Trekking the Alpujarras

Trekking the Alpujarras was probably the highlight of our trip so far. Over the 12 days and 150km we spent trekking we encountered many different landscapes and some truley beautiful views. The Alpujarras form the southern part of the Sierra Nevada park, which includes the two highest mountains in Spain (Mulhacen and Veleta), both standing at about 3400m. The name Alpujarras comes from Arabic origin and is thought to mean "Sierra of Pastures". It stretches from a village called Ugijar in the east to Lanjaron in the west, a distance of about 80km as the crow flies.

Map of the Alpujarras

 If you read our previous post on workingaway in the Alpujarras you would know that we already did the route from Ugijar to the little village of Yegen where we were based. Therefore we decided not to go back and do it again but carry on from where we left off. We set out from Yegen and headed towards the main village for the section of the Alpujarras we were in, called Mecina Bombaron, which has a huge population of 1200 people! This was in comparison with little Yegen, which was only 300 people.

To get there we headed along a local sendero. Sendero in Spanish means path. There are many of these 'paths' throughout the Alpujarras, the main one that we followed for most of the way was the GR-7. The routes are fairly well signposted although along the way we did get a little lost a few times as occasionally the signs weren't as clear as we would have liked. That first day taking us a fair bit longer than we initially anticipated. We eventually arrived after covering 15km (possibly more) and got some accommodation in an apartment. Accommodation in the Alpujarras is quite convenient if you are going to be trekking as in nearly every village you come across they have some form of accommodation whether it be apartments, pensions or camping. Prices are all very similar as well ranging from 30-50 Euros for a room or apartment, or 10-15 Euros for camping.

Incredible views

 From Mecina Bombaron we headed to Berchules where we stayed for an extra day and did a local sendero; Junta de los Rios (roughly translated as joining or meeting of the rivers). This was a 20km walk that had some lovely views over the river, although again we did end up losing the end of the trail having to turn back without getting to the end of the trail.

The weather throughout our trek through the Alpujarras was great with the exception of one day, the day we went to Juviles. Luckily for us this was just a small 6km stretch of road. It was thoroughly unenjoyable so we were pleased it was only the one day.

Enjoying the nice wind and rain on the way to Juviles

 After that day though things started to brighten up and over the next 3 days we had some of our best walking, covering 27km, passing through Trevelez, Busquitsar and ending up in Portugos. Although one of those days we didn't do any trails. Whilst in Trevelez (the highest village in Spain) we tried some of the famous Trevelez ham. Trevelez ham (Serrano ham) is famous due to it being the best place in the country to air-cure ham due to its altitude giving an ideal cold climate. This is a particular speciality in the Alpujarras.

The famous Trevelez air-cured ham (Delicious I might add)

 From Portugos we then had a 10km hike to a village called Capileira, along the way going through 4 other villages; Atalbeitar, Pitres, Capilerilla and Bubion. We came across a few other trekkers along this route, which we previously had not, highlighting the fact that we were now entering a much more touristy part of the Alpujarras. Capileira was the only other village that we stayed an additional night in to do a local route. This one called La Cebidella (an abandoned village above Capileira). This one had some incredible views down the valley over the villages below it!

Beautiful view over the valley

After leaving Capileira we followed a different trail (GR-240) taking us through Puente Palo (10.5km) then on to Soportujor (a further 10-15km). Arriving very late in the evening we were shown to a lovely apartment where we stayed for the night, our favourite so far and we thought it would be lovely to stay there for a few days but unfortunately this wasn't really an option for us.

Our final two days in the Alpujarras were fairly easy days in comparison to the previous days, going through the villages of Carataunas, Orgiva and then Lanjaron, our finish point! Whilst in Orgiva we camped for the night in what appeared to us an abandoned campsite, only to find in the morning that it was in fact owned and was an expensive 15 Euros for no facilities. After having a bit of an argument with the ower we ended up only paying 10 Euros before going off on our way.

