Lecrin Valley Limpers

This week we went to Prado Negro and a walk along the top of Tajos del los Riscos Moro. The walk started from the bar in Prado Negro, always a good place to start from as there is a cold beer waiting for you when you get back. To start with we followed a track heading uphill, and away from the direction we needed to be going, but there was a plan. Mike and Kees were going off exploring on their own, and we needed to set them off in the right direction, so they joined us for the first couple of km. We said goodbye and arranged to meet them in the bar later. We headed for the pimple, a small hillock on the ridge. In other situations it would be considered as a spectacular outcrop of rocks but amongst these magnificent rock faces it is a mere blip, but for us it served as a pleasant place to sit and have a snack before our serious climb. Now if you have not been up the Tajos del los Riscos Moro before it comes as a bit of a shock, when someone says “We are going up there” ...

Hi We had a superb walk this week, well it could not really be described as a walk, it was  more of a scramble in a river, and we all got soaked. We had met at Los Mondarinos in Durcal and then driven down to the Rio Durcal picnic area, it’s only a couple of kms but it saves the walk back when it is starting to get warm. You can only do this walk in the summer when the water temperature is high enough, and the volume of water is reduced. The walk starts by following an acequia as it meanders through a cleft in the rocks. If you can take your eyes off the narrow path for a moment and look up it is a truly stunning path. Anywhere else, it would be a tourist attraction, with coach trips and “that will be €5.00 please”. In our corner of Spain it’s “so what, why would anyone want to come here” Long may this attitude continue and we can continue to enjoy our walks in solitude. Well, not quite, there were 22 of us. The acequia and river eventually meet up and this is w...

With hot weather forecast for the weekend we wanted somewhere cool to walk this Sunday, so we introduced a new walk to the group. The walk is centered around the Rio Bermejo, a delightful little river above Pitres in the Alpujarras The start of the walk is on a forest track some 20 minutes drive above Capileira. At 1750 metres altitude it made the perfect place to start a walk from  in August. The temperature was just right, with a gentle breeze blowing to cool things down. The path climbs steadily for the first 3 km, with much of it in the shade from the surrounding forest. At the top we met up with the Sulayr trail and we turned back along this towards Capileira. The walk crosses a number of tiny streams which all join up to make the Rio Bermejo, we discovered the delights of this river later when we had returned to the cars. Finding a nice shady spot we stopped for elevenses, we had now reached our maximum altitude of 2239 metres. With the slight breeze keeping th...

We had an easy walk planned for this weekend to the Sierra Huétor. The Parque Natural de   Huétor is on the far side of Granada, just off the A92 Guadix road. There are a lot of paths and trails to choose from, so this week, due to the expected high temperatures we chose one that was quite short and kept to the shade most of the time. The walk starts by going straight up to the Cruz de Viznar on a rocky path. In the past I have always come down the path but going up was a lot easier. After a short scramble on the last few metres we all made it to the top. The views from up here are superb, we stayed a while admire the open vistas, and then returned to the forest for a walk to some civil war trenches. These have recently been restored and are a potent reminder of the utter senseless stupidity of war. We stopped here for an early lunch and then called in at the visitor centre. The receptionist asked where we were from, and was quite surprised with the answer we gave ...

A perfect walk on a perfect day just about sums up our walk this weekend to Elorrieta. It was our big end of the month walk and we needed to go high, as this week it was going to be hot, not like last week when we were wearing fleeces in Cozvijar. Our destination was Elorrieta, This used to be a former Tuberculosis Hospital, or a hut for Forestry workers in the Lanjaron valley, depending on what story you believe. Nowadays it is a refugio but not like the super luxury Porqueira one we stayed in a few weeks ago. This is basic, no doors, no windows and snow on the floor. I don’t think it will be on our weekend away list for next year. We had an early 8 am start from the valley and met up with the Granadinos contingent at Hoya de la Mora, the car park on the side of Veleta, at 9 am. The first part of the walk is a bit boring as it crosses the lower slopes of Veleta, which is not the prettiest place in the Sierra Nevada due to all the sky lifts and buildings that are sca...

This week we had a short easy walk from Venta del Fraille. With the temperatures at this time of the year always nudging 40 degrees, we needed something that was quick and easy so that we could get to the bar for a cooling drink and some shade before the heat got to us. Instead of the temperatures steadily rising throughout the week, as normal, they kept going down. By 8.30 on Sunday morning at the BP garage it was freezing and overcast. Everyone was looking for the long lost fleece at the bottom of their rucksacks. The ones who could not find something warm to put on just huddled in a corner out of the wind, with their teeth chattering away. We drove to the bar Venta del Fraille on the carreteria de cabra road for the start of the walk. There was thick grey cloud hugging the hill tops and a strong wind was blowing. I swear it was warmer when we here in January. Bring on global warming I say, at least then we would be able to enjoy a walk in shorts and T shirts in July. T...

Can I first start by apologizing to all you poor sods who spent last weekend crawling over the mountains of the high Sierras only to be credited with walking 38.5 km, when we had actually walked 46.9 km and climbed 2465 metres, I needed new batteries in my calculator. It was a great effort by everyone who went. This week we had something a little easier planned for the group, a quick up and down the hill and then into a bar before it got warm. We met in Marchenna and I was surprised to find we had amassed a group of 19! Setting off in 4 cars we drove the 4km to the start of the walk above Padul. The walk follows an undulating path in the forest, with plenty of shade from the sun, the temperature was forecast to be 38 degrees. After a couple of kms the path starts to gain some serious height with a short climb alongside a barranco. Unfortunately this bit of the walk is in the sun but it was still only 9.30 in the morning, so the blistering temperatures were still a few ...

