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Off for a weeks scenic jolly in Asturias (Northern Spain) tomorrow.

Taking the narrow gauge railway that runs along the coast and will stop off at a few villages along the route






Will be eating loads of seafood and sampling the wine and Spanish cider 

Turkey tomorrow, oh ffffuuuucccchhhheeeennnnnn  yes

feck me, woof. i only just noticed that post of yours from 2 months back!! that's right where i live now... in gijon. not sure if you stopped off there or not. so where abouts did you go? how did your cider pouring technique come on? would have been a pleasure to share one with you.

managed the whole way to anglesey and norfolk this summer. livin the dream eh?  next summer should be better - taking 4 weeks off work and goin on another camping roadtrip. down to croatia & montenegro, ferry over to italy, and on to corsica, then back through france. just hope the feckin car holds up 

andy_g » Sat Sep 08, 2012 8:44 pm wrote:feck me, woof. i only just noticed that post of yours from 2 months back!! that's right where i live now... in gijon. not sure if you stopped off there or not. so where abouts did you go? how did your cider pouring technique come on? would have been a pleasure to share one with you.

I'd forgotten you'd moved from Barcelona up to Gijon otherwise I would have given you a shout.

Flew into Oviedo ,a nice enough town, stayed one night there before taking the narrow gauge railway (Feve) along the coast of Asturias and Galicia. Stopped off for a night or two at some little places here and there, principally Cudillero, Luarca and Viveiro. I was pleasantly surprised by how green northern Spain is, reminded me very much of Devon/Cornwall here in the UK.
Although not completely off the beaten track there were relatively few tourists (compared to the numbers you find in southern Spain) and consequently we struggled a bit with the language, very few people spoke English, even the woman staffing the tourist info centre in Oviedo spoke only Spanish and a bit of French. Ordering stuff in restaurants was also a challenge as again the majority only displayed their menu's in Spanish and we ended up eating some very surprising dishes, thankfully most of it very very good, I naturally tried the local cider but if truth be told I think it's an accquired taste 

All in all we had a great time, the seafood was fantastic, the people were most hospitable and our Spanish improved with each passing day . You can keep your southern costas, Asturias is now deffo my favourite Spanish destination.

yeah, its a pretty special part of the world, alright.

i know cudillero and luarca fairly well, there's some great beaches near there. in my opinion though, the best of asturias is east of oviedo and gijon, between ribadesella and llanes - the best beaches, amazing little villages, limestone caves and blowholes, and 2500m high mountains about 20k from the coast. i also get that distinctly cornish feel about the place - the little fishing villages, the connection with the sea, the rolling green landscapes leading to craggy cliffs, the excessive cider drinking... they even share the same celtic blood.

we do get lots of tourists in the summer though, but instead of being brits they're all posh kunts from madrid.

andy_g » Sun Sep 09, 2012 2:27 pm wrote:yeah, its a pretty special part of the world, alright.

i know cudillero and luarca fairly well, there's some great beaches near there. in my opinion though, the best of asturias is east of oviedo and gijon, between ribadesella and llanes - the best beaches, amazing little villages, limestone caves and blowholes, and 2500m high mountains about 20k from the coast. i also get that distinctly cornish feel about the place - the little fishing villages, the connection with the sea, the rolling green landscapes leading to craggy cliffs, the excessive cider drinking... they even share the same celtic blood.

we do get lots of tourists in the summer though, but instead of being brits they're all posh kunts from madrid.

, Yeah, what "tourists" we did see seemed to be mostly from other parts of Spain.

Thanks for the tip about heading east when in Asturias. Maybe next time I'll do Gijon to San Sebastian in which case I'll send out a shout to you in Gijon and Sabre in San Sebastian (I think that's where he lives ? )

woof woof ! » Sun Sep 09, 2012 9:34 am wrote:

andy_g » Sat Sep 08, 2012 8:44 pm wrote:feck me, woof. i only just noticed that post of yours from 2 months back!! that's right where i live now... in gijon. not sure if you stopped off there or not. so where abouts did you go? how did your cider pouring technique come on? would have been a pleasure to share one with you.

I'd forgotten you'd moved from Barcelona up to Gijon otherwise I would have given you a shout.

Flew into Oviedo ,a nice enough town, stayed one night there before taking the narrow gauge railway (Feve) along the coast of Asturias and Galicia. Stopped off for a night or two at some little places here and there, principally Cudillero, Luarca and Viveiro. I was pleasantly surprised by how green northern Spain is, reminded me very much of Devon/Cornwall here in the UK.
Although not completely off the beaten track there were relatively few tourists (compared to the numbers you find in southern Spain) and consequently we struggled a bit with the language, very few people spoke English, even the woman staffing the tourist info centre in Oviedo spoke only Spanish and a bit of French. Ordering stuff in restaurants was also a challenge as again the majority only displayed their menu's in Spanish and we ended up eating some very surprising dishes, thankfully most of it very very good, I naturally tried the local cider but if truth be told I think it's an accquired taste 

All in all we had a great time, the seafood was fantastic, the people were most hospitable and our Spanish improved with each passing day . You can keep your southern costas, Asturias is now deffo my favourite Spanish destination.

  Well, you are in Spain numbnuts  why is it that the English expect other nationalities to speak English to them when it's not even their first language, it's your job to learn their lingo, not the other way round you divy.  Being a self confessed worldly traveler I thought you would have known this 'years' ago. 

Mind you: "An idiot is entitled to be an idiot", perhaps the costas would suit you better sir.

Woof, I'm going to Italy, do you reckon they'll all brush up on their English skills upon my arrival, or should I be as surprised as you when they all speak their native tongue.

Kenny Kan » Sun Sep 09, 2012 11:36 pm wrote: why is it that the English expect other nationalities to speak English to them when it's not even their first language, it's your job to learn their lingo, not the other way round you divy.  Being a self confessed worldly traveler I thought you would have known this 'years' ago. 

Mind you: "An idiot is entitled to be an idiot", perhaps the costas would suit you better sir.

Woof, I'm going to Italy, do you reckon they'll all brush up on their English skills upon my arrival, or should I be as surprised as you when they all speak their native tongue.

It's a long time since I was in a country or area were so little English was spoken. As an English speaker you do kinda get used to other nationalities having a smattering of English, particularly those involved in the tourist industry maybe that's because English is generally used as the worlds lingua franca. Not that it's any excuse for my failure to speak Spanish, Greek, Urdu, Persian, Japanese, Swahili or any of the other 50 odd languages used in the countries I've visited, I hang my head in shame 

why should we learn their language when we go for 2 weeks to foreign land when they come over here to live and work and they don't even bother to learn English?

fek 'em.

If they wanna converse they'll have to speak English.

Roger Red Hat » Mon Sep 10, 2012 1:10 pm wrote:If they wanna converse they'll have to speak English.

Reminds me of a time in South Africa, some fella said something or other to me and I replied "Sorry mate, I don't speak Afrikaans can you speak English ? he responded in the broadest of Geordie accents with

"I am speaking bloody English"   
                                                        .