Lecrin Valley Limpers

It’s been a cold week in the valley, with a bitter northerly wind blowing most of the time, why they can’t turn those dam windmills around and suck warm air up from the coast is beyond me.  The idea of heading off downhill for our big walk, and walking on the sunny side of Sierra Lújar, seemed like a good idea. The starting point for our walk was Lagos, a small pueblo nestling on the side of the Sierra Lújar, its main claim to fame is the bar, whose owner definitely never went to the charm the punter school. By the time we arrived the windmills above the village were turned off and there was no wind. The last time we were here they were going around like the propellers on a spitfire and you could hardly stand up.    The walk starts by heading uphill on a little path that winds its way up to the windmills, everyone was hoping they would not turn them on and blow us away again. From here we headed off to the pueblo of Lújar. There is a bar here whose owner can’...

With the temperatures predicted to fall by the weekend it was decided to head downhill this week for a walk from Gúajar Faragúit. It was an easy walk and we had plenty of time for a coffee before the start of the walk. By the time we had all met up in the bar there were 24 of us, so a good turn out for a cold morning. We set off,all wrapped up, by heading downhill through the village, they have spent a lot of money over the years improving it and it is now a very pleasant village to walk through. At the bottom there is a bridge over the river and then the climb starts. We had not gone far on the path up to the castle before we had a stop to take the coats off. It’s strange how quickly you warm up when there is a hill to climb. The castle covers a large area and it gives you a good idea of the layout of a Moorish castle, a lot of the internal walls are still in place. We had a look around the castle before setting off again, this time we headed off down into a steep ...

There was a traumatic start to our walk this week in the Huétor Parque Natural but, in the end, it turned out to be a superb walk. We had two meeting points, the first was at the BP garage in Cozvijar and I could not believe the number of people who turned up, there were 27 of us and we needed 7 cars. Can you imagine the problems of trying to keep track of all those cars, especially when my Suzuki is not only turning out to be a Friday car, it was obviously the last car on the last Friday of the year. The poor garage mechanic has now been reduced to a gibbering wreck who retreats into a corner sobbing every Monday morning when I turn up on his doorstep. Fortunately I had written directions for all the drivers on how to get to our second meeting point in Huétor de Santillan where another 3 people and 2 cars were waiting for us.       True to form the Suzuki broke down on the autovia, I have to stop, wait 2 minutes and then it goes again, so I was th...

Hi. This week we had planned a very easy walk to Mondújar castle, so easy in fact we had to have a walk around Talara to try and get the kilometers up a bit. There were 20 in the group when we set off from the cross roads in Talara. To start with we headed off towards Beznar and to the statue of Zoraya, Muly Hacen’s favorite,  who he took with him to live at Mondújar castle when he was expelled from Granada by Boabdil in 1483. Turning off the main road we went under the autovia and headed for El Cerrillo, the little pueblo now isolated from Mondujar by the autovia. We said goodbye to Arturo here, he had decided to returned to Talara. He is still recovering after a recent trip back to the UK. The climb up to the castle is a bit of a scramble, and after some huffing and puffing we all arrived safely. The castle is famous for its association with Boabdil, the last Nazrid King of Granada, who settled here in 1492. The remains of his mother, Aixa, are said to be burie...