Carmen happy on reaching the end!

On reaching Lanjaron we were both happy and sad, it was good to finally reach the end, but it was also sad that it was the end of seeing all the lovely mountains that we enjoyed walking through so much. We promised ourselves we would try and do some more of this later in Spain (maybe the Camino de Santiago!)

Stay tuned for our next post where we returned to Granada and had our first taste of Semana Santa in Spain (Easter)!

Blood, sweat and some nice views

I am starting to catch up a little bit now with our travels, but still have a way to go, so please be patient with me. (Carmen always said I was slow!) I will just say now though a Happy Easter to everyone as our easter post will be a bit late!

Today was the day we were going to our first workaway. We were both a bit excited and curious of how the work would be and what we would do in our spare time. Our bus left at 8:30 in the morning and we went on a beautiful route through the Sierra Nevada mountains on winding roads with lovely views. We went all the way to a little village called Yegen, passing through several others along the way, which we will have more to say about in another post.

View from the bus

 We arrived in Yegen just after 11:30 and made our way through the village and along a trail just outside the village that took us down the mountainside a bit (we had been told about this in an email from them). We eventually found the house we were looking for after asking for directions at a couple of the other houses along the trail. We eventually got there about 12:30, just in time to have lunch together.

Carmen outside the house

After lunch we were shown around the land and they explained a bit about what we would be helping  them with. After then helping them to water some of the thorn bushes around the vegetable garden we set up our tent and unpacked our bags and got a bit settled before later enjoying supper inside their house in the evening before heading off for an early night.

The hole in the ground before we started

 Our first day of proper work in Yegen was quite a surprise. We started work at 9am and we worked for 5 hours making cement, pickaxing and shovelling before having lunch at the late hour of 2pm; by which time we were both starving. After a very quick lunch we were back out working at 2:30ish watering and pruning olive trees till about 6pm by which time we were both wilting in the hot temperatures and were ready to collapse. Supper was then at 7. We were then chucked out of the house just before 8 as their child Phileas had to go to bed. We promptly fell asleep before 9pm once in our tent feeling exhausted.

Carmen mixing some cement

This was our work schedule pretty much for the whole of the first week, with additional activities like cutting firewood as well. We also met a couple of their friends from Belgium who came to visit and we had lunch with them one day, but didn't get much of a chance to chat with them.

At the end of the first week we decided to head off of the land for the weekend and explore a bit of the villages around as we didn't have a chance to do anything during the first week due to working all day long. We walked via the road to the village of Ugijar (12km) and passed through another little village called Valor along the way. We found a hostal in Ugijar for the night and had a nice menu del dia (menu of the day) in the evening, where Carmen had a vegetable salad, for starter and I had salmorejo (a cold tomato soup with egg in), traditional dish of Andalucia. Then both of us had another traditional local food; habas y huevos for the main course (broad beans and fried eggs), which was absolutely LOVELY! Dessert was fruit pudding, which was very nice as well.

View over Ugijar

 The following day we looked around the village of Ugijar before having a lunch of soup at the same place as the night before, Carmen having the soup I had and me going for a garlic soup this time. We then headed back to Yegen via a different route to the one we took before, it was slightly shorter at 10km, but was more scenic, with lots of beautiful views over the lower mountain areas. We arrived in Yegen and stayed in the Pension in the village for the night as El Clasico was on and we wanted to stay and watch. So we watched in the bar with the locals and had a cerveza and tapas (beer and tapas). Carmen and I were supporting different teams so that made the evening more interesting. I would like to say on here that my team beat Carmen's!

Admiring the view over the mountains

 Our second week of work was much the same as the previous week with the added responsibility of having to dig an area beside the house to make a herb garden as well. We were also helping to make plaster to coat the side of the water deposit that had now had the walls fully constructed. We had exactly the same work schedule in the morning but in the afternoon we took it easier starting at 4 and finshing at 5:30, as we had an extra hard morning. The rest of the week was much the same and we took the afternoons a bit easier as it was supposed to be something that wasn't all about the working, so we had some afternoons where we climbed the surrounding hills and visited the village and just relaxed.

