I'm in a Camino State of Mind

This day 5 weeks back we took off with the girls on a post Leaving and Junior Certificate trip.  We headed off to Spain and Santiago de Compostella to walk the Camino Finisterre from the Cathedral to the end of the world.  It was our first introduction to the Camino Concept.

That trip was just 1 week long, with 5 days of walking.  I became an addict.  I am now a self-confessed Caminista.  We are planning another trip before Christmas and looking forward to the day we can commit the time to walk the big one, the Camino Frances.  I'll write up a piece on our Camino experiences once I get my photos sorted.

A Camino is just a walk, a long walk.  You can do your Sunday long walk, but walking all day, day after day does something to your body and mind.  Something good.  In the beginning, it is tough, but then your body adjusts and that is where the mind and soul start to kick in and the endorphins begin to feed your pleasure zones.

4 weeks back in Wicklow and the urge to walk again became an itch.  I thought back to a year or so when I was planning a walk from Wicklow to Glendalough.  The late Pat Kavanagh put the thought in my mind and I began to explore maps and aerial photographs to find a doable route.  On Friday, I walked it.

Pat had the idea of a Camino St. Patrick, while I felt a Viking Raider Route would be more fitting.  Having done a Camino, I think the spiritual aspect is more important than the warrior side.  Though I have yet to clarify which Saint would work best.

For me, this early version of the route starts at the Abbey in Wicklow, heads out the gate and up the Marlton Road to the Ashtown Road and on to the Rocky Road before crossing the M11 to the Blackhill Road.  I chose these roads because they are either quiet or have a footpath.  In reality, I skipped most of the Marlton Road, because Caroline and I just walked out our front door and cut over to the upper end of the road.

Looking back at the sea and Wicklow.

Looking forward to the distant hills.

From the end of the Blackhill Road, we dropped down a wooded track, our first off road section, toward Glenealy.  We crossed the railway on the footbridge and came out beside the Pub in the village.  It was closed, so we had our lunch on a picnic table beside it.  This was about 2 hours into our walk.

Our first off-road trail.

From the pub, we crossed the main road and headed up into Carrick Wood at Ballymanus, past the local GAA pitch and the Christmas Tree Farm.  From here we headed generally west on beautiful forest trails.  From the edge of the wood a bit of thrashing through Ballydowling Wood, about 100m, took us to another easy trail.

Leaving Glenealy over a stile beside the church.

This trail emerged onto a quiet back road, where a short road walk took us into Ballinastraw forest and on to one of the loveliest pieces of woodland in Ireland, Clara Vale.  At about 20km into the walk, the beauty of Clara Vale recharges the batteries.  The babbling sounds of Croneybyrne Brook and bird song draw you down to the more placid waters of the Avonmore River.

For scale, that hairy critter is beside my size ten and a half shoe.

The Avonmore Way

From here we picked up the Avonmore Way, Wicklow's newest way-marked trail and headed north toward Glendalough.  Passing the beautiful Church and School at Clara we turned uphill along a path to Our Lady's Statue and on through wooded trails to a quiet high road.

The church at Clara.

After 7 and a half hours of walking, we crossed a gate into a field and pitched our tent behind the ditch amongst the flies and the evening midges.  A quickly cooked dinner, tea, dessert and Captain Morgans and Coke saw us retire to the tent at about 8:30 in the evening, to escape from the dreaded scourge of two of Ireland's carnivorous critters, the Midge and the Horse Fly.

Somewhere above Clara Laragh Waterpark, near where we camped.

For the past three weeks, I have had a fierce itchy spot on my right shin where a horse fly took a bite.  Last night I took another hit to the same spot.  Is there no god?

Despite our early retirement to bed, I slept.  Not a great sleep.  Bits of my body were moaning after the day's exertions and I could only be comfortable for a short while in any position.  However, like any professional sleeper, I soon managed to complete these positional adjustments without really waking up.

At various times during the night I heard the gentle pitter patter of a light rain shower on the tent, the screaming of a lonesome deer as he gave out about something and the occasional yapping dog in a distant farmyard.  I think about 5 cars passed the other side of our ditch during the night.  I did wonder about the deer and if he was in trouble, but he just seemed to be wandering about the field complaining.  Maybe we were in his favourite spot.

Saturday morning saw us rise bright eyed and bushy tailed, though stiff of limb and joint.  Unfortunately, at 6:00am the Midges and Flies were either still about, having lain in wait for us, or we disturbed them opening our tent.  They proved a good motivation to get moving.  By 6:30 we were packed and gone, leaving only a small patch of flattened grass to show someone camped there.  You carry out what you carry in, leave no trace.

By 8:00am we were sitting at a picnic table outside the visitor centre in Glendalough brewing up our tea and eating our cereal, fruit and yoghurt for a pleasant breakfast, accompanied by a selection of begging birds.  We gave the birds some cereal because they were probably part of the reason why the flies kept away.

Can you spot the birdies?

The Avonmore Way doesn't actually go into either Laragh or Glendalough, those links haven't been completed yet, so we just followed our noses, finding a pleasant descent through the woods to the Derrybawn Wollen Mills and in the Green Road to St. Kevin's 6th Century monastery at Glendalough.

