Stopover at Santander??? (1 Viewer)

[Malcolm Bolt]

I am due to catch the 10.00 10 March ferry from Santander to Portsmouth and want to stay close the night before.

Does anyone know if it is OK to stay in the ferry port? Local talk here in Oliva says not because that dock is locked up overnight.

Are there any good spots nearby to pull in?

 

[billkce]

Hi

Its my understanding that you can stay on the ferry car park / queue in the port. They allow travellers catching the early ferries to stay overnight. I'm not sure when the gates shut.

Friends of ours did this in early Jan. I will check with them again & re-post.

 

[billkce]

Hi

Disregard my previous.oh: Spoke to friends & herewith their reply. More to follow when received.

'Yes we did stay in Santander but we all got booted off the docks even after all of us had checked with the ferry company to confirm it was ok???????
Had to go to a local racing stadium but to be honest it was fab! Bar within
15m and fairly quiet - very good other option. ':thumb:

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[vwalan]

hi, santander can be very awkward . we used tostop at playa de magdelina along the quay and turn right down by the museum but that got signed and police move you on. sometimes you can carry on around keeping the sea on your right ,there is a sports ground abit further round with a car park as said sometimes thats ok. another place is on the industrial estates out by the airport.
others stay at the big shell garage between torrelavaga and santander . its a truck stop can be noisy.
we head out to tagle a beach by souances the carpark is a slope but there is a flat bit oposite the picnic area or half way down the slope i can just about cope .
another area people park is around the back of aldi in torrelavago . again its used by trucks . its on the drag through the town near a big daf garage ,theres a lidl ,aldi . dia ,carrefore all in close area . we use it for stocking up before coming home. allow half hour or so to get into santander. also up the road from the aldi under the main road into the country is a railway station sierra pando we use that as well.
we use san vicante de la barquera for the vets so have been hanging around that area for awhile each time we come home. torrelavago is ok not far from the coast if you get up to that area early . i love that coast .

 

[hilldweller]

I am due to catch the 10.00 10 March ferry from Santander to Portsmouth and want to stay close the night before.

Does anyone know if it is OK to stay in the ferry port? Local talk here in Oliva says not because that dock is locked up overnight.

Are there any good spots nearby to pull in?

Look very carefully where you do park, there was a big warning a while ago about no parking anywhere for any reason for campers. The signs were counter intuitive to us Brits. Did not look like no parking of campers but it was. Pictures of clamped MHs were shown.


PS.....

It's all here with a bit of searching....

Link Removed

 

[Malcolm Bolt]

Santander

Thanks for all of the above. Looks like we might give that stadium a try for starters. (any other sugestions welcome though)

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[vwalan]

hi, better to not be in santander . believe me i have been moved from the sports ground . always do it at the most inconveniant time . remember its a game to the guardia . i recommend better o be a few miles out . you get left alone then.

 

[billkce]

I am due to catch the 10.00 10 March ferry from Santander to Portsmouth and want to stay close the night before.

Does anyone know if it is OK to stay in the ferry port? Local talk here in Oliva says not because that dock is locked up overnight.

Are there any good spots nearby to pull in?

