Saturday 8th March 2008

We really wanted to stay at Camping Orgiva much longer. This is definitely the best campsite that we have stayed on – friendly, lovely views, lots of options for walks from the site, easy access into a town, excellent showers, good bar and restaurant, reasonably priced especially for longer stays. Highly recommended.
However we have an appointment in Rome at Easter and must move on. We will return to the area at some time to see Ronda and Granada and to do more walking in the Alpajuras. We will certainly use Camping Orgiva as a base then and take advantage of the additional 10% discount for returning customers!
The sat nav wanted to take through Granada and to the north of the Alpajuras but we wanted to see more of the mountains. Our destination was another National Park, Sierra Espuna, about 5 hours driving to the north east. We guessed that the road would not be very good but were pleasantly surprised to find that the N348 had been recently improved and was a very good road. It was another glorious day of blue skies and the air was crystal clear. The views were fantastic – looking across the valley, we could see the snow-covered peaks of the Sierra Navada and their were fantastic views down the valley with its white-washed villages clinging to the sides of the mountains. I would have loved to taken some photographs but there were no places to pull in on the road, so you will just have to image the pictures.
They were still making improvements to the road, adding many bridges to cut off narrow bendy sections and this entailed us driving over temporary surfaces and dirt tracks. Later it became obvious that the road improvements were by no means complete and we travelled for miles on dirt tracks alongside sections of partially-built new road. We then travelled on the old road – narrow, undulating and poorly maintained and we realised what an improvement the new road was! We were soon back on another section on the new road and continued on it until we joined major roads near Almeria. Once the whole of the N348 has been upgraded, it will open up the centre of the Alpajuras, which has its benefits and disadvantages for the inhabitants.
The scenery changed considerably as we approached Almeria with hundreds of rounded cone-shaped low hills. On the road towards Murcia there was a wild-west feel to the view with deep ravines in loose sandy rock and vehicles driving on the dirt roads created huge dust clouds – no a place to be on a blazing-hot, windy Summer's day!
Shortly after Lorca, at a town called Alhama, we started the climb up into the Sierra Espuna. The roads became steep, narrow and windy as we approached the village of El Berro where the campsite was located. Conveniently, a large Dutch motorhome was in front of us as we wound our way through the narrow streets, so they cleared the cars out of our path! The campsite is sited on a terraced hill with lovely views over the village and the National Park. As we had hoped, there are walks directly from the site and we were provided with photocopied details of 5 walks drawn up by a previous British visitor. To make us feel really at home, the site has free Wifi Internet access.
Photos: View from the pitch at Sierra Espuna Camping at El Berro.

Friday 7th March 2008

We wanted a relaxing day today, so the morning was spent reading. Jane finished Chris Stewart's 'Driving Over Lemons' and read a third of his next book 'A Parrot in the Pepper Tree'. She will have to slow down or she will run out of books before we return home next!
In the afternoon I took a walk into Orgiva and found that the main street was again being filled with firecrackers. Today is a holiday, as I discovered when I attempted to buy some supplies – all of the shops were closed. Tonight the statue of Christ from the main church will be paraded through the town and, it appears, there will be more fireworks.
When I returned I got out the laptop, determined to get the blog up to date whilst we still have Wifi access. We discussed going into town for the parade at 18:00 but decided that we weren't that keen to experience more firecrackers, so we decided to stay in.
The firecrackers went off at 17:30 but were relatively brief compared to yesterday. However, that was just the start and they continued sporadically until well after midnight. After sunset they had 'proper' fireworks i.e. coloured rockets and we were able to see these from the campsite.
Photos: In the three weeks that we were away, the furrowed field had changed into a field of potatoes - Spring has arrived; Orgiva's main street prepared for World War III.