We had completed our pilgrim's way.  We had walked from one major settlement to St. Kevin's centre of worship and pilgrimage.  Over the coming months, I hope to meet with others and explore the best walking options from the Parish of East Glendalough to Glendalough.  In that exploration, we will gather together the history and features of the places passed through.  Hopefully, Wicklow will have a new Camino to join the growing web of fabulous trails through its landscape and its history.

Of course, this tale doesn't end here in Glendalough.  We were on foot and now some 30 odd KM from home.  Glendalough doesn't offer a direct public transport option back to Wicklow, so we retraced our footsteps back to Clara and onward along to the southern end of the Avonmore Way.  From the trail end, it was a short walk into Rathdrum village, a welcome coffee shop and a bus home to Wicklow Town.

I'm still in that Camino State of Mind.  I've let the genie out of the bottle again.

It's been a while since I posted a blog. This one is about hockey.

Just back from Three Rock Rovers ground, where I watched Wicklow Ladies 1sts get beaten by Muckross 5ths in the Division 11/12 Cup Final.  In the league, Wicklow beat Muckross 4-0 at home and 6-1 away.  In the League, Wicklow won 17 games, drew 1 and lost none.  Muckross won 10, drew 5 and lost 3.  Wicklow scored 123 goals and conceded 10 while Muckross scored 43 and conceded 19.  Granted, Muckross came third in the division and lost out on promotion by just a single goal.

I point out these statistics to highlight the enormity of the Muckross achievement.  Well done Ladies, you played better than you have all season and came to today's game well prepared.  If I played for Muckross like these girls did, I'd probably leave the club and move to another to try to play in a higher division.  Because you did not play like a typical Div 11 team.  Indeed, both teams probably could have held their own in the Div 7/8 Cup.

Muckross have a great season ahead of them next year, if they continue to play like today.  Though several of them would have put many a  Premiership Soccer Star to shame for their diving and acting. I was really surprised at how easy they toppled over, I suspect it was just acting though, because then there were no Wicklow players tackling them, they seemed to have no problems staying upright.

However, such acting would not have been noticed by the pair of Muppets in yellow shirts who never seemed to have the pace to keep up with the game.  One of them should go to specsavers, while the one who was wearing glasses should have worn his distance vision glasses instead of his reading glasses.

These two have inspired me to become an umpire.  I always thought you had to be able to see, to ref a match and I thought you should have a fair grasp of the rules too.  Now I know you just need a brass neck and a whistle.

Leinster Branch need to stand back and take a long hard look at themselves and the game they oversee.  These two teams were obviously too good to be refereed by such weak referees.  I've umpired the odd Junior match and to be honest, I think I would have done a better job today.  The LHA need to put pressure on the LHUA to provide a better standard of umpiring in such important games.

The other thing LHA needs to get a grip on is the bottom 4 Divisions of the Ladies Leagues. Divisions 9-12 are really Development Leagues.  There are huge variations in skill levels between teams within divisions and between divisions.  Strong First teams entering the League from developing clubs should not be forced to work their way up through each division in order to get to the seriously competitive divisions.

These developmental divisions should be for the development of younger players, the rehabilitation of injured players and should also provide the educational environment where players working their way back down to the Vets Leagues, can be encouraged to share their experience with their upcoming colleagues and opponents too.

Divisions 9-12 should have the flexibility to fast track a Developing Club's first eleven or even a second eleven through to their proper level.  Perhaps something like a challenge cup for for Division winners and runners up who could compete for two promotion places to Division 8.  Or that there could be a place reserved in Div 8 for the best performing 1st team from the Developing Divisions

I suggest that fast tracking be reserved for a club's First or Second Team, which at this stage would be Developing Clubs.  Larger Clubs can simply promote their better players up through their teams to their rightful level of competence.  Additionally, larger clubs have the influence and clout to influence committee decisions and have exceptions made in their favour.

Speaking of Larger Clubs, I have been to many games where the team Wicklow have faced in a critical game against a second, third or fourth team from a Large Club only to find that the team is considerably different to the team faced in less critical games.  For example, larger clubs have been known to field a different 11 for League and Cup games.  In many cases, this is legal, or marginally legal, but it gives the larger club an unfair advantage when playing against the first team of a developing club.

This loading approach may be fine for games between larger clubs, where both clubs can call on players from higher divisions to boost a team and so play on a level playing field in a game within a game.  But it really is a form of  blatant cheating when bigger clubs do it to smaller clubs.  The rules really need to be tightened in this area.  Otherwise, the LHA runs the risk of becoming a club itself, where newcomers are excluded, bullied or otherwise kept down.

Developing Clubs need to be supported through proper regulation of the game.  The game in Wicklow has grown dramatically in recent years as has the game in many of Dublin's outlying dormitory towns.  These clubs need to be able to compete on level terms with the established Dublin clubs, but as long as a lax attitude to players playing down to boost lower teams is allowed, the big clubs will continue to dominate the game and draw talent away from emerging clubs.

I am not suggesting that Muckross have been in any way unsporting in the matter of playing players from other divisions.  Muckross is a strong and vibrant club and can probably acquit itself at any level.  I was a bit taken aback and somewhat jealous, when I found out about the professionalism a club of this size can bring to the game.

Video analysis allowed their coach to break down Wicklow's playing style and tactics.  It allowed them to develop and play specific disruptive strategies to effectively stop Wicklow from taking control of the game.  Wicklow's ladies played better in all areas of the field with the exception of perhaps the Muckross D.

