Sant Carles de Rápita/ Alcanar:

Sant Carles de Rápita/ Alcanar:

The Experience:

We had one day leeway between Alicante and Barcelona. So we decided that we would stop somewhere between the two places for the night. We had asked our new friends we had made in Allicante for a recommendation as to where to stay. We did not want to stay in Valencia because we were worried that the traffic would be too hard for my husband to handle (remember, we were driving at this point). We wanted some place quiet, where we could see the sunrise over the sea the next morning, but not be tempted to stay longer than just the morning.

Our friends recommended that we stop somewhere near the Delta de I’Ebre, the delta of the I’Ebre River. We took this to heart and found what looked to be a nice resort in Sant Carles de Rápita, not far from this location. I was unable to find the resort in our GPS, which had not been updated in four years. So, I typed in what I thought was the address.

The GPS, took us to Alcanar, a tiny fishing village with narrow one way roads. By this time my husband really had to use the restroom. There were just residential houses and flats where the GPS lead us to. No restaurants, no hotel. We saw someone on the streets, she didn’t speak English, but she conveyed to us that there were no hotels there.

By this time my husband was cursing me. We drove around for a little while until we finally found one of two restaurants that were open (and right next to each other). It was a shwarma place. My husband raced in as fast as he could.

Now you have to keep in mind half the people in Spain are fairly dark. Anyway, in very broken Spanish Arvind ordered: “Dos Shwarmas, Uno Carne, Uno Pollo” (Two Shwarmas, one meat, one chicken). And then asked “¿Baño?” (Bathroom?).

The man at the counter gave my spouse a little smirk, and without saying a word pointed to the restroom. It was obvious that he was making fun of us in his head. Once my husband was in the bathroom, I asked the man if he spoke English. It turned out the man was British of Pakistani descent. We probably ran into the only person in town who spoke better English than Spanish.

Food:
In Spain there are Shwarma places on almost every corner. We had not tried it until we came to Alcanar. The flat bread was homemade, and the juice from the meat soaked the bread from the inside. I don’t think I have ever had a better Shwarma.

The Hotel:

The owner of the Shwarma stand did not know where our hotel was, but he was able to point us in the direction of a town that had hotels. We started towards Sant Carles de Rápita, took what we thought might have been a wrong turn, and low and behold, the first hotel we came to was Carlos

III.

It was off season, and the place was nearly empty. I think there were only five guests there. It was night. We had purchased a bottle of wine earlier in Alicante, so we sat in the empty bar that overlooked the beach, an empty pool and the Sea, and drank our wine. It was the first night that we did not go out. It was beautiful and we were quite content.

My spouse set the alarm early so that we could see the sunrise. As it turned out, it was too early, and we had wait a few more hours for the sun to actually show. We got some great pictures of the sunrise and were quite content with our stay.

Carlos III would have been a really nice place to visit in the Spring or Summer, when one could have gone swimming. There was a child care facility there, along with a bar and restaurant. The rooms were simple and clean, with a great view of the sea.

The only bad thing was that there was a cement plant obstructing part of the view nearby. It was actually pretty at night when the factory was lit up, but in the morning it was a slight eye soar. I asked the receptionist about it the next morning. It turns out that the cement factory was built after Carlos III, and the owners and staff of the resort were quite upset when it was built by a Mexican Company.