And we are off! Well, wait a minute, I do not have a fridge magnet yet! That is the downside of checking out a city during the afternoon when stores are closed! So first, the souvenir store! We know exactly where we are going thanks to the hotel and the excellent Zamora map that the city produces! We even found an accessible parking spot just outside of the old city walls in order to make this job quicker and on the way back to the car got some beverages for the trip (well Andrew’s beer will be given to him after he completes the drive). Now we are ready to rumble! Our first stop, which will be after an our is Salamanca where they have, according to the Lonely Planet and some other sources “the most beautiful main plaza in Spain”. We will have to check it out! So onto the prairies we went, flat and straight south to Salamanca we drove – sort of reminded me of the east/west drive on the Canadian prairies! And the temperature was going up, up, up! When we got to Salamanca it was about 32 degrees – up for a walk anyone? Sure! A very short one and this time I am bringing my water bottle! First stop – fridge magnet! Second stop – town square and wow – it was as beautiful as everyone had mentioned – it would also be lovely to see at night all lit up! Now that I got Andrew safely back to the car (he takes pictures of the street sign where we park in case I get hit by a bus) it was 42 degrees inside it! Yikes! Time for some AC! Hitting the highway the inside temperature of the car got down to 38 degrees and there it hovered for the rest of our trip. Lovely we are in the proverbial heat dome of a teal car! It was interesting that the landscape also started to change at this point too — more like Osoyoos again – tumbleweeds and nothing seemed to survive unless it was heavily watered. We were taking a secondary highway down to Badjoz and it was pretty nice – gas prices were lower too! The only challenge was the big trucks and passing them on the sometimes curvy road. We also stopped at another “picnic” area which was basically a wide open parking lot with a few bushes for shade (which we parked next to one) where we ate the left overs from last nights pizza. We got into sweltering Badjoz at 6:30pm and the thermometer here was a lovely 40 degrees at that time! Driving around the city, which seems to cover a hill, there was a small walled area across the Guadiana river which we might need to check out before leaving tomorrow – looks fascinating! When we got to the hotel, a heat wall hit us when we opened our car doors! The AC Marriott hotel is pretty nice, unfortunately walkie could not fit into the first room they sent us to (these hotel in Europe the rooms are small if not upgraded!) so we had to move to a 2nd room however all is good – it is only one night! Cool fact that I just realized – we are within walking distance of the Portugal border! Badjoz sits barely inside Spain! Tomorrow we are continuing our journey south with a 2 day stop in Huelva before moving onto Sevilla!