Watching from the sidelines I realised that Muckross were extremely defensive in their game, breaking down every Wicklow attack.  It was also noticeable that Wicklow threatened the Muckross Keeper about 3 times for every attack from the Muckross girls.  Muckross sometimes had 9 or 10 players behind the ball.

This is where the inept refereeing altered the balance of the game.  While Wicklow had more short corners, they should have had 2 or 3 times more and often in quick succession, where infringements were made in clearing the ball.  Too often the free went incorrectly in favour of the defending team.

This Muckross team now have the honour of beating Wicklow twice.  UCD beat Wicklow last year in the 11/12 Cup when Wicklow won Division 12.  In three seasons, Wicklow Ladies Firsts have lost 3 games, 1 League game to Muckross and 2 Cup Finals to Big Clubs, can any other club claim such a record?

There is something special about this team.  Promotion to Division 10 seems a bit pathetic for the team that has no other rival in the entire Irish Hockey scene in terms of games won and goals scored. It is high time that this team was rewarded with promotion to their rightful level.  Several months back I worked out on paper that they should be playing in Division 8 if they are to face a consistent challenge each Saturday and experience defeat more regularly.

Let me make 3 suggestions to Leinster Branch:

1. Promote Wicklow Ladies First Team to Division 8.  There is no reason why it can't be done, unless politics is an acceptable reason.  At the same time develop a protocol to allow other strong teams from smaller clubs follow suit.  I would also suggest that if the team is subsequently relegated in the following season, they should return to the same division from which they were promoted originally.
2. Introduce Photo ID for both the Ladies and Men's games and online registration of players and team sheets, so that the Referees (with reading glasses if needed) can validate the teams they referee.
3. Open up Divisions 9, 10, 11 & 12 to proper development.  Allow for 8 v 8 in Division 12 where a team cannot field a full team.  Allow league games to be played on any day of the week within the bottom 4 divisions with the agreement both teams, LHA does not need to be informed in advance once a score is provided by midnight on the Sunday.  The players are big girls and can think for themselves.  The Men's Committee should consider a similar developmental arrangement for Divs 7 & 8.  Their lower divisions should be smaller to ensure a Division 8.

Finally; congratulations to Muckross and commiserations to Wicklow.  It has been a privilege and a pleasure to watch you train and play over these last 3 seasons.  Whether ye go up 1 or 3 divisions, you won't have the hassle of a Muckross in the leagues anyway.

A Bit of a Walk

Gran Senda de Malaga

Having survived our visit to the caves and a pleasant afternoon, I felt strong enough to try something else. A bit more challenging. So I planned a walk up through the valley above the caves. There are some old mine workings at the head of the valley I thought I would like to have a look at. I also thought that sticking to valley walking would allow me to go further.

So after an early breakfast we set off across the town to find our car, then it was off to the caves.  Just before the caves there is a boreen leading off into the valley.  My plan was to drive up this lane to a carpark about half way up and explore the higher reaches on foot.

The best laid plans of mice and men . . .

My plan was not to be.  Caro decided that a dirt track was no place to bring a hired car.  Granted, the start of the lane did look a bit rough, so my plans had to be changed and we headed off from a small carpark on foot.  We hadn't gone more than 100m when the road surface improved dramatically and it remained good for what else we saw of it. Fortunately I was in form for the walk and enjoying it, otherwise I would have gone back for the car.

Starting from the caves would add 12km to my planned route, so I decided on a change of plan as I hadn't planned on doing any more than 18 or 20 km in total.

Also, we hadn't gone particularly far before we came across one of the stranger sights of the day.  A train of caterpillars, little hairy fellows, just a bit smaller than my little finger, marching nose to tail across the road. The first bunch appeared to have been disturbed by a car and their formation was reassembling.

Some enquiries on FB and I was informed by my favourite ex-pat in Spain that they were Pine Processionary Caterpillars. They look awful cute marching along like a little miniature train. Fortunately I didn't touch any of them as they are vicious little buggers and their hairs can sting you quite badly.

Googling them shows them to be quite destructive and capable of destroying pine and cedar woodlands. They are also the inhabitants of those silky nests I had seen on El Fuerte. When I saw the damage cars could do to their little processions I felt sorry for them, but now having read about them, I don't.

About 3km into the walk we came to a junction.  A rougher road headed off to our right and up toward a highish pass. According to the map, there was a route from the pass down another valley that joined this one further up near where I had planned on originally parking the car.  This would keep us under the 20km and add about 450m in climbing.  That should be safe.

So off we went up the side valley and through the woods.  I must say it was lovely going.  The paths were well maintained and the footpath took the occasional short cut to avoid some of the longer hairpin sections of the road.  The scenery improved as we climbed and I was loving it.

Not wishing to make the same mistake as we made on Monday, I was carrying 4 litres of water between us and we stopped frequently to take a sip. I carried the rucksack as I knew if I let Caroline loose with it, I would never see my precious water again.  At least when I had the water she had to wait for me every now and again.

Looking across to El Fuerte (centre)

Caroline gambolling ahead.

It didn't take too long to reach the pass, which was in fact a crossroads. One track headed left to return to the caves via a different valley, but that would have been too short a walk for the day that was in it and how I was feeling. Another route led straight on toward the higher mountains hereabouts, while a third track headed off to our left and was our intended route.

Unfortunately, the main track had recently been rebuilt and all trace of the tracks to our left and right had been obliterated. Bugger.

