Hmmm I booked a ferry crossing to Santander in July - anyone any experience of staying in Northern Spain with recommendations?

[TheHonEnid]

I am happy to camp although dh isnt.

I don't know the area at all - nice beaches? The only place I know I want to visit is Bilbao and teh Picos de Europa national park but so far we have precisely nowhere to stay.

yes I might do that cam (am keen to go to guggenheim)

That's my main reason for going Enid, we're doing lots of art and history and kulchur

It'll be too cold for beaches in April

We're also staying in Madrid and visiting the Prado (I've already bought my timed entry tickets online - that was fun trying to suss out the Spanish instructions for c/card payment, luckily I pressed the correct button, although rest of their site is available in English)

I haven't tried it myself, but I've been recommended this hotel in Bilbao: www.petitpalacearana.com/

Teh picos is luverly

DH and I camped there

You must go to a place called Poo, we stayed there just to have stayed in a place called poo. Lovely beach with masses of mussels clinging to the cliffs.

You realise it will be the vessel of vomit that crossing??!

Hope not CD

We've done hundreds of Channel crossings and never been ill - even when the rest of the boat has

We stayed in Comillas which was lovely. Some great deals on self catering rooms - we turned up on spec as it were in early July & found one no problem

CD - I lived in Poo for a year . Best beach ever. And there's another Poo right by the Picos.

I've done the ferry a few times and so far we've never had any problems with sickness - we've had more problems on shorter channel crossings. It sets off around 4pm - by the time you find your cabin, explore the boat, etc it's already time for dinner and then bed. Then you wake up in the morning and just have time for breakfast before you arrive. It goes by very quickly and the kids love it. Just about to book to go back in May with a 2-week old baby - definitely beats flying on Ryanair...

Ah yes this was Poo de Llanes (or something like that)

dh adn I lost our spanish phase book in Llanes out on the piss one night
it was v embarrassing having to troll round the scenes of crime from the night before as we both knew bugger all spanish then - of course as we had lost our phrase book we didn't know what spanish for "i have lost my phrase book" was so had to go through comedy sketch style mimes ad nauseum only to be handed menus, writing pads etc...

We did find it eventually!

Aaah, so it's you that all the locals are still talking about...

We used a lovely campsite a couple of years back - it was with both Eurocamp and Eurosites but it was cheaper to book direct and reception do speak English. We had a big mobile home. It was equidistant from Bilbao and Santander, so we did both and the beach was next to the campsite - it was fab. Can dig out the name for you, if you're interested. Oh, there is a big zoo along that coast, too.