the ferry home

2^nd December 2013

We wake early and prepare to leave San Sebastian by 0900, driving through lovely countryside, we have breakfast on the road, beside a service station café. 

It is very convenient being able to stop somewhere and then sit down to a table and have a normal breakfast with coffee, and take our time.

We are heading along the coast to Bermeo, but we see a nice place to stop before we get there, as we get glimpses of the coast and beaches. We stop at Mundaza, at the place where the estuary reaches inland a little. There is a park, and a school. 

The plane trees have been pollarded and leached together, arms meeting and conjoined. We cross a railway line to get to the boardwalk beside the sea. There are small boats beached where the tide has left them, and assorted buoys.

We sleep overnight at the Brittany ferry terminal in Bilbao ferry port, waking at 7am, and getting ready to drive on board.

After leaving the van on the lower deck, we make our way up to deck 7 where we had booked a cabin, and spend a very relaxed day on board, taking in a movie in the afternoon, and a great French meal in the evening.

The sea was very calm all the way round the bay of Biscay into the channel, and we arrive in Portsmouth and drive home.

4^th- 9^th December

We spend the next few days unpacking the van and recharging all the car batteries, and motorbikes which had all gone flat in the two months we have been away.