Thursday 6th March 2008

Thursday is market day in Orgiva and, after a late start, we made our way into the town. When we got to the main street, we found it closed by barriers and the road full of stands with strings of firecrackers attached. Asking a passing local, we found out that it was the festival of 'El Christos'(?) and they would be letting off the firecrackers at midday. We wandered around the town and bought some essential supplies and made sure that we were back in the main street by 12:00. Sure enough, as soon as the church service finished, the firecrackers were set off. We were standing in a doorway just above the firecrackers at, what we thought, was a safe distance. The firecrackers were very loud but they had also included a large number of very big ones that were absolutely deafening. The noise was concentrated by the high buildings and the echoes amplified the effect. Everyone around us had their hands over their ears but it was still deafening. Jane evacuated our position but, being a man, I was determined to see it out. And then the smoke hit – it was choking and blinding – we all evacuated! We were all relieved when the firecrackers finished we breathed a sigh of relief but then the rockets started with more rapid-fire deafening bangs directly overhead. Long canes and lumps of plastic were falling all around us. It was totally ridiculous and very Spanish - far too loud and the smoke meant that nobody could see anything – but we had certainly experienced some local culture.
We returned to the campsite and barbecued some pork cutlets and intended to have a quiet afternoon reading before we were distracted. Our neighbours Marie and Rex invited us for a drink and we explained the mystery of the unoccupied motorhome – they thought that there might be a dead body in Henrietta given that there was no sign of life. We were shortly joined by Marie and Rex's neighbours, Andy and Laura and a very pleasant afternoon followed. Marie told us about http://www.motorhomefun.co.uk/ and we signed up to this very good free site later in the evening.
Photos: The firecrackers start with lots of spectators; I missed the shot of people, hands clamped over their ears, bent nearly double, running away but here is one as the smoke approached. Within a minute of taking this, the smoke engulfed me and I felt my way up the street with the other hand on my ear. Fortunately, I managed to find Jane sheltering in an almost smoke-free area.

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.

Thursday 14th February 2008

The bus for Malaga left Orgiva at 08:30, so it was an early start for the 20 minute walk into the town. It was a three and a half hour journey to Malaga, the first part of which was through the Alpajuras and, although rather windy causing problems for some of the more sensitive locals (they provided sick bags!) it was very pretty. The journey along the coast was not as interesting – a succession of resorts with high-rise, densely packed apartment blocks. We arrived in Malaga at 12:00 and after obtaining a map, we set off on a sightseeing tour of the city. The old town was interesting but was not as well preserved as some others that we have seen. They are obviously attempting now to preserve the historical buildings even when they want to redevelop areas of the centre. We passed an example of this – the facade of a huge building was set on props with scaffolding to support it but the rest of the building had been demolished (see photos). Following two of the town trails shown on the map, we stopped off for an excellent lunch in a side street by the Episcopal Palace. I had the local speciality of Ox Tail Stew, which was very tasty. We visited the impressive cathedral and then walked on through a park to the Malaga Bullring. The building was closed but we walked around the outside and admired the statue to a famous toreador.
Walking back to the bus station we then caught the airport bus and arrived in plenty of time for our flight. After an appalling and very expensive pasta and tomato sauce (how can they make such a mess of such a simple dish?), I vowed never to eat in an airport restaurant again.
The flight left on time and arrived in Bristol 10 minutes early. We were very grateful to our friends Ann and Nick who were there to meet us at such a late hour and it was good to catch up with their news on the way back. We arrived to a lovely warm house (Ann had put on the heating for us) and after a very short time we fell into bed and slept soundly.
Not a very romantic St. Valentine's Day but we were home safe and sound.
Photos: Preserved facade in Malaga; Toreador monument outside the Malaga bullring.

Wednesday 13th February 2008

Today was spent planning our trip back. I walked into Orgiva to the bus company office and found that we could take a bus to Malaga centre at 08:15. This gave us plenty of time to catch an evening Easyjet flight to Bristol in the evening. We booked the flight and prepared for a very long day travelling tomorrow.
We were very happy to leave Henrietta at the site and they were very understanding when we explained the circumstances and the fact that we weren't sure when we would return.
Photos: None.

Tuesday 12th February 2008

Yesterday we had checked the bus times in Orgiva and, on the recommendation some other friendly campers, we took a bus to Pampaneira up in the mountains. There were wonderful views from the bus as we climbed up the winding roads but we were somewhat concerned about our ability to find the track back to Orgiva. Fortunately, there was a tourist information office in Pampaneira where we could ask advice and purchase a good map of the area. There are a number of maps available but most of them look pretty but are totally useless – coloured lines on a plain background with no landmarks marked. It turned out that the track was clearly marked for much of the walk but the map was useful for the latter part.
We were miles from anywhere when we received a phone call from Diane, Jane's parents nextdoor neighbour. Jane's mum was lying on the kitchen floor with paramedics attending to her. She had broken her arm and was about to be taken to hospital. We had no option but to complete the walk and wait for further news from the hospital. Once we arrived back at the campsite, we were able to go onto the Internet and investigate options for flights home. Being relatively close to Malaga, there were quite a few options but we had to work out how to get to Malaga airport. We would have to wait until tomorrow to find out how we could get there by public transport.
Photos: Local wares on display in Pampaneira; View from footpath of Pampaneira (bottom) and Bubion (top); Almond blossom and the view towards Orgiva.