An uneventful 250 km motorway journey the length of Castile,on the A62 “Autovia de Castilla”, brought me to Salamanca,the historic university town,whose yellow stone buildings remind me so much of Oxford.Except that the Plaza Mayor also carries off a pretty good resemblance to Its namesake in Madrid.
 Salamanca |  |
Plaza mayor
I established myself in a rather odd looking campsite (Camping Regio )at the back of hotel in the suburb of Santa Marta de Tomes .You check in at the hotel reception. The site has all the facilities but is clearly suffering out of season without a resident manager as everything is looking tatty, and it bears an unfortunate resemblance to a cemetery , with all the pitches marked out with stones, and each having its own "tombstone" electricity point.
Being new to the experience of plugging my van into the mains,I cautiously tested the sockets with my circuit tester. A correct combination of lights on this device should indicate an adequate current, and a working earth connection. Quite a few of the sockets were not functioning, but those that were, produced a combination of lights on my device which did not exist in the instructions .I went and had a chat with an Englishman parked nearby who said(much in line with online forums I'd read) that he didn't bother to check campsite sockets at all now, but anyway he thought that the odd combination of lights I was getting was OK.Much has been written in debating the subject but essentially Continental wiring is configured differently to that in the UK, with two lives as opposed to a live and a neutral. In practice this doesn't matter(do you bother which way the current is flowing when you plug in your electronic devices through an adapter when on holiday abroad?-you don't)
Nonetheless I do plan to continue testing sockets at sites as my device also tells me whether there is an working earth connection, something I do consider important before connecting my metal vehicle to the mains!
There is a bus into the city but I managed to miss the one I was aiming for as I was standing at the wrong stop. As there wasn't one for another half an hour I decided to stretch my legs with a 4 km hike to the city centre...and it then had to be a taxi on the way back later as however hard I searched I just could not locate the correct return bus-stop despite looking hard, and asking. This reminds me of the English couple who introduced themselves to me in a café in Burgos yesterday, as they were my next door neighbours at the campsite ,where they had spotted me earlier. They told me of a bus they had been advised to catch out of town which went back to near the campsite ,and suggested I did the same. When I met them later after I'd had a pleasant walk back along the river path, it transpired that they had missed their stop and had to walk back miles from an industrial estate in the distant suburbs!
Being new to the experience of plugging my van into the mains,I cautiously tested the sockets with my circuit tester. A correct combination of lights on this device should indicate an adequate current, and a working earth connection. Quite a few of the sockets were not functioning, but those that were, produced a combination of lights on my device which did not exist in the instructions .I went and had a chat with an Englishman parked nearby who said(much in line with online forums I'd read) that he didn't bother to check campsite sockets at all now, but anyway he thought that the odd combination of lights I was getting was OK.Much has been written in debating the subject but essentially Continental wiring is configured differently to that in the UK, with two lives as opposed to a live and a neutral. In practice this doesn't matter(do you bother which way the current is flowing when you plug in your electronic devices through an adapter when on holiday abroad?-you don't)
Nonetheless I do plan to continue testing sockets at sites as my device also tells me whether there is an working earth connection, something I do consider important before connecting my metal vehicle to the mains!
There is a bus into the city but I managed to miss the one I was aiming for as I was standing at the wrong stop. As there wasn't one for another half an hour I decided to stretch my legs with a 4 km hike to the city centre...and it then had to be a taxi on the way back later as however hard I searched I just could not locate the correct return bus-stop despite looking hard, and asking. This reminds me of the English couple who introduced themselves to me in a café in Burgos yesterday, as they were my next door neighbours at the campsite ,where they had spotted me earlier. They told me of a bus they had been advised to catch out of town which went back to near the campsite ,and suggested I did the same. When I met them later after I'd had a pleasant walk back along the river path, it transpired that they had missed their stop and had to walk back miles from an industrial estate in the distant suburbs!
Funereal campsite " Camping Regio"
Lunch was here The afternoon weather in Salamanca was a complete change from my experience yesterday, with all the street cafes open for business for the Sunday crowds in very comfortable sun, and after having a good walk around I joined them for a late lunch outside a cafe I believe I visited with my wife when we were last here in 1985.
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