Caro was gambolling out ahead of me on the main trail and if I didn't call her back soon, I would lose contact with her. Bugger.

I had a quick scan for any trace of what might have been the correct trail and gave up the hunt. I suspect the gully that was fenced off with rusty old wire and rubble might have been it. I headed off on the main track, resigned to a day at altitude. Bugger.

El Cielo is the pointy bit in the distance.

A short while later I caught up with Caro and explained that we were no longer on the planned route, but that there was an alternative route passing Cerro Molinero and summiting just below El Cielo, which ominously translates at Heaven. This hill tops out at 1508, which is fine in feet, but in meters puts it at half as high again as Ireland's highest mountain and we were parked at just above 150m. This might get tough.

We stopped for lunch at almost the same level as our summit on Monday. It felt good to be this high up again. I remembered looking across from El Fuerte to El Cielo and thinking that it looked like a nice climb and had put it on my list of mountains I would like to climb some day. Maybe next time I took a spring break. I just didn't expect next time to be quite so soon.

Gorse in bloom

A little after lunch we passed the ruins of what had been either a substantial ranch or a small village. Old field walls to retain soil and moisture added a poignant sense of isolation. People had lived here and worked the land once. How long ago? What happened to them? Were they victims of Franco's war or was it earlier than that?  Had they like the Irish, found this high land too hard to work and were their descendants now living across the Atlantic on some Caribbean Island, or California or South America in some former Spanish Colony?

We climbed onward and upward, leaving the village and the driveable road behind.  Soon we were headed out across the bare hillside, the shelter of the trees left behind and the full power of the sun beating on our backs and heads. Caroline took on the appearance of some Jihadi warrior with her fleece draped around her head like a turban or somesuch.

After an hour of this, I began to wish I had found the other path. It was hot, dusty and almost windless. I was roasting and could feel the backs of my arms beginning to fry. Bugger.

My growing discomfort didn't lessen my pleasure though. The walk and the climb was proving to be an exciting exploration. A bit of a change from walking The Murrough.

El Cielo was closer now, but felt more like hell. It was one of those hills that always looked closer than it was, or else it was moving away from us at about half my walking pace.

One thought running through my mind now was the fact that there was no turning back.  The quickest way back to the road was to keep going. I began to have evil thoughts about Caroline. She was too fit and this seemed to be too easy for her. With each step I was beginning to feel just that little bit older.

Gradually I reeled the mountain in. Inch by inch I closed on the summit, however, the summit was not my goal. Just to the left the trail dropped over the shoulder and descended into the head of the valley we had been walking in at the beginning of the day. We crossed the ridge about 50 m below the summit and I did not regret it. Next year I will return a bit earlier in the season, because there is another good summit a mile or so beyond.

The other side of the hill.

The descent was rough. Steep and loose. The kind of place where one false step could find you making your descent a little more rapidly than intended.

The sun began to settle in the sky and the temperature began to cool down to a more acceptable degree.

The steep slippery bit turned out not to have been the most difficult part of the descent. Once the route began to level I began to get a sense of just how far we had travelled. I was tired and the route back seemed to get longer with every step.

Thoughts of getting fitter began to flit through my mind and a plan began to form. This region of Spain deserves to be explored more thoroughly and to do so I would need to be up to a good walk every day. Roll on Spring 2016.

From car door to car door today's walk turned out to be no longer than I had planned, just short of 20km. It involved a total ascent of over 1,520m, as opposed to my original plan for 400 to 500m. We were out on the hills for close up on 10 hours in total. Our height ranged from 166m at the car to 1,457m at our high point.

The end of a bit of a walk!

Busy, Busy, Busy

Sorry folks, I haven't stopped writing up on my trip to Spain. I will get back to it, its just that I've been busy.

Today started off with a walk around Cullen's Hill out a Three Mile Water, south of the Town.  Our mutt, Kerry, came along with us.

We did about 7 km at a brisk enough pace of about 5.2 km h. I say about, because when I checked further details I realised that we are already in the car and driving home when I stopped the tracker. Our max speed on the track comes in at 63 km h, not bad eh?

So I knocked a bit off the distance and pace to make it more realistic.  But as usual, any pace over 3 km h is Caroline's responsibility.

The afternoon was spent doing a bit of work on the boat and watching/listening to rugby matches.

Yesterday was work followed by Hockey Coaching. So I gave myself a break. I hope to continue my Spanish tale tomorrow.

Something else I found out, Blogger seems to think I'm somewhere on the other side of the planet. The time for this post is around 22.05.

Wombles for a Day

Nerja is famous for its caves and its cave paintings, I saw a lot of the former and none of the latter. I had to rob the pic on the left from the website of the Fundación Cueva de Nerja.  The caves with the art are currently closed to the public for conservation purposes.

I didn't try to hop out of bed today, I had the sense to do so gingerly. In the past, when I have overdone it, I often found that the day after the day after was the worst. This was starting off like that, or it could just be that my rest day hadn't done anything to heal me, because it didn't turn out to be a rest day. I had plans for today :-)

We drove over to the caves, I almost regretted giving up our convenient parking place only a few minutes walk from the hotel. However I did say I had plans and continuing to torture my legs wasn't part of it.  Mind you, the descent into the cavern did hurt a bit, but the splendour of the caves took my mind off it completely.

