On Monday we packed up the car and camper, said goodbye to the beautiful Algarve and crossed our fingers.

It still wasn’t clear if we would be able to enter Spain (Andalucia, specifically). It took about an hour to get to the border where we found out the border is in fact closed to tourists (it would have been no problem to cross the border if we were heading home to Germany but not to stay in Spain). Luckily I was able to dust off my rusty Spanish and convince border control to let us through. He felt bad that we had already paid for our rental house and that we had four kids in the car, so he let us go through! We were sooooo grateful! And relieved. We were still a bit worried we would get stopped along the way, but we arrived with no trouble.

The house we have rented is very spacious (each girl has her own room!), has a (cold) pool, hot tub and ocean view. The beach is a 2 minute walk from the house (though not the cleanest, so we will have to look around and see if there is a nicer one nearby). More places are open than in Portugal, so the girls and I have been eager to get out of the house a bit. Yesterday Hannah and I had a date at a department store where we picked up some things we “needed”, including treats at Starbucks. Today Olivia, Luisa and I went! Charlotte is very much a homebody so was happy to stay home, bake a cake and chat with her best friend. Hopefully things will stay open and we will be able to explore over the next few weeks.