NOVEMBER in the Sierra Nevada. This camino runs from the rio Guadalfeo to Orgiva. It???s a back lane from a river to the centre of a small town. It is steep and long. Cars can be a problem. Goats can too . . .
There are places where men have patched the camino with concrete, but other men and animals have left their marks before the concrete has set. Men tread in wet concrete by accident because they know what a pain concreting can be. Cats and dogs do it because they seek immortality.
The pomegranates are at their ripest in November. The name pomegranate means Apple of Granada ??? which is the city on the other side of the mountains. Yesterday I bought two collarless shirts there for ten euros each. I would imagine the shirts with collars cost more ??? but I don???t know this for certain. That’s just me thinking logically.
Oranges are just beginning to ripen and drop off the trees. People drive over them ??? and pomegranates too. And olives and almonds and sweet chestnuts.
This morning the Sierra Nevada ??? the highest mountain range in Spain ??? is cloaked in dark clouds.
Glancing down the camino, Sierra de Lujar is bathed in sunshine.
Arriving in Orgiva we refresh ourselves with beer.
And a friendly chap in Molino???s provides us with tapas.
While a chap on a guitar outside another bar in Plaza Andalucia plays Concierto de Aranjuez very deftly indeed.
Then we wander back down the camino as the moon climbs above Lujar and the sun sets the sky on fire.
That???s the first day over. I think I???ll climb some mountains while I???m here.
Nice report and good photos. An area I don’t know too well.
Hi Richard. It’s a corner of Andalucia we’ve visited several times. Very handy for the mountains and the coast.
Cheers, Alen
You’ve outdone yourself with your pictures, Alen. What a beautiful depiction of your trip on the Camino. I look forward to more stories from ‘The Porch’ :laugh:
All the best!
Hanna
Hej Hanna. Thank you for that. You will note that Spain’s sky is as blue as Denmark’s. Not as warm though, I bet.
Cheers, Alen
A cold beer and tapas after a nice walk in the sunshine – sounds idyllic.
It beats a can of Coke and a Gregg’s pasty in Darlington town centre on a cold November afternoon. By a country mile.
Cheers, Alen
How can you bear to come back to freezing, dull and gloomy England after being over there at the start of winter? I’d find that really hard!
Never knew that about pomegranate but it makes complete sense…
Blinding sunset photo at the end – I’ve only really seen one decent sunset over here this year.
Carol.
I can’t bear to be back in freezing, dull and gloomy England. That’s the simple answer to that one, Carol.
We had a few blazing sunsets over there ??? one in a rainstorm when a heavily overcast sky was all pink underneath. I don’t know how that works.
Cheers, Alen
Actually, I did see something similar a couple of nights ago. It was a very gloomy day with more or less total cloud cover, except just at the horizon. When it got dark, the whole of the underneath of the cloud layer went bright pink for about quarter of an hour. I was coming back from a walk and walking towards it so got to watch it – would have been too dark for me to get a photo though (not that I had my camera)…
That sounds plausible. Perhaps, where I was in the mountains, the cloud layer ended down at the coast and the sun had just dipped beneath it. It was pretty impressive. Bright pink clouds and heavy rain.
Wow! It all looks lovely, very warm, sunny and agreeable! That looks to be a dangerous number of goats, though – did you turn and run?!
Ha ha. They are herded down the camino in the morning to the river and back again in the late afternoon, grazing all the way. They are quite harmless though a bit noisy and smelly. It’s a great job though, goat herding. All you need is a dog and the rest of the day is yours. Can’t imagine it pays much, though.
Cheers, Alen
Hmm, well if all else fails I will try goat herding. But I am told it’s quite lonely! :D
If you had a really well trained dog,or goats for that matter,you wouldn`t have to work at all.Maybe just a quick head count on their return each afternoon :)
I’m working on that, Alex. What’s “come bye, lad” in Spanish?