These are dry limestone caves, the rivers that once flowed through them have moved on due the tectonic uplift and other technical geological and geomorphological factors, I don't plan on delving into here.  If you have any questions, I suggest you ask Mr. Google.

The caves are truly awesome. I've been to all of the open public show caves in Ireland and nothing compares, though I loved the boat trip at the Marble Arch Caves.

Photographs just can't do justice to them.  All I can say is go and see them for yourself. I took hundreds of shots and could have filled several servers with them.  This is just a tiny selection.

The shapes and textures just capture your imagination.  This is like walking into a magnificent art gallery of the works of the masters, only this master is Mother Nature.

You can get some sense of the scale of this cavern from the tiny humans on the walkway emerging on the left from behind this column.  For me, this was a religious experience.  It must be what visiting the Vatican and going inside St. Pauls is like for a devout Roman Catholic.

These caves are the result of geologic processes that began over 225 million years ago when the limestone beds were first laid down.  Tectonic pressures between the African and European plates led to the creation of these mountains over a period that stretches from 65 to 5 million years ago and it was at the end of this period that water began to perform its craft on the rock to carve out these caves. Rome wasn't built in a day you know.

These public galleries represent only about 1/4 of the caves.  You can arrange supervised trips to the closed galleries, which is something I would love to do.  The trips are for a full day and are for a minimum of 10 cavers, minimum age 14.  Anyone on for a trip below ground?

I labelled this post, "Wombles for a Day" because a line from a song I never liked wormed its way into my head, the lines (with a little poetic license) go:

Underground, overground, wombling free,

The Wombles of Cuevas de Nerja are we.

You can Google Wombles if you need any help with the concept, I shall not return to the subject :-)

It was with great reluctance that we climbed out of these caves and back into blazing sunlight.  We took a nostalgic wander around the park and wondered about what lay hidden beneath our feet before we headed back to the car.

Returning to Nerja, my earlier misgivings were shown to be right, there was no free parking to be had within an asses roar of our hotel.  We ended up parked outside someone elses hotel on the far side of town.  But by this time my legs were working properly again and the lure of an ice cream on the way back through the Balcon de Europa (the center of all life in Nerja) gave me the childish enthusiasm.

Lunch and a siesta in our room, was followed by a brisk walk along a beach we hadn't been on before and a visit to the Museum.  The museum is small and compact and focused on the history and archeology of Nerja and surrounding areas.  At this point in the year, it looked like they weren't ready for tourists yet.  Several of the displays weren't working.  I would love to have seen more on the archeology of the caves.  Prehistory is my kind of history.

Our evening was a relaxed affair with a wonderful meal in an Indian Restaurant, at the end of the evening, I was once again surprised at the bill; so inexpensive for delicious food.

So that was my kind of day, underground, overground, short walks and good food.  Tomorrow will be different, lots different.

A Funny Kind of Rest Day

Day three dawned bright and sunny as we knew it would.  So did the pain.  My calves and my thighs were suffering badly and making the rest of my body feel miserable too. Now, my body is used to my back moaning and complaining, so legs, even though there were two of them, didn't upset me too much.

I hopped out of bed to greet the new day.  Only it didn't happen quite like that.  All that moved were my vocal chords; to give voice to the screaming pain that was coursing through my legs as I attempted to raise them from the bed.

This was muscle pain on a supreme scale.  My calves felt like they run a marathon with arrows embedded in each of them and my quads were too painful to even touch, someone had used them as a darts board. A physio wasn't going to be much good, I would pass out at their first touch.  I knew I had to get up and get the lactic acid system, that had replaced my blood system, energised and moving.

Two pain killers followed by a trip to the loo confirmed that I was suffering from severe dehydration, not being sure how to treat it, I let my body tell me.  So I had breakfast as usual, but accompanied by four glasses of orange juice and a litre or so of water.

Herself, whose Christmas present this was, was in flying form.  She was all on for the hills again today, however, my performance on the four flights of steps down to the breakfast room seemed to convince her that she would have to make the rest her way in this life, alone if I was dragged out onto a mountain again.

It was a comedy and an agony getting down the stairs to breakfast.  I'm sure my squeals of pain, expressions of torture and my crippled gait must have convinced the other residents of the lounge that my wife was Christian Grey in drag and that I was some kind of willing gimp.  Occasionally I got a fit of the giggles at my own predicament.

A rest day was declared.  Today would be gentle.  I should have heard the alarm bells ringing.  "I think a little walk would be good for you to get your blood flowing and clear out the lactic acid in your muscles", she said.  I knew that resistance was futile.

The trip back to the room overlooking the sea was relatively pain free.  Great I thought, the pain is easing.  I could move my legs, but they still felt stiff and swollen.

Returning to ground level brought the painful truth into stark reality.  Going down the steps was still excruciating.  From the many tales of childbirth I have heard, this was something similar, only twice as bad.  I had two legs in labour simultaneously, while women have only one birth canal.  Going uphill was just an acceptable level of pain, a bit like a raging tooth abscess.

Having gained the level footpath outside the hotel, I found that I could walk in a fairly normal and pain free way and maintain a reasonably respectable pace.  I was occasionally overtaken by little old ladies with walking canes. They graced me with pitying toothless smiles, understanding my pain and looked witheringly at the rapidly departing back of my spouse.