The view from the hill above the house

 We also met during the second week one of their neighbours, an english couple of ladies originally from Manchester who had been living there for 7 years. It was a really nice lunch and we were able to have a good chat with them. We were sad we were not able to have met them earlier.

The plastering was finished on Friday morning and we left on Friday afternoon to head up to the village to stay in the Pension for another night of relaxation. We had another menu del dia with some lovely salmon and pork leg on the bone (gorgeous) before going back to bed for the night.

A certain highlight of the whole stay for us was a certain cat that was living with the couple we stayed with. His proper name was minimus, but Carmen nicknamed him James Bond because of his habit of following us everywhere stealthily and sneaking into the shelter of the outer tent whilst we were trying to sleep, sometimes climbing on top of it. But every morning when we got out the tent he would run out of the tent and sit on a straw bale which was close by and start licking himself as though he had been there all the time. It was quite entertaining!

Our next post will see us trekking through the Alpujarras, probably the best part of our trip so far in Spain, so stay tuned!

A short stop in Granada

To leave Alicante we had to get up early and make our way to Plaza del Toro where we were getting picked up by a local Spanish guy named Cesar and his mother. This was our first experience of using blablacar, which is a car sharing website, this allowed us to save 30 euros on our trip to Granada. Along the way Carmen had a nice little chat with Cesar's mum in her broken Spanish, which seemed to be well received.

As we were driving past the Sierra Nevada mountain national park we were treated to some lovely views of the high snowy peaks, unfortunately we never got to climb to the top due to the snow and not having the right equipment. We also passed by the cathedral town of Gaudix where a lot of the population live in houses underground or inside the mountains, we even saw a few of them from the car.

We stopped briefly at a service station for a coffee and a little chat with Cesar in my extremely limited Spanish and his slightly better English about his travels. (He had travelled quite a lot). The really pleasing thing to hear from him though was that Granada, our final destination, was his favourite city in Spain and was one of the top things in Spain I wanted to see as well!

Church in Granada with the Sierra Nevada mountains in the background

We arrived in Granada about 2pm and had a few km walk to our hostel where we checked in, we were pleased to note there was a kitchen at the hostel meaning we could cook some food for ourselves! The only negative about our hostel was that the toilet cubicles were extremely small, so small in fact that you could not sit straight on the toilet as your knees would hit the door!

The next day we went for a walk around Granada and entered what must have been one of the popular student districts (later learned it was the Albayzin and Sacromonte districts). It was really crowded with students and lots of hippies selling handmade trinkets and playing music, it was a really cool place to be. Whilst there we also bought some amazing ice cream. We got two different flavours, Ferrero Rocher and Kinder flavours! Best ice cream we had ever had!

Street musicians in Granada

Carmen with the amazing ice cream

 Along this section of the city it allowed us to additionally see the outside of the Alhambra (which we did not get to see this time around as we did not have enough time, plus you have to book well in advance).

Once out of the Albayzin district we saw the arrival of a bride for her wedding and got a few shots of her before she went inside and they shut the doors so we could not see anymore. A bit further along our walk we saw the courtyard of a Muslim Medersa, which naturally had some similarities to the ones in Morocco, but also some differences.

Bride and her father

Another highlight we saw on our walk was a group of men who were carrying a big metal framework contraption on their shoulders and necks. They were all marching in time together and had a man in front of them guiding them as they walked along. We thought this was something very odd. Little did we know at the time that this was in fact men from one the brotherhoods practising for the Semana Santa festival (Easter celebrations).

Locals practising for Semana Santa

This unfortunately was where we had to leave Granada for now as we were due in the small village of Yegen in the Alpujarras the next day to begin our workaway experience, which I shall tell you more about in our next post.

