Comillas - We have lift off!

The part finally arrived, and somehow Tracy managed to painstakingly piece together all the wiring to get the electricity functioning again (well, the heater doesn't work, but we definitely don't need that at the moment).

We'd definitely recommend Comillas to anyone who wants to spend a week waiting for a spare part for their injured campervan.

Trip 2 from Comillas - San Vincente de la Barquera

By now, we were struggling for things to do while we waited for the replacement part to arrive at the campsite. So, we caught the bus to this little fishing town, and were pleasantly surprised to find another interesting place to visit.

The town is on the Camino de Santiago, so we passed lots of pilgrims along the way, and we then joined them on the climb up to the castle and the church on the hill above town, to enjoy the fantastic views of the estuary and green countryside below us.

Comillas - El Palacio de Sobrellano

Once you've decided that you want to become a Marquis, you naturally need an impressive old stately home to live in to impress your new Royal chums.

So, you build yourself a haunted-house-a-like Neo-Gothic pile on the hill overlooking the town to remind everyone how important you are. This was a bit of a nouveau riche attempt to buy some class with its over-the-top Gothic austerity, but it was interesting to see how the other half lived in the 19th century.

Trip 1 from Comillas - Santillana del Mar

From Comillas, we took the bus to this wonderfully preserved little medieval village – for some reason, it rolled off the tongue really well, if you said it to the tune of bom-tiddly-bom-bom, bom-bom (if that doesn't make sense, I'll gladly sing it to you next time I see you).

The town is set in the middle of some beautifully green Cantabrian countryside, and was built around a shrine to Saint Juliana – a Roman saint who supposedly captured the devil himself, there's lots of faded carvings of Juliana proudly leading the goat-like devil round on a chain. We explored the basilica with its Romanesque cloister, and wandered around the medieval streets, before having a surprisingly cheap Menu del Dia for lunch – they include a flagon of vaguely drinkable wine with each meal.

Comillas - Wardrobe Malfunctions on the Beach

Most of the holidaymakers who come to Comillas ignore all this Modernista architecture and spend their time sunning themselves on the glorious beach and getting bounced around in the waves.

We ignored the sunbathing and went straight for the waves – being too mean to buy any body boards, we improvised with cheap lilos and rode the pounding surf. A wave was judged to be a good one, if it managed to pull down Anita's by now de-elasticated bikini top and bottoms, and treat the astonished sunbathers to a full moon in the day time.

Comillas - El Capricho de Gaudi

This was our favourite building in Comillas, a summer home designed when Gaudi was just 31. Although his buildings definitely got weirder and wackier the older he got, this one had a few of his trademark touches – it has a bit of a fairy-tale/Hansel and Gretel look to it, covered with lots of colourful ceramics, and featuring unconventional shapes and curves, and innovative design feature.

Comillas - El Universidad Pontificial

The Marquis wasn't content with impressing the Spanish King and the local people, he also wanted to impress God, so he built a huge seminary the size of a royal palace overlooking the sea.

More Mondernista architects from Barcelona were summoned to design another hugely impressive, but again over-the-top monument to his wealth. The opulent interior was designed by Montaner, and it must have seemed a strangely palatial environment to learn about God for the young seminarians who'd just taken a vow of poverty.