After about ten minutes of this bear like gait, I gained confidence and a bit of speed.  The little old ladies were soon left behind and checking my walking app, I found that my pace was around 3.5 to 4 km/h.  "Not too bad", I thought.

At the end of the street I stepped off the kerb onto the road surface to cross to the other side. It was the first downhill stretch since leaving the hotel and every fibre in my body screamed out in protest. My vision blurred and I felt a swoon coming on. Fortunately Caroline had sensed my difficulty and appeared like a Florence Nightingale vision at my side to steady me.  That 6 or 8 inch step almost killed me.

I learned my lesson.  Level is painless, uphill is tolerable, downhill is going to be a bit of a problem. The next 50 or so metres was fine.  It was level, but then came the descent to the beach.

We were passing the Parador Hotel and crowds of geriatric guests were emerging to head for a day at the beach. I mingled with them and observed their arthritic movements. I learned from them how to move downhill with less pain. So far the day of rest was going wonderfully well.

I had no hat and the sun was now beginning to beat an insistent tattoo on my naked skull.  Caroline was trawling through the sun-glasses sections of one beach stall and I spotted a rather elegant straw hat that would fit the bill perfectly. One less discomfort to deal with.

Checking my trusty walking app, I realised that I had already covered in excess of 1.3 km.  That wasn't too bad.  Only another 1.2 km to the turning spot where we would return to the hotel to complete the 5 km walk to loosen up my limbs and get the lactic acid flowing again.

The turning point passed somehow. But I should have known that would happen.  I was persuaded to continue on to the cliff-top village of Maro, where I was promised a rest, a coffee and a bun.

We climbed a gentle incline and soon Nerja, it's suburbs and beach life were left behind in the shimmering heat haze.

Fields and crops and plastic "glass" houses began to appear.

Sure signs that we were leaving civilisation and heading out into that parched hell again.

I could see an aqueduct in the distance, now behind us.  The last water anywhere around.  I felt a momentary panic coming on, but then I remembered the 2 litres of cool water in my backpack.

I was actually enjoying the walk though.  I found the agriculture and the waterworks to feed the veggies quite interesting and reflected on our own water situation back home.  I wondered if the Spanish farmers had to pay for all of this infrastructure and how was it metered and how much did it cost?  Who paid for the leaks?

We took a detour off the main road to get away from the traffic and the dust and crossed the riverbed (dry) via a large and impressive single arch bridge.  This was the old main road and once carried the bulk of trade and commerce along the coast.

Behind the old bridge, you can see the two supports of the current coastal route, while behind that you can make out the many arches of the Aquila Aqueduct, of which, more later.

Behind the aqueduct runs the motorway. In my many trips to Spain since my late teens I have travelled most of this motorway from the French border to Cadiz and witnessed its construction over many years.

Their patchwork construction method reminded me of Ireland's approach to road construction.  It was built in sections just long enough to make you relax into your journey. Then they would shift you back onto the narrow, winding old "main" road to wake you up again.

You had only stopped complaining, when you were shifted once again, through another maze of cones and back onto another lovely section of motorway.  Today, I think the road is almost totally completed.  I wonder if I'll ever get to drive its full length?

Maro turned out to be really boring.  Maybe it was my endorphin and pain dulled brain, but I felt nothing for the place. Perhaps it is different in the summer. However as we moved down a side street to work our way back toward Nerja, something exciting happened.  The church bell began to ring. 1.10pm was a strange time to be ringing a bell and it was being quite insistent in it's jarring tone.

Windows and doors on the sleepy streets were opened.  Sleepy heads poked out from behind shutters, dogs barked and small clumps of neighbours gathered in animated conversation looking toward the tiny church at the end of the street.  Then the clamour stopped and everyone went back to their siestas, except for us and a few cats disturbed from their slumber.  I'm not sure the natives were any wiser than we were, as to the cause of the religious racket.

So Maro was to be the turning point.  This is where we were to sit down and enjoy a leisurely coffee and a bun in a cafe, but the route we followed seemed to assiduously avoid any signs of food or sustenance.

Don't get me wrong, we did stop and rest.  We drank half of our water and ate some buns and other goodies from the rucksack on my back. There was no risk of hunger or thirst.

Heat does funny things to you brain.  We were well on our way back to Nerja when I spotted a signpost for "Las Cuevas de Nerja" or something like that.  This is probably the main tourist feature of the region and I had been there almost 30 years ago, before the motorway.  I suggested a diversion and divert we did.

My limbs had loosened up a bit and the pain had receded to the level of a migraine in my legs.  I've had migraines in my head before when I eat too much cheese, so I knew my legs would survive and that it wouldn't prove fatal.  I tucked the pain away in a well insulated compartment in my head and sacrificed the direct route back to the hotel.

Strangely enough, Caroline did put up some resistance to this diversion.  She was concerned that I might be asking too much of myself, but in the end, I persuaded her to join me on this nostalgic trip. After all, another 20 or 30 km wouldn't mean anything to her.  I married a thoroughbred.

As it turned out, nostalgia and deja vu aren't all they're cracked up to be.  The cave was less than a km from the sign, so I wasn't adding much to the walk.  I didn't remember anything of the place, it had been completely redeveloped in recent decades and the caves were only open in the afternoon to guided groups.  We made plans to return in the morning and after a short wander around the grounds, we set out to return to the town of Nerja.

