in the season and the snow, though plentiful, was just too wet for my tastes. So I wandered about town, dodging the hourly rainfall and taking in the sights. Not too much to be seen here, but nice to look around a place I had no idea even existed!

I woke up at about half past five and pulled myself from my bed- half five really is far too early after a night on the town. After getting massively lost in the corridors of the Centric Hostel (painting all the doors the same colour was a cruel trick) I eventually stumbled down to the desk and checked out. About ten minutes later I got to the bus station and managed to procure a bottle of water from the one vending machine in the whole place that actually worked (if you get ...

Andorra to Perpignan So Luis takes myself and Florin up to his apartment and he introduces us to his 2 lovely daughters and his friend and her daughter also. Before long we get a message from the two girls saying they are in town but cannot find the apartment so we agree to go and find them. The four of us spend the evening playing cards until quite late before retiring to bed. Luckily for us Luis daughters have given up their room - willingly or not I do ...

... taking us over the border questioning us if we are carrying drugs. No I wasn't, obviously. It takes us a further 5 rides to make the 100km to Perpignan, and the final of which was 80km, il leave the rest unsaid. It was a long and slow journey. But at least we made it. The two guys were unable to make it so took the last 100km by train, which did mean I got to visit 'the centre of the universe' as the train station claimed. Now I have seen everything.