Travelogue

First night camping at Cala D'OquesWe thought that after the rush of picking up the van and stocking it, it would be nice to just chill on a beach for the first two nights.

Herb had done some research and found a lovely little campground called Camping Cala D’Oques located right on the beach along the Costa Daurada (Golden Coast). The whole Mediterranean Coast of Spain from Barcelona to Gibraltar is divided into various Costas - Costa Almeria, Costa Blanca (White Coast), Costa Brava (Rugged Coast), Costa Calida (Warm Coast), Costa del Sol (Sunshine Coast), and so on.

Although we did have a reservation, there wasn’t much space left for us, and it was a bit of a free for all in that sites weren’t assigned. Fortunately, the van was small enough to squeeze into what was the last beachfront spot.

There were some ominous clouds on the horizon, and the forecast wasn’t particularly great, so we quickly got ready to go to the beach before things turned.

Platja del TornWhile getting stuff out of the front seat of the van, I somehow managed to closed the door on my fingers. Three of them, up to my knuckles, were literally stuck in the door, which somehow managed to completely close. Not wanting to make a scene, I sort of quietly yelled to Herb that I needed help. Jumping into action, he ran from the back of the van to the front to open the door, smacking his head into the overhead storage along the way. Once he had set me free, we assessed the damage. He had a pretty good-size goose egg on his forehead, but my fingers were miraculously not broken. However, when I bent them, they started bleeding across my knuckles.

I hoped that none of the other campers saw the crazy Americans settling in. We took a few minutes to collect ourselves and tape up my hand before heading out to the beach.

From our campsite we walked along a beach path to the Platja del Torn, a 3 km long, lovely, dark sand beach set against the dunes. Beaches are called “platjas” in Catalonia as opposed to “playas” in the rest of Spain. It is also Catalonia’s most popular naturist beach. Naturism is much more common and accepted in Spain, so on most beaches you will find a variety of attire (or lack of), from nudity to topless, to bathing suits. Everyone seems very comfortable with the concept.

Herb fell asleep almost immediately so he missed my first entry into the Mediterranean, which was probably good, because my hopping and whooping along the hot, dark sand to get to the water was not the most graceful.

Night time mountain bikers whizzing past our campsiteThe whole time we were at the beach, dozens of mountain bikers came speeding down the hill behind us. We figured we must be along a popular mountain biking route. Even later that evening after dark - which in Spain in the summer is after 10:00 pm, mountain bikers with headlamps sped by our campsite along the beach path. What we were to learn over the next few weeks is that biking is extremely popular in Spain - they were everywhere.

The next morning, we woke up to rain and a pretty bleak forecast for the whole day. However, things looked better further south, so we decided to shift down a “Costa” or two and arrive a day early at our next campground - Camping La Marina, in Alicante on the Costa Blanca.

Too bad, because this campground and beach would have been pretty phenomenal on a sunny day.

Description

Platja del TornFamily-run campground in Tarragona on the Costa Durado. The campground has 2 km of beach on the Mediterranean Sea and is adjacent to the very popular Platja del Torn.

There is a restaurant with two garden terraces overlooking the sea, with daily paella specialities.