We took a day out from Ceceno to visit Torrelavega so as to stock up with supplies from the Carrefour Hypermarket and visit the nearby town of Cartes which had been recommended as a place to visit by one of the bar staff at our campsite.
Torrelavega is a sizeable industrial centre (51,000 inhabitants) about 17 or 18 miles to the west of Cantabria’s capital city Santander. It doesn’t appear to have a lot going for it except that a great many supermarkets are grouped together in a large retail area to the east of the city and Vanya wanted to stock up on Cava and Albarino wines before we left Spain. It suited our needs perfectly.
Just 4 miles south of Torrelavega is Cartes, sometimes called Cards. Cartes is a small medieval town of almost 6,000 people. I say ‘medieval’ but there’s really just the one street, Camino Real, with it’s rows of small stone mansions (so typical of Canatabria) which reflects anything medieval and even then it is late medieval. In fact, most of the houses date from between the 15th and 18th centuries.
We wandered up and down the mostly pedestrian Camino Real a couple of times with Vanya checking out a small store selling various local produce and buying me one of the local ciders. Camino Real is a beautiful street and was alone worth the trip out. The mountain mansions that line this street, many with coats of arms carved into the facade and wooden balconies filled with plants and; large ceramic flower pots lining the pavement create something of a spectacle. One of the older buildings on the street proved to be a small and very friendly bar. We took lunch there – some good wines, a plate of assorted cold cuts and cheeses and the best croquettes I have ever tasted (being two each of Iberico ham, prawns and some truly delicious cheese ones). We also got to talking with one of the locals who insisted on buying me “a special Cantabrian wine” which tasted not unlike the txakoli wine I sampled in Zarautz way back on Tour 5 in the Basque Country. It’s not my favourite type of wine but, hey, it would have been rude to say no.
This was a very short trip to Cantabria but I know we’ll return. It’s on now to Urt on the other side of the Pyrenees.