Saturday, March 27, 2010

A challenge

Spain on a budget (he says...)

We've had a 4 week break from our travels and this has given us the chance to catch up with some post winter maintenance on our old Spanish house. And, with the 'luxury' of broadband, an opportunity to get a lot more work done and content/features added onto our Club Motorhome website.

Well, we're itching to get back on the road again and have decided that we will head across southern Spain with Portugal as our target. We intend to do this trip on a strict budget and plan to spend no more than we would by staying at home. Of course, we don't have to budget for any ferry crossings so the only potential extra cost is fuel. By our reckoning, the amounts we save on water, electricity, logs, fuel for the car and 'excess'  food shopping will let us break even - we'll see...

So the route will take in Aires where possible, which is our preference anyway, and we will avoid any road tolls - again our normal preference. The basic route plan is as follows:


The Aires en route are:
  • Ibi
  • Cartegena
  • Venta el Peral
  • Alcaudete
  • Cabra
  • Valverde del Camino
  • Tavira

 Very happy to hear advice from others who may know of some good stopping places close to this route.

If all seems to be going according to our budget planning we'll then spend a little while exploring southern Portugal as it seems that the weather has improved following the attrocious winter. Inspired by some of the excellent blogs I've been reading we'll stay at some great sounding wildcamp spots. We have little experience of wildcamping and, although we are happy with our leisure battery and solar panel arrangements, it seems water and waste capacities will dictate how long one can stay in such places, again, we'll see....

Mission Impossible? (she says...)

Getting the call of the wild when no extra budget has been set aside can be frustrating to say the least.

A challenge they say is good, and so in the spirit of research for clubmotorhome and not, of course, because there are some
 fabulous fiestas to experience during the very important Easter 'celebrations' here in Spain. We have decided to set off again

With three very important aims:
- the first to spend no more per day than our 'home' budget
- the second to limit our fuel to our 'home' energy costs - this includes electric, wood, gas, and water.
- to have fun and experience what the southern areas of Spain and, fingers crossed Portugal, have to offer us. This is of course
 without spending over 'budget'.

When at 'home' I figure we live reasonably on 100 euros a week for food, diesel and the odd 'pint'. It does not cover celebrations, birthdays, catastrophes or clothes or any of the extras that come along. So the blog for this trip will include a brief expenditure up date, to let you know how I am facing up to the challenge.

Diesel is likely to be the problem due to its ever increasing cost. The one card we have tucked up our sleeve is that we are pretty sure we are starting on nearly a full tank - I'll let you know.

Speak to you on Monday.....