Spain 2013 - Coast to Coast

diciembre 2013 - enero 2014
Using the route laid out by Guy Hunter-Watts, we walked 416 kilometers in southern Spain from Maro on the Mediterranean to Bolonia on the Atlantic. Leer más

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  • España
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Familia, Senderismo
  • 283kilómetros recorridos
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  • Sedella to Alcaucín

    20 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ 🌬 50 °F

    Canillas de Aceituno to Alcaucín, 8.27 km - Apts. Cortijo Del Alcázar

    The rain stopped by the time we got up and there were clear blue skies, but oh my, the wind was incredible. It sounded like a freight train. We had to walk on because Finca Duende had other guests arriving, and we had reservations in Alcaucín. Christian drove us to the village of Canillas de Aceituno; from there, we stuck to small lanes and tracks, afraid to venture off into the mountains in such conditions. I have never walked in wind so strong, not even in Alaska. Even without the strong wind, we would not have taken the official route with its trajectory high on Maroma because - sadly - there are not enough hours of daylight at this time of year for me to do the longer route safely.

    This is the last photo you will see of Marie in her favorite purple buff… As we were posing for Ned to take a photo of us leaning into the wind, a strong gust whipped the buff right off of Marie's head and sailed it out over the rocky defile below us. It is long gone now!
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  • Alcaucín

    21 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ ☀️ 54 °F

    Alcaucín, 4 km - Apartamentos Cortijo Del Alcázar

    We had a rest day in Alcaucín today, walking into town to get fresh fruits and vegetables at the weekly outdoor market, chicken from the butcher, and bread from the bakery. On the way back, we ran into a real charmer of a cat. He was stout, solid, and friendly - and absolutely determined to hold onto our attention! Back home, there was time for washing our socks and shirts and bandaging Marie's eye because something flew under her contact in the wind yesterday. It is really cold here tonight, so I built a fire in our upstairs fireplace. These duplex units are run by a young couple, Raul and Eva, who live here with their children. Raul has been very kind and helpful.Leer más

  • Ventas de Zafarraya to Alcaucín

    22 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ ☀️ 52 °F

    Ventas de Zafarraya to Alcaucín, 18 km - Apartamentos Cortijo Del Alcázar

    The hotel in the next village , Aquí Te Quiero Ver, where we stayed in 2009 on the TransAndalus, is closed for the winter, so Raul, the extremely kind young man who runs the casitas we are now staying in, drove us to Ventas de Zafarraya so we could do today's walk in the reverse direction. He will do the same again on Tuesday so we can continue on to Pulgarín Bajo. In return, we will help him with translations into English because he is trying to get more tourists from the US.

    It is quite cold now that we are far enough into the mountains that we have lost the influence of the Mediterranean. There was a thin glaze of ice on parts of the trail until noon today. As it warmed up, we had beautiful views from the track and several miradors. Shortly after the busy Area Recreativa de Alcázar, we ate a great meal at the restaurant where Raul's wife Eva does the cooking.
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  • Alcaucín

    23 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ ☀️ 54 °F

    Alcaucín, 4 km - Apartamentos Cortijo Del Alcázar

    We did our Christmas grocery shopping today because we have to carry all our food for the next three days into Pulgarín Bajo. It is not near a village or a store. That means we are eating lunchmeat, cheese, and bread for Christmas dinner!

    From the little mountain casitas where we are staying we can see the U-shaped break in the mountains on the skyline that is called the Bouquete of Zafarraya. That is where we started walking yesterday, following a route to the east that brought us back to Alcaucin. We can also see the route we will be following tomorrow: it is an old railway line that starts at the Bouquete and continues straight west, the higher of the two lines we can see. Coincidentally, this is the same route we followed on our bikes in 2009 on the Ruta TransAndalus, the first time on this trip we have had such an overlap. After enjoying the view, l sat on a bench just above our casita and read a history of the Sephardic Jews in this area and their expulsion from Spain in 1492, The Forgetting River: A Modern Tale of Survival, Identity, and the Inquisition. It's by an American journalist who works to uncover her family’s long-buried Jewish ancestry in Spain.
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  • Ventas de Zafarraya to Pulgarín Bajo

    24 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ ☁️ 52 °F

    Ventas de Zafarraya to Pulgarín Bajo, 15 km - Cortijo Pulgarín Bajo, Casa Mirador

    We are warm and snug in front of the fireplace in Pulgarín Bajo awaiting the storm with hurricane force winds that is headed this way. Gusts of up to 87 km per hour are predicted for Christmas day. The only source of heat in our 150-year-old house is the fireplace in our central room, so we have all our clothes and jackets on, as well as blankets wrapped around us. Thank goodness we are carrying our down sleeping bags with us!

