Walk Sunday 1 July 2018 Laguna Yeguas

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We had a cooling experience on our walk this week. Our destination was the Laguna Yeguas on the side of Veleta. We had arranged to meet at the Hoya de la Mora which, fortunately this time,  was clear of snow. The last time we were there the carpark was under 4 metres of snow and just the cabin roofs were poking through it.
 The temperature, at 12 degrees wasn’t bad but it was windy which brought it down into the chilly range and I was glad I had some warm clothing with me, unlike Brenda who looked liked she was heading for the beach. The higher we climbed the cooler and windier it became, fortunately we managed to find a bit of shelter out of the wind up by the observatory.
After a short break we headed off across the snowfields towards the Laguna. I was starting to get excited, the last time we had seen so much snow was a number of years ago and there were icebergs floating on the Laguna, would we be fortunate enough to see them again?
Yippee, there they were, I could not believe it, July in Andalucia and there were icebergs in the laguna. We just needed a polar bear to make it seem real, somehow cows walking through the snow are just not the same.
The next treat I had in store was a short extension to the walk up to the lagunas de la Virgen. A series of small lagunas all interlinked under the sheer rock face of the Tajos de la Virgen, an area of unparalleled natural beauty that would turn this walk into one of the greatest walks of 2018. After climbing up through the snow we arrived in the area of the lagunas. There was nothing, they were buried deep under 1000s of tonnes of snow. With my reputation in tatters the only thing I could offer was a full refund.
For the return part of the walk I had intended walking up to the top of the chair lifts, but the paths were covered in snow and there are some steep drops in places. So we returned on the outbound path back to the carpark where we stopped for drinks and tapas. Our usual bar “Skibobs” was closed, I don’t know whether they ever managed to find Bob in all that snow or not.
A great day out and it was good to return to the high mountains.

We walked 11.7 Km and climbed 544 metres

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