Day 26 & 27. Sunday 12th & Monday 13th May,
Parma to Rocchette, Italy
Waking to another warm morning in Parma, we decided to head on to the coast and enjoy some beach time before the weather changes for a few days.
Supplies were purchased in the Lidl next to the Sosta and then we were on our way. Once again on the motorway. As it was Sunday we didn’t encounter many HGV’s on the road. There were lots parked in the service areas waiting out the weekend 
.
We passed some beautiful hill villages – how anyone ever thought it was a good idea to start a town/village up in these seemingly remote areas is beyond me – but there are so many, we can only think it all started as a means of survival.
There are so many tunnels and viaducts on this section that we lost count. Some roads are so high up you get dizzy looking at the view, and even though you may be on top of the world, there is always a hill village higher 
.
As we neared the coast a range of mountains came into view. Called the Apuan Alps. The more we looked at them, the more they looked unreal, like they had been created for a movie or similar. They were really craggy, lots of dramatic points on the horizon.
Driving past them we realised that they were being quarried for marble, so we called them Marble mountains 
. It appeared we were in the centre of the Italian marble industry, factories and huge cranes – similar to the Harland and Wolf ones in Belfast – everywhere, piles of cut marble line up in the yards waiting to be shipped.
Eventually we neared Grossetto and chose one of a few campsites along the Mediterranean coast in Rocchette. Most of the campsites on this coast, listed on P4N and such, comment on the mosquito problem. Though I am a gourmet supper to the blighters, we had no choice but to stop!
We pitched up at a very big holiday village called Camping Village Baia Azzurra.
There’s a couple of swimming pools, outside sports courts, entertainment venue, restaurant, bar and shop. We don’t normally choose these big sites but just wanted to be close to the sea.
After we settled the van we took a late afternoon stroll to the dog friendly beach, approx 1km walk from the site. Meg obviously loved it. She went in the water retrieving sticks and dug big holes in the sand . We sat and watched the sun going down before walking back.
By the time we sat down to dinner we had both been bitten by the biggest mozzies we’ve seen in a long time. I even got bites through my long sleeves and long trousers 
.
Out came all the anti Mozzie supplies and bite cream.
We did manage to enjoy our first BBQ in about 3 years though. We tried a small Korean BBQ on the suitcase gas burner. It worked a treat and cooked our shop-bought kebabs to perfection – well, with Gareth’s help, of course .
Luckily, all of our 
deterrents worked, meaning we had a lovely night’s kip free from kamikaze buzzing in the van .
Monday 13th May
This morning was a bit chilly if I do say so myself. I was rudely awoken by our pesky dog at 5.30am. I thought she needed to go to the loo but she didn’t, she just wanted to get up with us, so I told her off and went back to bed, only for her to do exactly the same thing again an hour later! This time I stayed up, she huffed off back to her own bed while I made a cup of tea.
As it was nice and quiet on site I put on a long sleeved top, took my cuppa and my kindle outside. Would you believe that the were still there waiting for me, and managed to get the only part of me still exposed, so I now have a very itchy foot too .
I took Meg for her morning walk, out of the site and up to the end of the road where there is another holiday park. Most of the beach on this section is private and belongs to either restaurant bars or holiday/campsites.
Looking out across the bay you could see the mist sitting on the water, beautiful. They seem to be letting verges go wild here too, so pretty with a mixture of poppies and yellow weeds 
.
On the way back Meg took a fancy to a stick and carried it for a long while – very unusual for her but soooo cute.
Just after she eventually dropped it, a pigeon took off and made her jump out of her skin 
. Scaredy cat Meg ran straight into the road, taking my arm out of its socket with her! Thankfully, there were no cars coming .
Back at the van, I cooked a full English breakfast, with bacon we’d had in the freezer from the UK .
Gareth had to do a bit of work this morning so I did some washing and tidying. After lunch we got packed up and headed down to the beach again. The temperature was perfect for us, a cool breeze was blowing on the beach too.
Book reading and dog entertaining was the order of the day making the afternoon very pleasant indeed.
Back at the van we had pizza takeout from the on-site restaurant, a very lazy but tasty dinner 
.
Off again tomorrow hoping to get closer to Sicily and hoping for not too many at our next stop 
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