A Tower, A Gun Battery & Seaside City

January 29^th, 2026

I woke up to strong winds yesterday in the Carrefour parking lot in Alcazar de San Juan, strong enough that I questioned whether I should drive Octi on the highway as the van gets blown around in the wind.  The winds backed off a bit, so I decided to give it a go in the early afternoon.  Tired from the last three days of wandering around Toledo and Madrid, I planned on just driving closer to the coast.

The wind turbines were moving a lot faster than normal!

I ended up about 45 minutes from the coast and pulled into a place that I’d found on my camping app that looked decent.  I was greeted by an English couple in their late 50s who had been running a bed & breakfast for the last 20 years and were morphing the place into a campground as they figured there was less maintenance.  Turns out that I was one of their first guests that wasn’t family, friend or had stayed in the B&B.  I was the only one camping there that evening which made for a nice quiet evening.

Sunset at Casa Perez Camper Park.

The wind had calmed down by the morning, but it was a little cloudier.

In the morning, my plan was to check out a viewpoint that had an old tower called Torre Santa Elena near a small fishing village called La Azohía followed by visiting an old gun battery called Batería de Castillitos.  I figured these two stops would take maybe an hour or two…well, I got that a bit wrong.

Can you see the sea?

Driving through sleepy La Azohía...the only people I saw seemed to be seniors on e-bikes.

It was a lovely spot.

I had parked Octi in a little pullout, part way up the hill, and then walked 400 meters to the tower.

Torre Santa Elena...or in English, Saint Elena Tower.

The smooth bit that you see running from the coast from left to right are greenhouses...more on that in a minute.

The view from the tower.  You couldn't go into it, just up the spiral staircase beside it.

It was a gorgeous day.

Can you make out the football (soccer) nets by the ocean?  What a great place to play!

By the beach in La Azohía.

Checking out the petanque (bocce) court by the beach.

Not sure what they are growing in the greenhouses...but there were a lot of them!

After the viewpoint, I had to backtrack about 3-4 kilometres and then take a road towards my next stop.  The road passed through a flat area surrounded by hills on all sides.  As it started to approach one of the hills near the sea, an old man walking the dog flagged me down as I was crawling over a speedbump.  With a German accent, he mentioned that the road ahead was closed to motorhomes.  At first, I thought he meant that there was construction but just 50 meters ahead there was a road sign stating that campers and trucks were prohibited due to the road being narrow.  I figured that I wasn’t technically a motorhome, and yes, Octi is longer than a normal car, but I decided to go for it.

Driving the windy, narrow road...hoping I hadn't made a mistake.

Looking back from the valley I came from.

What a view!

The road was newly paved and it was narrow in some sections, but in general it wasn’t bad.  I met a few cars coming the other way, but there was no problem passing by each other.  There were a couple of tiny pull outs, so I had to get a pic with Octi in it.

Gorgeous!

About 7-8 kilometres later, I made it to the tiny, two-tiered parking lot.  The lower level was full, so I drove up a curved, stone road which was only about two to three times the length of Octi and did more than a 90-degree turn into a small rectangular area with the space for about 10 vehicles.  It was steep enough that the rear wheels of the van started to spin when I was halfway up.  I stopped, backed up a bit on the curve, and took a bit more of a run at it.  The tires skidded again, but my momentum got me up there.  All the while, a carload of older French tourists got to watch the action.  They were friendly and one of them guided me into an empty spot, which was furthest from the ramp and at an angle.  It was perfect for Octi…provided no one ended up parking behind me, otherwise it was going to be a challenge getting the van out and turning it around.  Oh well, worry about that later, after the visit.

The Batería de Castillitos or “Castle Battery” were about 600 meters from the parking lot, but even from that distance, I could see one of its massive guns.  The battery was built and armed between 1933 and 1936 and it was equipped with two Vickers-Armstrong 381 15-inch guns which were originally designed for a Brazilian battleship, whose purchase was cancelled.  These guns, weighing 97 tons, could fire a 885 kilogram shell a stunning 35 kilometres!

For some reason, even though this was built in the 1930s, they decided to make it look like a medieval castle.

It wasn't until I researched the place more for this posting that I read that the castle was built in the 1930s...so no wonder I thought it looked fake, or that it was made for an amusement park as I commented in this video.

I feel like an investor could turn this place into a medieval dinner and a show kind of venue.

Again, I thought it was originally a castle from a while back, so I am pointing out the flaw of the spiral staircase going the wrong way, but that didn't really matter since it was made in the 1930s and the soldiers would unlikely have to defend the place with swords in a siege.

I couldn't stop enjoying the view.

This gun is massive.  Crazy to think that it was meant to put on a battleship!

Anyone seen "Dr. Strangelove"?  That's what I was trying to emulate.

At the end of the point, on the left, is the Jorel Battery, which has smaller guns.  I decided to walk there to take a look.

These guns were rusted out.

A modern radar station...the only active item left on this point.

An old lookout.

Inside the lookout.

I walked back to the main battery, and decided to check out the other big gun, even though it's identical to the first one. 

Note the little lookout on the left.

The view of the gun from the lookout.

Looking over to the other gun and lookout (on the right of the gun).

On my way back to the van, I noticed this "derailed centipede train".

Still enjoying the view as I drive back from the peninsula.

I thoroughly enjoyed checking out the battery with its bonus castle.  Since I spent longer than expected on my visit, and the drive to and from the battery was slow (but beautiful), it was now around 3 pm.  There was no way I was going to make it to my originally planned campsite, so I changed my plans.  First, I needed a grocery store to buy some food for lunch so I headed to a Lidl (which seems to be my favourite store on this trip) in Cartagena, a city of 220,000.

After yet another ham, cheese and pickled onion baguette sandwich (my staple), I was recharged enough to do a brief foray into Cartagena to have a gander at the waterfront.  The parking lot for the local football team, FC Cartagena, allows motorhomes to stay there when there is no game scheduled.  I didn’t plan on staying overnight there as I figured there’d be a fair amount of city noise, but it was perfect to park for an hour or two and go for a walk.

The football stadium.

A lovely pedestrian street leading to the oceanfront.

Cartagena does have some lovely historic buildings.

Someone's fancy yacht in the shipyard.

Now that's a superyacht.

Heading to the harbour.

This was a massive statue in the inner harbour...of a naked man!  (and yes, it was all anatomically correct...I had to look!)  Look at the size compared to the dark brown benches to the right of it.

Nice catamaran.

That big, wide mast caught my attention...I had to go check it out.

It looks like a very expensive racing catamaran.

I started to head back, and walked through this awesomely painted tunnel.

This is one of the local attractions, a lookout tower.  It was closed due to high winds.

These looked to be some kind of meringue desserts...

...but look at the size of this thing!

Not sure if someone stole the head of this statue...or it was meant to be like that.

A little square I stumbled upon.

With some massive banyan trees.

Jamon anyone?

Back at Octi, I found a spot on my camping app just 15 minutes outside of the city which was an urban development that stopped for some reason, so there were roads and sidewalks, but no houses.  It made for flat terrain and a very quiet environment…perfect for the end of a busy day.

I drove past this roundabout with a submarine, and the logo for the football club has a submarine on it, so I had to do a little research.  Isaac Peral built Spain's first submarine in 1888 and the "Peral" was the first submarine to be powered by electric batteries!

There are the concrete skeletons of a few buildings to the right of Octi in the background...I wonder why the project has stopped.