The road back was dusty and occasionally noisy, but fortunately most of the traffic was on the new
motorway and our road was relatively quiet.

We recrossed the earlier river bed and got a closer view of the impressive Aquila Aqueduct. This was constructed to carry water to a local major industry.  A sugar factory built by a local benevolent landowner.  Like most sugar factories today, the place is now derelict, but has an imposing chimney stack with nice brickwork.

From the main bridge over the rio, we also got a different perspective on the old single arch bridge.  There are caves in the cliffs to the left hand side of the valley, some of which appear to be or have been recently inhabited.

One cave in particular looked like it might have been the residence of an artist, judging from the colourful array of paraphernalia around it.

The photo doesn't show the caves, but I was distracted by some strange noises emanating from the small fields and sheds below me.  Here I saw several horses, various fowl and what looked like a suckling sow of considerable size.

However, none of these appeared to be making the curious sound.  Finally a small black goat appeared and scampered madly about the place.  Mystery solved.

The remainder of the journey to my bed passed off without incident.  All that happened was a repeat of yesterday.  I got slower and movement became more difficult and painful.

We returned to the hotel I took some more anti-inflammatories and lay down for a while.  Caroline provided a welcome coffee and I must have dozed off for a while, because I felt better when I woke and suggested we go out for a bite to eat and discuss plans for the following day.

The restaurant was one of three suggested by one of the hotel staff. Caroline, being Caroline chose to head for the one furthest away. It was closed. Luckily for her the restaurant we did dine in proved to be superb and I sated my appetite on a wonderful beef steak with a delicious pepper sauce.

My funny kind of rest day turned out to have covered one kilometer more than the previous day and slightly more up and down also.  What kind of madness has possessed me?  How will I feel tomorrow?

Spring Water and Lemons

Day two dawned bright and just a bit too early.  We hung around for the "early" breakfast at 9.30 and then headed off to Lidl to buy some food and water for the day ahead.  By about 11.00, we were looking for parking in Frigiliana, the quaint touristy mountain village of this particular region.  Like Nerja, parking was a problem and we ended up finding a place at the bottom of the village.

I love my iPhone and especially love my new iPhone 6 with the slightly bigger screen, as opposed to the 6+ which is just an iPad Mini with a phone.  Actually, the phone seems to be going the way of the old transistor wireless, some of these monster phones are making the old Motorola Brick I had back in the late 80s look tiny.  I swear I saw a kid in Nerja with a 32" TV stuck to the side of his head and he chatting away to someone it.  Reminded me of the old Ghetto Blaster.

Anyhow, distractions aside and back to my toy.  For this walk I used an app called Wikiloc.  The previous night's surfing on the web led me to it and a most appealing looking route.  The app showed a route "Frigiliana to El Fuerte".  It was showing just 6.5km and 558m of ascent.  I was pretty confident I could handle that.

It turned out to be nice that we had parked at the bottom of the village and had to climb up through it to get to the start of the route. Frigiliana is a beautiful village and our leisurely warm-up through it's cobbled streets was a pleasure.  At the top of the village, we came across a lovely restaurant with beautifully tiled tables, that just had to be photographed.

However, when we eventually emerged on the upper side of the village, we struggled to find the start of the walk.  A German couple informed us that you could not walk from where we were to that summit you could see in the distance, because there was another valley in between.  It sounded a bit like that old Irish line of "if I was going to there, I wouldn't start from here".

By this time I had Wikiloc sorted and running and it was pointing me toward a starting point. Unfortunately I couldn't download enough detail to see tracks and trails, because my roaming data wasn't working properly.  However, by using my innate navigational skills I brought the start point to within 50m of me, but by now we were already on the route, only it didn't look quite right and seemed to be heading through someone's private property.

We came across three people doing something to the local water supply and asked them for directions.  Yep, we were on the track alright, "No problem", we were told, "carry on.  It is our property, but we allow access to the Parc National, by the way, would you like some lemons, we have loads of them".

We thanked them for their kindness and said we didn't need any lemons at the moment, but we might see them on our descent.

We headed out into the sparsely wooded hillside and what passed for a forest in Spain.  Our Irish forests must seem like jungles to the Spanish whenever they come here.  Apparently it is the rainfall that makes the difference.  But if you ask me the only difference the rainfall makes is that the ground is softer here in Ireland.  Within moments, even in the depths of the forests, we were creating our own dust storms.

The German tourists of earlier had been anything but Germanic in their planning, or they were deliberately trying to put us off the trail.  There was no intervening valley.  Indeed there was no respite from the continuous climb.  It was around this point that I began to think in Metres as opposed to Feet and finally got a sense of what lay ahead of me.  I was about to climb a Spanish mountain on the same scale as Carrantuohill.  El Fuerte was just 50m lower than Ireland's highest mountain.

To add to my anxiety, I realised that by parking at the bottom of the village and taking that leisurely stroll up its streets, I had added another 200m to the advertised height of the climb and another 3km each way to the walk.  This was becoming a challenge.

Up and up we went.  It wasn't mad steep, it was just steady and sustained.  But the going underfoot, while dusty, was also easy and well maintained.  There was ample evidence all along the route, that this was a well managed and cared for area.  The trail was well used but the only litter we came across were the peelings of a single orange under the pine tree where we stopped for lunch.

