Day 12 & 13: The Big Wet

Staying: Camping Al Cancelas - Santiago de Compostela
Date: Thursday 10th April
Distance Travelled: 420.7 Miles
Song of the Day: Why Does it Always Rain on Me - Travis

It´s not often that we will run more than one day together, generally becuase we have very different views on things and are constantly disagreeing with each others blogs. However, we were both of the agreement that these two days we could do as we only had 1 goal, to drive across Spain. Well, the top of Spain to be precise. We split the journey in two, as it is an epic journey, and arrived in Santiago de Compostela this afternoon. Also, coming here was something Laurie wanted to do, so it is only fair she blog about it.

Yesterdays journey, although long, was completely uncomplicated. We got out of San Sebastian really easily; the roads in Spain are signposted really well, so we got going in the correct direction. After a brief stop for lunch somewhere green (I don´t remember exactly where, but between Santander and Oviedo), we contiued on our merry way, to rock up at our campsite where we had views of the Atlantic out the back of the van.

Today, however, was not so good. It rained most of the day yesterday, and continued all night, and was still going when we got going this morning. Turns out that the dodgy wiper we had decided this would be the perfect opportunity to throw it´s toys completely and stop working. After a lengthy period of me standing in the rain working with tools to try and get it fixed (insert swearing as you see fit), we decided to get back to the campsite and find a mechanic. We came across a petrol station on the way and after some sign language they pointed us to where we could find a mechanic.

So we roll on up to the back of this Hyundai dealer in the middle of nowhere, and Cam walks inside to ´chat´ with the guy working there. The conversation consisted of signing and pigeon-spanish (and that´s being nice about my Spanish), but I was able to convey our problem. This guy was a CHAMPION; he tried to fix the wiper we had, but couldn´t (they had none in store as this wasn´t a shop), he then ran off and removed the wipers from one of the cars that were in the parking lot and installed that (obivously the wiper is designed for a right handed car, but it still wipes innit). All of this took about 10 minutes, which was 10 minutes he didn´t need to give me. He was fantastic about it, and I practically had to force money into his hand (in fact, he came back with pens and stuff because we paid him). It´s good to see that there are still nice people in the world who will happily help a stranger.