Can I first start by apologizing to all you poor sods who spent last weekend crawling over the mountains of the high Sierras only to be credited with walking 38.5 km, when we had actually walked 46.9 km and climbed 2465 metres, I needed new batteries in my calculator. It was a great effort by everyone who went. This week we had something a little easier planned for the group, a quick up and down the hill and then into a bar before it got warm. We met in Marchenna and I was surprised to find we had amassed a group of 19! Setting off in 4 cars we drove the 4km to the start of the walk above Padul. The walk follows an undulating path in the forest, with plenty of shade from the sun, the temperature was forecast to be 38 degrees. After a couple of kms the path starts to gain some serious height with a short climb alongside a barranco. Unfortunately this bit of the walk is in the sun but it was still only 9.30 in the morning, so the blistering temperatures were still a few ho...

This weekend was our biggest Limper event ever. We went on a walking weekend in the high Sierras, staying 2 nights at the Porqueira refugio. With eleven of us booked to go on the weekend we needed 3 cars for the drive up to Hoya del Portillo, above Capileira, the highest point to which you can drive. Everything went well on the drive until we hit the dirt road above Capileira. Once again my Suzuki proved it was not up for the job and died. We abandoned it by the side of the road and squashed ourselves into 2 cars, fortunately Cees had a deck chair in the back of his van and I was able to ride in style in the back. We just need to cut some windows in the side and we have the perfect transport, enough room for us all.  From the carpark you have to walk to the refugio, some 8km away. The walk also involves a 500 metre climb up to 2500 metres, so it made a good warm up session for the main event of the weekend, Alcazaba. The refugio is not the typical hut you find dotted...

Our walk this weekend was on Saturday, and we went to the Rio Borosa in the Parque Natural Cazorla and it was spectacular. We had done part of this walk last year when we had our away weekend to Cazorla, but we did not have sufficient time to do the complete walk. This time we decided to do it as a day walk departing at 6am from Cozvijar and drove the 220km to the start of the walk. Dave, Julie, Antonia y Fernando did it the easy way they went up Friday night and camped. Mind they were still awake at 6am, when the local Cockerel announced daybreak. To make things a little easier Mike and myself split the driving, we will do this again the next time we have a long journey, it worked well and we arrived spot on schedule, these GPS devices are amazing at calculating times, even if they don’t know the easiest route through Cazorla. The walk starts by following the Rio Borosa, this is a wonderful green track that criss crosses the river umteen times as it makes its way up th...

On Sunday this week we went to Pico Lopera. The peak with the fire watch tower on the Almunecar road. There was a good turn out, 17 of us, for what is an easy walk in stunning countryside. We had an early 8.30 start for what was promised to be, but never materialized,  warm day. The walk starts from the Meson Los Prado bar, it has been shut the last few times we have walked from here, but it was open this week. The tables and chairs were out and the new owner greeted us with a friendly hello. Not like the usual miserable landlords in the past, we had stopped using the bar a while back, even before it closed. We set off at a good pace, I think the leaders could not wait to get back and try out the beer and tapas. We have done this walk so many times, I think we could all do it blindfolded, but then that would spoil it because we would miss the wonderful scenery that it passes through. We had our mid morning snack at the top where we had stopped to admire the views, be...

This week we returned to Restabal to resume a walk we started a couple of weeks ago but had to abandon due to torrential rain. On Friday I thought we were heading for a repeat drenching when one of the weather forecasts was predicting heavy rain and thunderstorms. Fortunately it was just the guy at the weather center who was winding me up, for most of the walk there wasn’t a cloud in the sky.   The Ayuntamiento must have heard about our problems a couple of weeks back, when a section of the path we were on turned into a muddy swamp in the thunderstorm, because this week they have started to concrete the track, so no problems here from now on, (if you like walking on concrete). The walk was not a long walk one and it needed something to raise the pulse a bit, otherwise I would be inundated with complaints that I was letting standards slip by making things too easy for the limper virgins. There is a delightful little track that climbs straight up the hillside from the r...

We set a new record this week, both for the distance we walked and the height we climbed.    The weather forecast had been predicting storms for the weekend, and I had said that I would decide on Sunday morning whether or not the walk was on. At 7 am on Sunday the weather, while not brilliant, did not look too bad, OK we might get a few spots of rain but that is why we all carry waterproofs. The walk was setting off from Restabal, it was not a long one and we were never going to be more than 1 hour away from the village, so even if it started to rain we could get back before we got wet. So I issued “The walk is on” email. I was most surprised to see 19 including 3 new walkers all eager for a walk. At 9 am it started to thunder, there was a request from Cees that we go to the bar for a coffee and wait to see what happens to the weather. He always wants to go to the bar for a coffee, so as usual we ignored his request, preferring to get on with the walk and the...

This week for our big end of the month walk we went to the Sierra Huétor,  you always have a good walk in this park, and this week was no exception. We had moved on to our early summer start time of 8.30, and we were in Huétor and ready for the off by 9.15. There was only a small number of us this week, the migratory Brits having already started their move back to cooler climates, and everyone else is taking time out for the European elections, workshops, family and friends. It was a little cool first off and I did question the wisdom of wearing shorts, but it made us walk a little faster in an effort to get warm. To start with the path was in the forest then, after 4 kms, it started  an easy climb up to a look out tower. There was no one else around, we had the place to ourselves. Normally on a Sunday this park is quite busy, but today it was like a midweek walk when you see nobody. We discovered these paths last year, whilst on a midweek walk, but we only cloc...