Wound our way out of Castellón past a large beautiful park, several interesting statues and out into the fields of oranges and olives. The hills were on one side and the Sea on the other, but the hills were a lot closer.

It took about an hour to reach the foothills, crawl through the pass and arrive closer to the beach.  Being closer to the water made the air much cooler, though the cooler air came in way of the sea breeze to our side.

Found a beach road off the busy ‘national’ road that let to Marina D’Or, “City of Vacations; miles and miles of large condos and four-star hotels.  Not a very large beach, but a nice green belt to separate the tall buildings from the beach.  Not our style, but a nice break from the traffic.  Back on course, we now had beautiful hills on both sides of us. The deep green of the orange groves and light hues of the olive trees made for spectacular landscape. There was little in the way of towns or homes. We had another long, but not steep, climb to get through the mountains and then to the beaches of Peñíscola. The water was an incredible color with the white caps from the wind adding contrast.  It was a truly beautiful spot sandwiched between the beach beach towns of Peñíscola and Benicarló.  Though we’d only done 44 miles, the next 15 miles yielded no hotel availability, so sitting by the beach with a beer is what we will just have to do.