Our first target was the Covadongo lakes, not far from Cangas de Onis, but up a steep, windy road. After a while we reached the cloud base, but pressed on with headlights on, at a very slow pace, passing a number of cows with clanking bells, wondering if we would see anything at all when we reached the lakes.
But, to our delight, after a while we broke through into bright sunshine, and made our way on up the road to the very top, where we photographed distant snow-capped peaks, the Picos de Europa themselves, as well as the lakes.
It was a truly magical place, and we rather (well, quite) envied a group of teenagers we saw setting off on a guided hike of about seven kilometers to a mountain refuge. But with only a day in the mountains, we decided to press on, and headed back down the road. Then fate struck.
Round a bend we met a large tour bus, and there was no way past for us or for him. We had to back up, which we did gingerly, but not gingerly enough. He was advancing as we were retreating, perilously close to the cliff face. Then disaster: the back right hand wheel hit a rock with a bang, and, as we subsequently discovered, punctured.
The bus went by, and we crawled on down in the mist until we found a parking place for admiring the view, which was reasonably level. Out with the spare, jack in place, wheel nuts loosened, car jacked up, nuts removed - and could we get the wheel off? No, we couldn’t. Corroded in place, I suppose.
Various kind passers-by stopped to try to help, but nothing would shift it. We called our insurance company (in Paris!) who said they would arrange a rescue and call back, but no call. Eventually Diana found a solution on the Internet (we had phone connections and could set up a hotspot). The solution, in case you need to know, is to reinsert two or three wheel nuts loosely, lower the car, then rock it back and forth with the engine and gears to loosen the wheel. Eventually this worked, and we were able to put the spare on, and get ourselves cautiously down the hill, admiring this remarkable church as we went by.
Back in Cangas, we found a garage that could do the job. Except, of course, they didn’t have the right size of tyre in stock and would have to get them delivered. By them, I mean that inevitably no-one had exactly the same tyre, so we had to buy two. This gave us three or four hours to kill, so we found a parking place, photographed a little mediaeval chapel, and returned to the garden of the bar by the Roman Bridge for a leisurely tapas lunch.
Then we went and sat in the square and read our iPads until,eventually, the car was fixed, and we came along to our next, beautiful parador at Limpias. A lovely room with a private terrace, and a complimentary drinks voucher for Lorna’s friends!
Tomorrow we plan to set off early and see more of the Picos, before turning around and heading for our final stop at Hondaribia, pausing at the Guggenheim in Bilbao along the way. That’s the plan, but who knows what fate holds in store.
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