Pórtugos: Fuente Agria

When I began reading about the Alpujarra 20 years ago, one of the first photos I saw was of an orange waterfall. It was so beautiful, I could hardly bring myself to turn the page. It was one of the sites I was determined to see on our first trip on the TransAndalus mountain bike route in 2010. Reality intervened when we got to the Pórtugos area. The route of the TransAndalus runs on a dirt track high up in the sierra between Capileira and Trevélez. Pórtugos, meanwhile, is many km below on a totally different route. There was no way on either of our bike trips that we could easily detour down to it.

So when we planned this trip to be at the level of the lower villages, the Chorreón de Pórtugos was high on the list of sites to visit. Worryingly, as recently as ten days ago, access to the falls was blocked off by rockslides.

We started out on the GR 7 this morning and without a single problem arrived at the Ermita de las Angustias above the fuente that feeds the waterfall. The fuente has five spouts, each pouring forth water with a different degree of mineralization. All three of us wanted to try various spouts to find our favorite, but we all had in the back of our minds that we were going to be on an airplane in less than a week, so maybe it was not a good time to experiment. Instead, we headed downstream to the waterfall. We were amazed not only by the color of the water, but also by the varying textures that were evident. We had read that the waterfall cascaded down petrified wood from a dead tree. This seemed possible, although we can’t be sure. The stream’s high rock walls spouted more springwater in various places, so the canyon walls themselves looked painted. Moss and vines completed the picture. We were the only people around so we could take our time and enjoy all this natural majesty without any distractions.Read more