    Today's walk was marvelous, first along the line of the old cog railway that once carried potatoes and vegetables from the cortijos of the Axarqia to Málaga, and then on an old drovers' path that led from Málaga to Granada. We had Christmas "dinner" ( ham and cheese sandwiches) a day early at the same restaurant in the little hamlet of Guaro where Ned and I revived ourselves with ice cream on our 2009 bike trip. It was the week after I broke my shoulder, and today I marveled at the fact that we had cycled such steep ascents under those conditions.

    The owner of the cortijo where we are staying is very kind. He reminds me of my dad. He and his wife drove up from Malaga to check us in! He gave us a tour of all the buildings here. The cortijo has been in his family for generations. 60 men used to work here. He has preserved the old olive mill where the millstones to press out the oil were turned by donkeys. It was like having a personal tour of a museum.
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  • Pulgarín Bajo

    25 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ 🌧 52 °F

    Cortijo Pulgarín Bajo, Casa Mirador

    What a strange Christmas Day! The storm is raging outside, and all our attention is focused on our battle to keep the heat from the fireplace from whipped out by the wind. We have our bathroom towels rolled up and set at the base of the two outside doors to try to plug the gaps between the bottom of the door and the floor, but the wind is winning. We hope it dies down by tomorrow as we will be out of wood by then. How we wish we had purchased more than one extra basket of wood...! The chairs around the outside table, so neat and tidy yesterday, have all blown over. We are mulling over our options about how to move forward if the wind has not let up by tomorrow. Will we have cell service to call a taxi? Can we find a phone number for a taxi? Can we find a hotel room at the last minute?Leer más

  • Pulgarín Bajo to Colmenar

    26 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ ☁️ 52 °F

    Pulgarín Bajo to Colmenar via taxi - Hotel Restaurante Belén

    We took one look outside this morning and called a taxi to get us to the next town...where we have a hotel with heat! I spent an hour in the bathtub trying to get warm. The wind gusts in northern Spain last night reached 190 km per hour!!! They were "only" 140 km per hour where we were. It was impossible to sleep with the terrifying noise. Colmenar, where we are now, is not actually on our walking route, but there was no hotel in Riogordo. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny again, so we will be able to walk and rejoin the official route.Leer más

  • Colmenar to Villanueva del Cauche

    27 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ ☁️ 55 °F

    Colmenar to Villanueva del Cauche, 15 km - Hotel Las Pedrizas

    We had a good 15 km walk today... Nice sunshine but (same old story) lots of wind. We were walking on paved roads all day - we even ate lunch on the shoulder of the road - but we did see lots of olive groves and little cortices, and there wasn't much traffic. Now we are at a very friendly small hotel, Las Pedrizas, in the middle of nowhere where you have to wear all your clothes inside and huddle inside your sleeping bag under the covers to try to keep warm. It's right on the autovía, not in a village, so not much atmosphere, and the view from our window is that of a huge parking lot, but we are grateful to have a roof over our heads.Leer más

  • Villanueva del Cauche to Antequera

    28 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ ☁️ 54 °F

    Villanueva del Cauche to Antequera by taxi - Hotel Las Villas de Antikaria (Now Hotel MM)

    The view from our window this morning: heavy rain, fog, and wind. The bad weather combined with the fact that there is no hotel in Villanueva de la Concepción helped us quickly make up our minds to take a taxi to Antequera where there are hotels with heat! We are getting good at scouting out country taxis! The next four days are supposed to be sunny, so that will be good. We have a great mountain walk coming up that will take us from Antequera over La Escaleruela to reconnect with the Coast to Coast route.Leer más

  • Antequera

    29 de diciembre de 2013, España ⋅ ☀️ 50 °F

    Camino de Las Arquillas, 5 km - H. Las Villas de Antikaria

    Ned and Marie walked out on the same track he and I used to enter the city on our 2009 TransAndalus trip, the Camino de Las Arquillas. It is an old path built in Roman times to bring water to the city. Along the path are the remains of the “arquillas” through which the water flowed. It is lined with railings and traffic-free, so makes for a nice walk. Ned also showed Marie the small hotel where we stayed in 2009 - too cold for us this year. I stayed at the hotel, recovering from being quite sick.Leer más