Alicante - Hola Espana!

As I am about 4 weeks behind on the blog at the moment I shall be posting a few posts in quick succession to hopefully catch up a little bit. So instead of just arriving in Spain like this blog shows we are actually much further along with our travels.

The flight to Alicante was an early one, leaving from Gatwick at 7am and arriving in Spain at 9:30am (10:30am local time). This was a quick flight which I slept through mostly. Once arriving we took the bus into the town centre and got off at the beach.

Surprisingly to us we saw a few people on the beach sunbathing whilst we were wrapped up in about 3 layers of clothes. We thought they might well have been British, as we seem to take our clothes off at the first sign of sun!

Nice view over the sea from the Promenade

After having a nice bit of lunch by the beach we headed to our hostal, La Milagrosa and checked in. We then went out for a wander around to explore Alicante a bit more. We attempted to get to Santa Barbara Castle, but didn't manage it as we couldn't find the right street to take us to the top of the hill, so we ended up in a park instead at the base of the castle, before deciding to head back as Carmen was very tired due to our early start and being unable to sleep on the plane. Once back at the hostal we had dinner on the rooftop terrace and then went to bed.

The next day we went to the Basilica Santa Maria (church) after breakfast and were lucky enough to see a bit of a service taking place. They were praying and then just going up for communion, it was all very solemn. Afterwards we went to the modern art museum opposite from the basilica. This was very interesting and we saw some good pieces of art, but we also saw some things that make you think, "How is that classed as artwork?!"

Entrance to Basilica Santa Maria

 Our next destination was somewhere Carmen wanted to go for lunch. Plaza del Carmen was the place and here we enjoyed some croissants we had left over from breakfast and listened to the locals gathering for a chat. Spain seems to be a very relaxed and sociable country so far. We then headed up to the castle, and this time we actually made it inside! It had some really great views from up at the castle, as it is perched on top of a cliff overlooking the rest of Alicante. It used to originally be a muslim castle but was then later used by the Spanish once it was reclaimed.

Beautiful views over Alicante and the ocean from Santa Barbara Castle

The following day after we visited the local market as we heard this is the best place to go to buy food in a lot of Spanish cities. At the local market we saw a big collection of stalls selling groceries, meat, fish, olives and bread, with a fair share of them offering better than supermarket prices (always a nice addition). Afterwards we were planning to head to Elche, but unfortunately Carmen wasn't feeling too well so we decided to stay at the hostal. Later in the afternoon however Carmen was feeling better so we went out for a walk along the promenarde and got some wine, which we had with dinner on the terrace.

An old boat and statue called "The Surfer" along the promenade

 The evening turned out to be really nice and we had fun when we went for a stroll on the beach at night when it is quiet. We also had fun climbing to the top of a big rope construction that was on the beach, like proper kids!

Carmen at the top of the rope construction

 On our last day in Alicante we got a bus to Elche, where we went to visit the Palmerie, (a former Oasis). We walked through it and saw lots and lots of palm trees of all shapes and sizes. After walking through it via one route we had a wander through the centre of Elche and went inside another basilica and saw part of a Spanish funeral. We decided to leave this fairly quickly so as not to intrude, although loads of people seemed to be doing so anyway.

Carmen by some of the palm trees

We then walked some more through the town centre and visited another church and also a panaderia (bakers), where Carmen bought a potato empanada (pastry), which she really enjoyed. We walked back through the palmerie afterwards and stopped for a late lunch there. It then started to rain so we took shelter.

After it stopped raining we decided to get the bus back to Alicante. We were then going to get the tram in the afternoon to a place called Denia, but the tram would not have been running by the time we wanted to go back so we just had another wander around Alicante instead and got to see some really good street art graffiti.

Graffiti street art in Alicante (seems to be popular in quite a few cities!