We are delighted to share this first in a series of travalogues written by Sir Jeremy Blackham KCB, former Royal Navy officer who served as Deputy Commander-in-Chief Fleet, as he journeys through the Iberian penninsula. Jeremy speaks multiple languages with a particular fascination for the spanish dialects and is a keen supporter of languages and classics at Bradfield;

'The Bay of Biscay was unusually calm when I left Portsmouth on Sunday afternoon.  It can indeed be so, although less in the autumn than in summer.  This time there was not a breath of wind during the 36 hour voyage, the sea was flat, and it is mostly very misty with visibility less than a mile.  It will be a surprise if it is not stirred up by El Nino by my return trip on 31 October!

For a change I arrived at Bilboa instead of Santander.  Whereas Santander is an elegant town, with fine buildings and beaches and the port in the middle of the town, Bilbao's port is well outside the town and is busy, bustling and industrial.  The network of roads around the town, leading away to the south is daunting and challenging, much expanded since my last visit to Bilbao some thirty years ago, and difficult to navigate.  The traffic has grown exponentially and takes no prisoners - Spaniards are good reivers generally but do not respect the hesitancy and uncertainty which comes from getting used to spaghetti junctions where you have to get re-accustomed to driving on the right, and it was the morning rush hour! 

So, it was a relief to survive the town and set off into the wonderfully green and hilly country south of Bilbao en route for Santo Domingo de la Calzada, one of my favourite small towns, and a popular stop on the popular Camino de Santiago.  It's wonderful to be in Spain again.  It is so open and spacious, more so than any other country I know, so steeped in history from an extraordinary range of cultures - prehistoric, Celtic-Iberian, Carthaginian, Roman, Visigothic, Islamic (for over 600 years) and Spanish and of languages.  The countryside is so rural and always there are mountains in the distance on every side.  It's lovely to hear and speal Spanish again after nearly a year away.  And to be reminded of the passion for cleanliness.  Here bins are cleared daily, main streets in towns washed almost every night, and you never see any litter - by comparison English towns. and especially London are very grubby and less cared for.  Spaniards are always keen to tell you about their towns and are proud of where they live.  And eating is so cheap.  I bought a couple of coffees today for 3 euros (about £1,40 each).  When I told the young lady behind the bar that in England it would have cost more like 7 or 8 euros, she looked shocked and rushed out to tell her girlfriends who were having coffee outside.  They looked equally astonished and looked at me with great sympathy!

En route to Santo Domingo, a lovely ancient small town on the banks of the Rio Oja, which is one of my favourite places, I stopped in Haro, the capital of the Rioja wine region.  Haro is an old, once walled, town, perched on a rocky eminence above the River Ebro, near where the Ebro is joined by the very small Rio Oja.  It seems odd that so small a river should give its name to one of the great wine regions of the world.  Haro is full of wind merchants, bodegas and bars, and is surrounded by vineyards (including come of the great names of Rioja - Muga, Cune, Cerro Anon etc and lives and breathes wine - but I decided to leave that for another day and came on to Santo Domingo, first visited well over 30 years ago and most recently 2 years ago, sitting beside the Rio Oja, and right astride the Camino, with a constant stream of pilgrims passing through.  They are of all ages, but at this time of year mainly elderly folk, some even walking less than easily.  But I am afraid I don't feel guilty.'