A week in the Alpujarras

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Picking a place off the map back in Melbourne called Juviles (pronounced: ‘Who-billees’) then finding that getting there involves driving up kilometres of sinuous mountain roadways that seem too small for two-way traffic might at first seem a flaw in planning on my part especially when I have a bit of a fear of heights.

And yes. It was an oversight to think that you could travel into the highest mountain range in Spain and not have to navigate such roads. Put it down to naïve enthusiasm.

The trouble is that enthusiasm aside, I am seriously freaked out driving on these roads in Spain (being a passenger I mean – Dave is doing the driving!). Partly it is the driving on the right hand side of the road, partly the rapid pace of oncoming traffic and then there is the sheer height of the roads and harsh ‘drop offs’ at the sides punctuated by concrete bollards that would do you some serious damage before you eventually plummeted off into a ravine. ‘Aterrar!’

In spite of lessons learned from the Cadaques’ driving experience that had reduced me to a blubbering wreck - mind over matter really wasn’t doing it for me so I resorted to a combination of Valium and Deva Premal music to get here! Such a nice East/West combination!

We are in a wonderful house called La Golondrina (that means The Swallow because during the restoration of the house some swallows nested here). The house is owned by a Scottish writer Martin Cross who has been very generous and trusting in renting his gorgeous house to a couple of Aussies sight unseen! I found it in a random way on the Internet and was attracted to the description – Are you ‘looking for a genuine unspoilt rural experience, rather than a kiddy-on resort holiday?’ – as with all things that are meant to be, it has just been perfect.

It feels very remote here, the quality of light and air is rarified and there is a dry harsh beauty to the landscape that is similar to the Australian Great Dividing Range (Thredbo in summer particularly).

As I have been here longer I can tolerate the drives between villages but I don’t think I would ever get completely used to it! Dave has been a true champion and made a brave solo trip to Cadiar (a local town) and got some great meat and fruit and veg and booze (and coeliac stuff) so we could be mostly self-sufficient. We cooked up a La Golondrina special of ‘bisteak y patatas frittes y tomato ensalada’ that was to die for!

We have been using the local walking guidebooks to explore the area. Our first walk was from Juviles to Trevellez - about 9 km but we took a wrong turn so I think we did 11km! My legs sure knew that we had been walking - the first 5km up a steep hill in full sun- the second half was downhill through shaded trees. Thigh muscles and kneecaps both a pumpin’!

We wandered around Trevellez, a town devoted to Jamon factories (ham) and local souvenir shops and then more Jamon factories and caught the only afternoon bus back to Juviles. Perched up in the seats behind the driver it felt like some strange virtual reality Luna Park ride as we swept around the corners on the roads! And all this atheist could think was ‘God help the oncoming cars!’

The second walk was in a nearby town with the extremely alliterative and cool name of Mercina Bombaron and we chose this walk because it was basically flat – we followed along the Acequias (water channels) high above the town flanked by massive chestnut trees. These acqiseras are such amazing technology- basically they have been around since Roman times in one form or another and used to deviate the flow of the river through a series of stone channels with intermittent gates (these days made of metal but in the past slabs of stone) that allow water to be directed onto certain pastures or alternate waterways. In what is basically a very barren landscape we passed a series of verdant farms on terraced slopes fed by these water sources.

Our third walk was described in the guidebook as ‘relatively easy’ but I found it to be a challenging yet quite amazing walk. A trail called the Ruta Medieval took us from Juviles through the tiny village of Timar to El Fuerte. Little did we know we did the walk in the wrong direction according to the time of day. We walked downhill through the shady part of the morning and then directly uphill in full sun in the afternoon! We are not experienced planners or walkers and you certainly learn from mistakes such as these! Although I was slathered in 30+ sunscreen and didn’t technically get burned I was quite dehydrated despite drinking litres of water! But what a sense of achievement!

In Timar we saw the remains of an old mercury smeltering mine, visited a small but fascinating local cemetery and met Tonio the goat farmer and his mule. As we walked with him through the village he warned us with hand gestures indicting extreme slopes and ‘Sol’ and ‘Caliente’ (Sun, Hot) of what was to come, but needless to say – we pushed on with little real understanding of the consequences!

The walk ascended quickly above Timar and made its way in staggered zigzags ever upwards to the ruins of a Moorish stronghold of Juviles. The fort was completely obliterated except for some wall remnants, a couple of water storage tanks and shards of pottery and stone indicating past inhabitation. For what in Australian terms would be a significant historical site, it was amazing to wander through this place without a single plaque or sign in sight. And it was hot up there, and exposed and desolate in a totally beautiful way. Harsh.

On the way up through Timar we met an English expat Alex who gave us directions and we met up with him later in the local tapas bar in Juviles and then spent the next 36 hours or so in his company and that of his charming semi-communal household. He lives in an old house that he is slowly renovating (that had small highly personalized eclectic features that reminded me of the Port Lligat Dali house!) Downstairs, live two Senagalese men, Sogi and Aloo and a Romanian woman Mickie, who are his housemates. We shared a traditional African meal, cooked by Sogi–from a central communal dish and I have to say the notion that people from four different countries could randomly meet and be sharing a meal in a fifth place did make me feel quite emotional and blow my mind! (That and a fair bit of gin!) The power of Facebook will allow us to keep in contact with these new friends.

In the first days after arrival, I immersed myself in a few books to help me get over my road phobia – the first; ‘It’s not about the tapas – around Spain on two wheels’ by Polly Evans was a light and amusing book about a one woman’s solo cycling experience in Spain. Having recently experienced the highs and lows of the hills, the food, the accommodation and the random ‘goats on the road’ type experiences- I really enjoyed this book.

‘South from Granada’ by Gerald Brennan is by many accounts a supposed classic, yet I found it interesting but cool – a bit emotionally missing. Dare I say a masculine account of life in the Alpujarras post WWI? I watched a film interpretation of this book in Spanish whilst at ‘La Golondrina’ that showed Brennan fathering a child with a local Spanish woman and then taking the child back with him to Britain to be brought up by him and his wife. T’was not a sausage about that in the book! Not a whiff of sexual congress with anyone! Interesting! Lots of proud declarations about how far he could walk in a day but far less honesty about things that mattered I say!

I also tried the Washington Irving ‘Tales of the Alhambra’ – again a supposed ‘classic’ but the flowery self-satisfied prose and entitled politic drove me mad so I abandoned it. These blokes that arrive in a place, ‘locate’ a place to sleep and then eat and survive on other people’s toil and then ‘bang on’ like it is has been a hard days work totally loses me I have to say! Don’t get me wrong. As a 21st Century tourist I totally get that I am riding on the effort of others to support my existence. But the fact that these 19th Century blokes were so blasé about their entitlement really gets up my goat! (As Kath and Kim would say!).

(Having read just a bit of history about this country there will be more about cultural and phallocentric Imperialism and entitlement to come in future I am sure.)

Anyway- a week in the remote mountains was just as I imagined… time punctuated by the ringing of the church bell on the half hour, a time to pet the pregnant dogs in the street; ignore the daily beep of the bread truck; anticipate the beep of the veggie truck (to get nectarines to die for!); to ponder what was for lunch; to take advantage of siesta; to try our crappy Spanish on the locals; to sample tapas in Tino’s local bar and to talk til the wee hours.

And so a week in the Alpujarras draws to a close.

And so now we are on to Ronda and then Sevilla and then an expat AFL experience in Madrid on the weekend ….’Like sands through the hour glass – so are the days of our lives!’

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