Canal Du Midi

It's a bucket list item for many people, I guess. Barging in France. Especially on the  Canal du Midi. We collect Nick and Kerry, Andrew and Terry from Toulouse airport and drive the hour to Homps. There is a little wind swept marina with about 20 boats docked. Paperwork complete we are shown to literally the worst boat on the canal. It's old, dirty, falling apart. Kerry to the rescue and we-she -manages to negotiate a better boat. I am amazed they even had a spare one. We finally chuck everything on board and depart. The first lock is only a hundred metres down the canal. Neil is at the helm, and we are all ready to throw ropes or whatever. The lock keeper won't let us go though,because there has to be three boats in the lock at a time. He yells at us in French and waves a notice about. It's a water saving measure due to the drought! So we moor right there for the night to be first off in the morning.
Locks operate from 9am to 6pm with a lunch break from 12 to 2pm.
It's a pretty lousy start to a trip so all we can do is drink loads of wine and tuck into a wonderful spread of French baguette, cheese, olives and cold meats.
Some of us are more comfortable with the "Camping on Water" concept than others (you know who you are.) Here again; lots of wine helps!
We don't embarrass ourselves through the first lock; it's easy. We have Neil to steer and Nick to do a lot of the jumping on and off. The canal is quite busy so we sometimes have to wait our turn, which is a bit tedious. In some areas the tourist boats have right of way and off course it's one group up then one group down.
The canal du midi is a UNESCO site. It was built to link the Atlantic to the Med. It's 240 kilometres long and was built from 1662 to 1681.
It's very pretty and this stretch of the canal doesn't go through any industrial areas or cities and for the most part is away from busy roads.
It's hotter than we thought it would be. There is a water borne disease that is killing all the trees along the canal and so thousands of them are being removed and destroyed. The entire canal was like a shady avenue but now there's a lot more sun to contend with.
Along the way we stop to visit the little towns and to stock up on food and wine. Or to visit vineyards. My favourite town was Le Somail and we found a great restaurant with a pretty garden called Plan B. On Sunday morning at about 4am a commotion outside the boat signalled the setting up of a huge antiques fair and flea market lining the streets of town. Stallholders get in really early to secure the best spots and shoppers arrive before 8am to get the best deals. It's also because the afternoons are so hot, you need to be packed up by lunch time.
The highlight of all the locks on this part of the canal is the Fonserannes Ladder; a series of seven stepped chambers with 6 rises. The total height change is 21.5m. In the end we did have a great time but it's not a trip I would take too often.

Madrid and more..

Plaza Major, Madrid

Snacks at Mecado San Miguel

Tapas Bars

Dali

Girona

Port De La Selva

It was a long and hot drive to Madrid and we were happy to see that since our last visit Camping Osuna has new bathrooms.It's the only campsite in the greater Madrid area, not that well located so we had to catch the Metro in in the morning and Uber home each night. Madrid had great restaurants and wonderful tapas bars if you get away from the touristy areas. Pop in to Mercado San Miguel for a glass of bubbly and a snack, hang out at an outdoor restaurant on Plaza de Angel or bar hop in the trendy Cheuca area.
There is a bit more live music, especially jazz, than in many other European cities.
If you like art it's a must. I recommend the three museums on three consecutive days. The Thyssen spans 13th Century iconoclastic tryptiches to American Pop Art. The Prada has everything including halls and halls of Goya and the Renia Sofia has 20th Century art with some good Dali works and Picasso's Guernica.
With an overnight stop in Zaragoza, we headed for Girona and then Figueras ( to visit Theatre Museum Dali again) before a rest at the coastal town of Port de la Selva on the Costa Brava. There are still some unspoilt,hidden gems along the Med if you go hunting for them.

Southern Spain

Seville

Alcazar

Listau

Rhonda

Cordoba cathedral

Over the border our first stop was Seville for a few days. It's a wonderful Spanish city with beautiful Moorish  architecture and a great cafe culture. We can recommend La Bodega for tapas. The weather was awfully hot though, above 40 C until late in the evening. We drove south to Jerez de la Frontera, the capital of the sherry growing region and did a tour of the Listau Bodega.We avoided the busy Costa de Sol and spent a few nights in Rhonda. It's dramatically perched on the edge of a cliff but too touristy; attracting hoards of day trippers from the coast. We returned to Cordoba for a few nights. We enjoyed strolling the streets and finding all the old Jerez de Fino (sherry) bars.
We think the Cathedral of Cordoba is the best Cathedral in Europe. It started life as a huge Moorish mosque and when the Catholics took  it over in the 1600s they simply built their church within the old structure.