Bonfire night and we are on board Muirgen, in Mar de Cristal, having a week or so's R&R. It's about 18C and feels reasonably warm in the sun and out of the breeze. The boat is moored stern to, so we are sitting on the foredeck to make the most of the sun before it dips behind the houses and drops cold. The marina bar is closed for the Winter and there's hardly anyone around. There's a Spar and a single cafe bar that remain open in the little resort. That means we will be eating on board most of the time.
Over the following days, we get the folding bikes out and explore. Getting beyond Mar de Cristal in either direction along the shore means crossing open scrubland with tiny little paths. There has been some rain so it's a bit muddy in places, as well as being very rough. However, it's worth the effort. There are quite a few bars and cafes along the front, as we head towards Cabo de Palos and a lovely promenade and more people. One of the places we find is just a couple of plastic tables and chairs, strung with fairy lights, in the back yard of a smallholding, belonging to a Romanian couple. They served us Romanian wine (rather pleasant) and homemade cakes. We promised to go back for dinner one night but became too busy to return there.
We cycled in the other direction, through Isla Menores to Los Nietos and located the train stations (there are 3), as we wanted to visit Cartegena. We could have sailed there but at €47 a night and a stric 12pm to 12pm charging policy it was expensive and inconvenient. We caught the train the next day and it was less than €5 return for the two of us, for the 30 minute journey through the hills. We had a lovely day out, soaking up the culture in the sunshine. It's well worth a visit for a day or two.
Another day, we cycled inland, up the hill, to Los Balones, a slightly larger town with more bars and restaurants. I had the best hot chocolate ever, we visited the bodega to buy wine and Fever Tree tonic for our gin, went to a lovely deli to buy iberico ham and had a beer at a little cafe bar, which faced the sun and was sheltered from the breeze. Then we went for 'lunch' at a well known local restaurant that serves 3 courses table d'hote and a half bottle of wine for €12. It was good, hearty, local fare.
As the weather improved, we decided to sail over to Tomas Maestra for a couple of nights. This is where you access the Mar Menor from the sea, via a channel with a bridge that lifts every 2 hours, daytime only. There's a very large marina here, surrounded by bars and restaurants (mostly closed for the Winter) and an excellent Super Cor supermarket. There are no hotels here, just privately owned appartments. It's also right at the top if La Manga strip and we were able to ride the bikes almost the full length, about 13km and back. The area was extremely quiet but we did find one small cafe, on the promenade, overlooking the beach on the seaward side. It was a good place to get a drink and snack and frequented by plenty of cyclists.
In the afternoons, it was lovely to visit one of the bars overlooking the Mar Menor, facing the sun and picking up a bit of colour. From here you could also watch the Spanish air force training, as there was a training base towards the top of the lake.
We found a great restaurant, run single handed by a young Morrocan guy. There we struck up a conversation with three Norwegian ladies, a mother and her two daughters. In a bizarre coincidence, we had visited the small town of Mandal, where they were from and the mother still lived, when we sailed in Norway a few years ago. We even had a photograph looking down on the town which showed the mother's appartment. The mother and one daughter were English teachers and they had studied at York University, not far from our home. It's a small World!
Having returned to Mar de Cristal, via a short stop at an anchorage off one of the islands in the Mar Menor, we arranged to go walking with two of the ladies who worked in the marina bar. Pete had become very friendly with them when he was on the boat back in September. They took us up the highest of the hills behind Los Belones, where we had wonderful views over the Mar Menor, the sea and inland. We could even see a little of Cartagena from here. The sun was out and it all looked glorious. Afterwards, Toni dropped us in Los Belones, where we had lunch at an Italian restaurant before walking the 2.5 miles back to the boat.
We returned to the UK having had a very enjoyable time.