The walk also brought out the latent botanist and hidden chef in me as I tried to identify the many aromatic herbs we encountered.  We came across Rosemary, Sage, Juniper, Alyssum and many more. All we were missing was a bit of parsley.  The smells were gorgeous and many of them were in bloom.  This was their wet season.

I also wondered about this thing.  It looked like a kind of rolled up cobweb and I wondered what kind of monster had created that.  It was only after posting the photos of the caterpillar train on my Facebook page that I was informed that those very same caterpillars had built them.  Funny thing that, because I did see one of these nests with a big juicy caterpillar embedded in it.  I thought to myself, should I rescue it?  Good thing I didn't, as Ben tells me that their hairs are poisoned and can kill a dog or make an adult quite ill.  I'll come back to this later in the week in a subsequent post.

Up and up we went.  As I mentioned, we had lunch in the shade of a small clump of pine trees.  One of the pleasant things about this walk was that we were walking along the crest of a ridge and pretty much any breath of wind wafted over us keeping us slightly cooled.

You soon began to appreciate the benefit of being slightly cooler, whenever the crest climbed above the trail and robbed us of that slight draft we were quickly roasted alive.

During lunch, we entertained ourselves, or at least I did, by watching the ants making off with the crumbs we dropped. Ants are something Spain does really well.  They come in all kinds of shapes and sizes and deliver stings or bites of varying intensity from mildly irritating to bloody painful.  It serves you well to check carefully where you plan on sitting and to move your derrier occasionally lest they take you for a large incubator and begin laying eggs in your pockets.

Spanish ants make Spanish bulls look playful.

It turned out to be about a two hour tramp to the summit overall.  Arriving at the top felt like an achievement.  I was happy to be there and loved the fine views up and down the mountain range.

It is sobering to reflect on the history of this summit.  There was once a fort on the summit, I noticed some walls as I approached it.  In 1569 the last of the Moors were defeated and the Moorish women are said to have thrown themselves to their deaths from the cliffs at the top of this mountain, rather than submit to the Roman Catholic victors.

Such was the cruelty of the conquering Christians of that time and their insistence that the Moors convert to Christianity and give up their culture and traditions, that many chose death.  There are harrowing parallels today in another part of this small world of ours, only the roles are reversed.

On a more pleasant note, because I didn't know the bloody history until later, the return trip was a good one, back down the way we had come up.  As I descended further, I began to slow.  The climb had taken a lot out of me and unbeknownst to myself, I had become quite dehydrated.  The last 20 minutes to catch up with Caroline proved to be quite painful.  I hobbled down the steps beside the house of the lemons to join Caro where she sat perched on a wall, playing Candy Crush.

I leaned on the wall for balance, afraid that if I sat, I might never get up again.  Caro drew my attention to the house behind the high gates.  It was beautiful and as we stared at it, its owner emerged like a vision and invited us in to view his home.

Dr. Peter Peeters, a physicist, and his wife Claire Van Velsen had retired here about 15 years earlier and renovated this old Molino into a place of beauty. They had constructed an organic garden and wildlife refuge on the edge of the Parc where they frequently encountered wild mountain goats and boar on and around their patio.

I was pleased to hear that there were wild boar on the mountain, as on the ascent, I had seen what I suspected were signs of their rooting and their spoor.  I recognised this from a trip in the Sierra de Cazorla further to the north many years back, where we had seen a family of wild boar, mammy, daddy and a string of piglets, who passed us by, during the night as we camped out under the stars.

Peter had taken to writing to fill in time and has had a number of books published, which Caroline and I will read over the coming months.  I'm looking forward to the upcoming release of his most recent work, "A Journey through time and Africa", a recounting of a life changing trip they made in the 1980s.  We were shown the draft and it looks riveting.

It was here that we spent our last hour on the mountain in pleasant conversation, sipping delicious, cool spring water into which had been squeezed fresh organic lemon. For the way I was feeling right then, this is what I imagine heaven must taste like after emerging from the furnaces of hell.

We said goodbye to our hosts and their lovely cat and descended the last 200m to the car, rejuvenated. However, I was very much aware that all was not well with me from the waist down.  My legs didn't always feel like they were part of me and at times we seemed to have a divergent agenda.  It was a strange sensation walking on legs that had so obviously had been drinking heavily, while the top half of me was sober as a Judge.

On our return to our apartment at the top of the hotel, Caroline took pity on me and cooked a dinner so I wouldn't have to walk anywhere.  Bed-time couldn't come fast enough.  It was weird, I had thoroughly enjoyed the walk and the day, but all I wanted to do was sleep.  Even drink couldn't entice me to move, besides, my legs were already drunk and I was sure they would have a really bad hangover in the morning.  No point in my head joining them.  Anyhow, tomorrow is to be a rest day, so I wanted to get in a bit of practice for it, or that is my excuse.

The Details
The Summit of El Fuerte stands at 988m according to my tracker, while the map gives a spot height of 1007m, just 37m short of Ireland's highest peak.  The tracker gave us a starting altitude of 288m or a rough ascent of 700m, though the actual worked out at about 150m more when you took the rolling nature of the ridge into account.  Our total walking distance that day came to about 14km.

Since my return from Spain I have received the Bad Elf GPS Logger I had hoped to bring with me for greater accuracy.  It seems I will just have to make another trip out there to test it properly, though I did purchase the tracker for sailing purposes, you can't really test for altitude when you are supposed to be sailing at sea-level all of the time.