Rascafría

Chapter one: Ivy gets her new handbrake (eventually!)
Monday finally arrives and we head off early to the Iveco garage with our fingers crossed that it wasn’t going to cost an arm and a leg and they would get it done quickly so we can get going. Darren went in while I waited in the van with Bliss and quickly came back saying the receptionist was abrupt and quite rude. Well in my experience that seems to be a requirement for receptionists as most that I’ve met have been the same. Full of their own self importance! We are told to go away and come back after they have had their siesta at 4pm and have ordered and received delivery of the new handbrake cables. We took a drive to the nearest village to pick up a few supplies from the local shop and wait the five hours before going back to the garage. It was a scorching 30º day so it wasn’t a pleasant wait. When we went back to the garage we hoped that we would be on our way pretty soon but unfortunately the wrong part had been ordered and we had to wait for the correct part to be delivered before they could fix Ivy. The mechanics were all rude and obnoxious to be frank. I’ve never experienced such bad attitudes from a business in all my life. It really was like they were doing us a favour extremely reluctantly and we’d done something that seriously pissed them all off! Anyway finally at 7pm Ivy was all fixed, our bank balance was £250 lighter and we were able to go on our way. We were charged for 3 hours labour when we knew it only actually took an hour as we were sat inside the van while the work was done but at least we have a working handbrake and we can get on with our adventuring.

Chapter Two: A drama a day
We headed for our place to stay for the night which wasn’t too far away. We arrived at a lovely well maintained old village that had a free aire on the outskirts. We immediately went for a walk with Bliss as we’d all been cooped up in a hot van all day so we really needed some fresh air and exercise. There was a lovely country path that led us through a wide open grassy area with trees all along it, there was a few cows with their young on the grass so we quietly passed so as not to disturb them. We made it to the edge of a large lake and Bliss wasted no time in getting in to cool off. She leapt around like a young puppy, I guess she was relieved to feel the cool water on her belly after such a long hot day. We turned around to get back to Ivy feeling tired and ready for bed. Halfway back we came across the cows that we seen earlier but now they were all moving along the path slowly with their babies in the same direction as us so we hung back to give them space. Then one of the cows stopped right in front of us with her calf so we stopped too. She stood and stared back at us for what seemed like an eternity daring us to come closer, not moving apart from the occasional stamping of her feet. “Oh dear, what are we going to do” she’s not moving away and she’s protecting her calf. All we want to do is go back to Ivy and go to bed. Then as we continue to stand quietly and wait for her to move on we suddenly notice that coming to her to the left is the most ginormous muscle bound ginger bull with knackers the size of basketballs!! 🏀 Oh shit!! Not another bloody drama! So... we back away as quietly as we could and when we’re far enough away that we think we can make it to the fence we leg it, climb the fence and manage to circumnavigate the herd. Back at the van we vow, no more risk taking for a little while.Read more