Praia de Pantin

Praia de Pantin

 (Pantin beach)

Last night was bizarre. There were few places in the town to eat and we had no supermarket supplies because yesterday was a public holiday and everything was closed. The festival area was set up basically in a cemetery, and there was a massive drinks bar set up but no food! There was a jumping castle in the shape of a giant panda on all fours looking down on children jumping around under his belly. This had the unfortunate effect of appearing as though he was pelvic thrusting in a most inappropriate manner in the direction of the children. In Australia it would have been banned or investigated or something. I belly laughed as I haven't belly laughed in a long time. A Shari belly laugh.

Sunset at ten pm over the ocean was spectacular. Hunger had set in and it was time to find food.

We searched for somewhere to eat and followed a sign saying "restaurant"...and walked up a massive hill to get to it only to find it was a bit fancy for us. So back down we went to the bar down the street to find it was big on beer and town crazies and small on food. We walked a little further on to find another bar that looked like the hotel California but without so much as a beast in which to stab with our steely knives. So back up the hill we trudged and had a lovely, if not a tad expensive, meal at the restaurant. Later we found out about a hamburger cafe hidden away near the beach. 😣

Today has been a day of surfing and beach hopping. We stocked up at the 'supermarket with no baskets or trolleys' (this was so weird...you had to bring items to the counter after picking them out from the shelves. I had Suzy doing the running), and headed to another beach. After being given the runaround by the sheila in the Tom Tom, who we have nicknamed 'that f#%^+¥% bitch', we found another magnificent stretch of sand. Suzy and I swam and it took a while before we could feel our bodies again. 

There has been a strange phenomenon happening since Portugal...every now and again, about 8 times a day, someone lets off an enormous fire cracker that sounds like canon fire. When we first encountered it in Portugal we thought someone was shooting at us, then thought that the van was backfiring, and then we saw puffs of smoke shooting up into the air in the hills. It's really loud, and gives a fright when you aren't expecting it. It must be some sort of celebration...maybe we will ask someone. 😬💥💨

It is kids with fire crackers, and it happens during fiesta time. And everyone is having fiesta time.

Praia de Pantin was the only place to be this afternoon with a nice swell rolling in, and the waves getting crowded with surfers from all over. The wind has died down and its quite warm, so I went for a swim down the front. It was effing freezing of course, but the warm air felt nice. Holy shit, there goes another cannon fire.

Tony is in his element, making friends and surfing his head off. He reckons its a $30,000 surf...the most expensive to date.

We are going to have burgers for tea, and a nice bottle of Rioja and watch the sun set on the Atlantic again.

It turns out we have happened upon the best surfing beach in Spain. We didn't know when we stopped here for lunch 2 days ago. Tony surfed for 4 solid hours yesterday which isn't bad for an old fella. Today the waves are 2m and beautiful but alas Tony has no board and we have to move on. Surfers are out there until after 10 when the sun sets. There are no sharks!

Today we will head off for Asturia where they drink cider (sidre), and where we will hopefully find another nice beach in a town where they aren't celebrating some saint or other.