Wednesday 5th March 2008

With all of the necessary support services in place and Jane's parents coping well, we were able to resume the Odyssey. We caught a very early flight that involved taking a taxi to Bristol Airport at 04:00 this morning. Once again, the flight went very well, landing in Malaga 15 minutes early at 10:00. This gave us more time to explore Malaga and have a good lunch before we caught the 15:30 bus direct to Orgiva. We explored parts on the old town that were not on the official trails and were particularly impressed by the Inglesia de Los Martires (Church of the Martyrs) where we found all of the statues dressed in dark clothes for Lent. Some of the statues were mounted on plinths that would have large wooden poles attached to them so that they could be carried through the streets in a procession. We assumed that this would happen at Easter but we have subsequently discovered that the Spanish have processions during Lent.
The bus journey back to Orgiva was half an hour quicker than on the way out and the driver kindly dropped us off close top the campsite, saving us a long walk. This meant that we arrived back at 18:30, before it was dark. As we approached Henrietta the dying sun was giving an orange glow to the small clouds in the deep blue sky and we heard the Little Owl start its call as it hunted over the fields. It felt like coming home.
All was in order in Henrietta and, after clearing the fridge of slightly decaying food and throwing the mouldy apple cake that we forgot to take with us, we settled down to tea.
Photos: Inglesia de Los Martires; Statue of Christ ready for the procession; Body of Christ with statue of Mary in the background.