Autumn in Northern Spain

Our next trip was a short stint via France to Northern Spain. Before we took the ferry from Portsmouth to St Malo, we stopped off at Petworth House set in some lovely parkland.

You can just make out the Lido at St Malo

After exploring St Malo, we spent a couple of nights on a campsite at La Trinite-sur-Mer, near the stone alignments at Carnac, which we visited after a game of table tennis!

We also visited the Neolithic megalithes at Lochmariaquer - three different structures in one location. The Great Broken Menhir is massive, about 300 tonnes and possibly from another alignment! How did they move and lift this up over 2000 years ago?

The Great Broken Menhir

The Table des Marchands, a Dolmen covered by a cairn, is an ancient burial site. Inside are some interesting engravings. This has been rebuilt so is not as it was found.

The Table des Marchands

Our first stop in Spain was in Zumaia, on the Basque coast, a nice small town on the Rio Urola, where they celebrated the Octopus while we were there, washed down with some local Cider. We also took the local bus to Donostia-San Sebastian for a day.

Looking back at Playa de Santiago

The Playa de la Conche at San Sebastian

That's how you pour Cider here!

Near Zumaia is what's called The Flysch, a sequence of alternating layers of Sandstone and Shale or Mudstone. The layers of flysch act like an enciclopedia of Earth's history revealing details of geological and climatic changes over millions of years. A boat trip gave us a great view.