Walhalla: walking to Soportújar

Our goal was to walk into Soportújar, find the pharmacy, and fill a prescription. On the map, it looked like the GR 7 would be a good way to get there. I had noticed in the write-ups on a few Wikiloc tracks that there were warnings about deterioration of portions of the GR 7, but they were sort of old tracks, and I figured there was at least a 50-50 chance that the trail would be passable. We walked past the hermitage dedicated to Padre Eterno, remembering a friendly cat that had greeted us here in 2018. On that trip, we had just made an 800-meter descent from Puente Palo, high up in the national park. The next day I had to replace the brake pads on my mountain bike!

Today we walked the same 4-wheel-drive track in reverse, heading up to link up with the GR 7. Suddenly, Wikiloc gave us a negative beep-beep sound, and up popped a rather mysterious message saying that 50 m ahead was a route that was no longer supported. A few seconds later, we saw why. There had obviously been tremendous flood damage in the area as evidenced by a series of large wire cages filled with boulders to hold back flood waters, as well as rerouting of the track. We went about a kilometer farther, hoping we could still get on the GR 7, but when we reached the red and white blaze for where the trail used to take off, there was just a sharp drop that petered off into nothing. We had a great view of Cańar and the stretch of GR 7 we walked there, though.

So it was back down to the local road into the village, dodging an unusual number of cars for such a small community. Soon we were making our way through the crowds of tourists who had flocked to Soportújar to see the “village of the witches”. Teenagers giggled with their friends as they took selfies by Baba Yaga; couples looked romantic as they saved each other from dragons; parents sheparded their children into the witch’s cave; and grandmothers soothed babies in push chairs while waiting for the rest of the family to reappear. We guess there must have been at least 200 tourists in the village - by far the biggest crowds we have seen since we arrived in Andalucia. To top it all off, the pharmacy had a sign on it saying it was closed today for personal reasons. We made a hasty retreat back to complete solitude at our house overlooking the barranco.

This afternoon, Ramón and Michelle are working with a friend of theirs to make repairs to the area just outside our kitchen door where there used to be a patio with a table for outdoor meals. Last month in the big storms, a huge chestnut tree crashed down and wiped out the patio. Today they are mixing cement to make a support for the new patio. In the meantime, the table and chairs have been moved to a small terrace on the other side of the house.Læs mere