Latest from my pals who did this in January,

With regard to staying at the Port there was a problem. We were told by
Brittany Ferries that we could stay, as were a number of others. There was
only a skeleton crew on, at the Port, and the Port Authorities had gone home
as it was the 6/1/12 Bank Holiday, and the whole of Santander was out on the
town partying and the parking bays were all packed, and one of the people in
another RV telephoned England to ask them to try and override the Port
Police, Brittany Ferries were unable to arrange for us to stay as they had
no-one in the Port office working for Brittany ferries that they could talk
to.
I explained to the (very nice) Police man that there was no where else to
stay - I had checked - and used the Bank Holiday as the reason. He took
pity on us and rang someone and arranged for us to stay at the Racing
Convention Centre, on Calle de Racing which is in Santander, about 5 minutes
from the Port. You can get a picture of it on Google Earth as the Police
man did this for me to show us it was big enough to take our van. We then
proceeded to lead a convoy of about 9 motorhomes (one of which was a big
American Rig) around Santander, to which other Motorhomes wandering around
Santander joined, as they realised we had arranged with the Policeman for
somewhere to stay. The place was fine - protected from the road and safe -
and free and there was a lovely little Tapas Bar on site for drinks and
snacks.
I understood from the lady who had spoken to Brittany Ferries that normally
there is no problem with staying at the Port, it was due to it being the
6/1/12 and the Police not having security at the port to protect us.
However, I would definitely ask Brittany Ferries for confirmation of this
for the time you come home. There are some campsites just 30 minutes from
Santander that are open in March that you could use though, it was just we
couldn't in January as everything was closed on the 6/1/12 as it was early
in the season and bank holiday - have you got the Caravan Club book - if not
let me know and I will email you the addresses and telephone numbers (there
are about 5 sites that are near and open all year (except the 6/1/12!)).
If there is a problem the Convention centre at Calle de Racing was excellent
and huge and we would use it again, but I am not sure whether you would need
to get permission and I don't know who from.


HTH

Bill

 

[Malcolm Bolt]

Santander

Looks like this ain't going to be straight forward but at least we now have a few options. As things stand we will probably get there as soon as possible after the last evening boat has sailed and sus things out.

Thanks everybody :thumb:

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[Janele]

I am due to catch the 10.00 10 March ferry from Santander to Portsmouth and want to stay close the night before.

Does anyone know if it is OK to stay in the ferry port? Local talk here in Oliva says not because that dock is locked up overnight.

Are there any good spots nearby to pull in?

Ok - We were in Santander last week to catch the ferry to Portsmouth - we arrived a day early as heavy snow was forecast north of Zaragoza. So had a look around for places to park up for the night. Lots of places to park which seem ideal but after half an hour in one spot the local police approached us and said motorhomes are banned from Santander, no parking, definately no overnighting. I asked about the Real Santander Stadium which had a massive carpark and bus/coach park but they said no motorhomes allowed in Santander!! If we were not with our motorhome and say had gone for a walk along the sea front they said our motorhome would have been towed away!! So be very careful where you park in Santander!!

So we were escorted 6kms out of Santander to an out of town shopping complex and told we would be safe to stay in the carpark overnight. Actually it was quite a good place with a huge Carrefour, Decathlon, Worten, Toys r us, Burger King and Mcdonalds and a few other shops and cheap petrol. The car park was busy until the shops closed at 10pm but after that there was silence.

Coordinates for the shopping complex are:

N43 degrees 27' 24"
W3 degrees 51' 46"

Calle de Julio Jaurena
Santander

 

[marrod23]

If you want to be safe theres a nice little campsite open all year at a place called Somo just down the road on the way to Bilboa cheers Rod

 

[Brightspark]

Hi there, this thread is of great interest as we are due to catch the 10am ferry on the 25th Feb. Can anyone advise is this out of town shopping ctr good for rv's? any height restriction getting into the car parks? & is there plenty of turning space with a trailer? Any advice would help. Thanks:thumb:

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[Janele]

Hi there, this thread is of great interest as we are due to catch the 10am ferry on the 25th Feb. Can anyone advise is this out of town shopping ctr good for rv's? any height restriction getting into the car parks? & is there plenty of turning space with a trailer? Any advice would help. Thanks:thumb:

Hello Brightspark
Yes there is plenty of room to turn around and no height barriers as long as you go into the Carrefour carpark which is the largest carpark where the police told us it was ok to park and was safe.

 

[Malcolm Bolt]

Santander stopover

Thank's for all that information.

It's a shame they just don't want us to spend our money in Santander do they. oh:

Well it looks like the multinationals will get our custom. Carrefour usually have a decent cafe in France - hope it's the same in that branch. We try to avoid coocking on our last night away.

 

[Chris]

We try to avoid coocking on our last night away.

We try to avoid cooking. Full stop

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