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Great sunset, followed by the illumination of the windmills, and another lovely evening with our new Belgian friends J&J. This time we had my French and Portuguese beers instead of Belgian, and Margot. the Lidl equivalent of Baileys, also made an appearance.

After coffee & biscuits at their’s late next morning, we headed off in search of a meal in Puerto Lapice, a little town with an apparently strong Don Quixote connection. We parked in the town’s aire, with the facilities you’d expect, and a short stroll took us into the town.

The most well known DQ themed restaurant/museum/gift shop didn’t have a good rating on Tripadvisor on the food front. The alleged best restaurant was way out of town, so we opted for number 2 (out of 6).

Meson Cervantes was a great choice for us. We were not looking for some fine-dining high-end experience. We wanted authentic at a reasonable price, which is exactly what we had. Spain being Spain, turning up at 3:45pm for lunch was fine. €10 each for a 3-course meal, including wine or beer, and coffees. €40 for 4 of us – simple. Amazing value. It was quite small, so no fear of a large coach party coming in, which is a risk in this popular town. Admittedly, it had a couple of TVs on, which is usually a no-no for us but we ignored them and had a great time.

We thought we’d then aim to overnight high up with the windmills, and castle, at a Park4night above Consuegra. Right at the top there’s only room for about 6 cars, so finding a space later in the season could be a bit risky, but it was fine for our two vans.

Magnificent views both directions high above the plains, and of course we were nestled in beside the windmills. That night we returned to the very nice amber Belgian beers, just picked up from Lidl that afternoon, this time followed by red Martini, which took us back to our teenage years, although I think that would have been the white variety, or perhaps Cinzano.

In the morning, we were initially woken by a large mobile crane, parked 2 inches behind us, which had come to replace/remove the sails on the adjacent windmill. The police also arrived to assist with the required manoeuvring in this limited parking area. We were expecting to be given our marching orders, but in fact they just asked if J&J would mind moving next to us, and all was very relaxed and pleasant.

During the rest of our time up there, there was a constant stream of large coaches, each in turn mostly dispensing Japanese tourists.

After morning coffee and croissants at J&J’s, we continued to put the world to rights as we put off the time we had to say our goodbyes as they headed West and us South.

So after the necessary 4-person selfies, if that makes sense, we went our separate ways. We now find ourselves at the Park4night (Daimiel) an hour’s drive away in the Parque Nacional de las Tablas de Daimiel, well known for its marshlands and wild birds.

*** Just to mention that our blogs tend to be a couple of weeks behind reality, as we’re always in catch-up mode ***