Walk 27 September 2015 Prado Negro

This week we had two walks organised, an easy walk and a harder one and for the first time they started together and then split.

For this walk we needed to have sufficient cars so that the two groups could come back at different times.

 We set off in convoy for Prado Negro and we picked another car up en route. In the end we had 6 cars which completely filled the car park next to the bar.

With Dave leading we headed off down to the waterfall. This was the dodgy bit. Would there be any water in the river? When the walk was planned we had been promised rain on the Friday but it did not arrive.

The quality of the weather forecasts are slipping, at one time they would predict to the minute at what time it would start and how many drops we would get. I am thinking of going back to the old crystal ball and tea leaves, as the job opps boy at the Met office has no idea  what he is doing.

 Our spirits were lifted as we approached the falls, we could hear the sound of running water. Dave was relieved, free drinks for 22 would have cost a fortune in compensation if the river had been dry.

 The waterfall is hidden away and there are no signs pointing to it, but they are a little gem, known only to the few, well a few more now, after our lot visited them.  

 The walk continued downhill another couple of kms until we came to a junction. This was where our group split into two, Hilary leading the short walk up a track back to the cars and Dave leading the longer walk. This was going to be a real test of his navigation skills, not only were there previously unexplored forest roads to discover, he also had to navigate across open ground and find a hidden footpath.

 We stopped for lunch after we had completed all the climbing, the clear blue sky of early morning was starting to cloud over and rain looked possible, it was not forecast for this area.

The walk continued, passing through a small forest on an unmarked trail, I am pleased so say Dave passed this test with flying colours. The medio Ambiente have been busy since the last time we did this walk, they have been out waymarking the route back to the village. We decided to follow this instead of our usual track. As is normal in these sorts of circumstances the way marked path lead us into the forest and then stopped. Once again our man with the GPS navigated us out of danger and onto the right path. A couple of lads who were in front of us were last seen wandering about the hillside in total confusion.

With only a half km to go, it started to rain a bit, not enough for us to stop and put wet weather gear on, in fact not enough to stop us sitting in it when we returned to the bar for a drink.

An excellent walk, great company, what else could we want on a Sunday.  

We walked 17.7 km and climbed 486  metres.

Hilary’s walk report

We ambled to the picnic area where we had our official break in the shade of enormous poplar trees.  Twenty minutes later as families began to arrive struggling with tables, cookers, badminton sets and infants, we walked a bit more quickly back to the bar for good tapas and bit of difficulty dividing the bill between 13, no mathematicians amongst us it would seem.

Hilary