Category: Spain

Andalucía, Spain

Cumbres Mayoress to Cumbres de Enmedio Historical Trail

Joel

I was awoken early by very strong winds trying to blow over my tent. After attempting to weight it down with big rocks, I had to eventually bail and pack up before the tent got damaged. The winds reminded me of our easterly winds in Perth and whether there was a connection between them and these winds and the Santa Ana winds of southern California – all locations with Mediterranean climates.

The town of Cumbres Mayoress was very small and not so friendly. There were few places to eat, but we did manage to find a place open for coffee next to the square in the morning. We also found a supermarket to restock our supplies in.

Once we were stocked up and packed up, we parked our van on the outskirts of town, hiked up to the village castle, and embarked on what was supposed to be a ten kilometre hike to the neighboring town of Cumbres de Enmedio.

The hike was beautiful and a real interesting find. We could only conclude it was the original laneway connecting villages from back in Medieval times. It followed old rock walls on either side and passed scores of small farms along the way. The spring flowers were blooming everywhere and the rolling hills of the countryside were wonderful to look upon. The hike only managed to extend about 8kms in the end, but we all enjoyed ourselves very much. The village of Cumbres de Enmedio was very small, but a nice place to relax for a bit after the hike. From here we headed back into Portugal for the night.

Andalucía, Spain

Aracena

Joel

Woke up to a few friendly toots from local farmers passing by in cars, but the beautiful pastoral scenery of lush greenery and mist rising over the Rio Alcarrache surrounded us while we cooked up and ate a hot breakfast.

From here we headed into the small town of Aracena. It was nice and a bit more developed for tourism than most of the other towns we had visited, but our frustration grew adjusting to Spanish schedules. Many sites close early for siestas and evening dining is never available until after 9pm.

We hiked up to the Castillo de Aracena, only to find it locked up for the afternoon – so we attempted to hike to other locations around the town. Nothing really worked out and we found ourselves walking around in circles.

There was free camping in town in a vacant lot, which did not appeal to my fellow travellers, so we headed out of town to find another place to camp for the night. We were having trouble finding a suitable place, but finally found a farmer happy to have us camp on his property just outside the town of Cumbres Mayoress.

Castilla-La Mancha and Extremadura, Spain

Bullfighting and Fending off Bulls

Joel

We came to the very first town in Spain, called Villanueva del Fresno, and immediately discovered a recommended hiking trail just outside of town. It was twelve kilometres long but we found at the turnoff that there was really no safe place to park our campervan – so we drove and drove along a narrow beautiful laneway past many wildflowers and grazing livestock to find a place to ditch the van. Three kilometres later, we found a place to park next to a very old stone bridge across the Rio Alcarrache.

Well, that made our hike easier. Now down to a six-kilometre loop, we set off to hike along the river amongst grazing bulls and cows – which made a few of us a bit wary enough to opt for the other side of a barbed wire fence. Eventually, we found the trail cutting inland and worked our way back to the campervan. We decided this place was so nice it was going to be our campsite for the night!

Needing dinner and being high on castle exploration from earlier in the day, we decided to head back into Villanueva del Fresno for another snoop around narrow cobblestone laneways, central squares, and a castle. Like many of the villages we visited, the young children would all head to the village square to play after school.

We tanked up our water supplies again and headed for the village castle. This one was much more of a pile of rubble than the Castelo de Mourão, but it was situated with beautiful views of the surrounding countryside.

We discovered a local bullfighting ring in the village, so we decided to pop by and see if we could have a snoop. After a circumference of the structure and a few tries at the main door, and caretaker popped out and invited us all in for a free guided tour. It was only used a few times a month, but it was interesting to see the inside. Having seen a real bullfight in Mérida, Venezuela at the age of 8, I was not keen to see another.

After our bullfighting tour, we set off to try and find a place to eat dinner. There were a few recommendations in town, but neither opened until 9PM – as with most of Spain. To kill some time waiting, we found a pub open and drank ourselves some local beers. And what was on the big TVs in the pub? A live graphic broadcast of a bullfight going on in neighboring Seville. I chose not to watch, but many of my travelling companions could help but sneak a gory peek from time to time.

Finally, 9PM arrived and we heading down to the recommended restaurant. It turned out to be one of the best meals of our visit. They seem to be big on garlic around here, but that doesn’t bother me one bit.

Afterwards, we headed back to our planned camping spot late and I pitched my tent in the headlights of the van on the other side of a cattle fence, so I didn’t get visited in the night. A beautiful spot that turned out to be our favorite over the period of our travels, but I can’t say I slept great thinking about farm dogs visiting or whether a farmer might want us to move on.