A locked gate

The only direction we haven’t walked from Alozaina is east, so last night I searched on Wikiloc for a walking route that would head that way. To my surprise, there wasn’t one. I studied the IGN map and fell in love with a nice loop I could envision through the olive groves on the intriguing-sounding Camino del Monje del Esperón and Camino de la Jara. Now I just needed a connecting lane between those two parallel lanes, and I spotted the perfect one: Camino de Valentín. I checked carefully to be sure all three lanes showed recent usage on Wikiloc, and was pleased to see somebody had cycled on Camino de Valentín only 10 days ago. “That’s all set then,” I thought. But when we reached the connector today, it was firmly locked and obviously private. What a disappointment. The dirt lane beyond it looked so appealing, stretching out along a ridge with views on both sides. Oh well, after some head-scratching and checking on Gaia GP S, we backtracked. In the end, Ned found a farm track that would take us down to Camino de la Jara, and it worked perfectly well. We were back to the house in time for a great lunch of codfish steaks, mashed potatoes, and salad.

Video note: Our rooftop terrace has proved to be an unexpected bonus. We get a view of the Semana Santa processions turning the corner here, giving us a look at their faces: everything from pride in doing a job well to covert waves to family and friends.Read more