After a lovely stay in Hotel Don Paco in the pretty town of Llanes, we set out this morning for stage two of our trip - heading up into the Picos de Europa and staying in a little hamlet called Cosgaya.
I was on driving detail and it was an impressive drive into the mountains via a rather ‘challenging’ winding road through a tiny village called La Hermitage. The route was through an incredibly narrow gorge where the cliff face hung over the road in parts so I’m not sure how lorries or high sided vehicles cope when facing oncoming traffic. Luckily in our tinny Fiat we didn’t need to worry about that!
We continued on to the entry town of Potes which I was pleased we weren’t staying in as although pretty, it is very commercial. We parked in a supermarket car park and bought ourselves a DIY lunch of chorizo, local cheese, bread, tomatoes and I couldn’t resist a couple of bottles of wine, one of which was €1!!
The hotel is lovely - it and the other buildings nearby - look like alpine hotels with dark wood balconies and masses of flowers. I was particularly impressed by the two ‘meet and greet’ huge St Bernard dogs in the porch who seem to just enjoy lying in the sun all day being stroked and petted by the guests.
Our room is not as big as the last one but is well equipped - has a kettle - and great views over the snow capped mountains. Dinner was another good value ‘menu del dia’.
We are preparing for the first of a few serious mountain walks to work off all the ‘menu del dias’!!
