Found an amazing gorge and hiking trail in the middle of the Peloponnese. Stayed at a camper stop at Taverna Koustenis, Dimitsana (evidently the birthplace of the Greek struggle for independence against the Ottoman Empire in 1821). Walked the first section of the Menalon Trail 9.5 miles, total ascents of 3,000 feet and visits to three monasteries ( one from 983AD built into the rock face now just ruins, and the other two still active. The monks at the Prodromou monastery provided coffee and loukoumi.
Spring flowers on the Menalon Trail
Philosophou monastery perched on the cliff
Prodromou monastery built into the cliff face of the gorge
Prodromou monastery
Valerie in her wraparound at the monastery (women can’t wear trousers)
Front door of Podromou Monastery with bullet holes
Stayed at the campsite at Stoupa for a week and went on some great walks and a good bike ride. The countryside is fantastic for hiking but you have to watch out for paths on the map that disappear on the ground!
We travelled on the Anek Superfast ferry which from Venice took a long time – 32 hours. But it was a pleasant trip and as Anek is a Cretean company all the food was from Crete and surprisingly delicious.
The ferry was of course late and didn’t get to Patras until 1am. We’d decided to go to a campsite 30 minutes away rather than stay by the roadside and the man at Camping Kato Alissos couldn’t have been more helpful staying up until 2am to let us in!
Stayed at a Camperstop in the pretty village of Vila Viçosa In Alentejo on our way to visit a vineyard. Great big car park area, had some toilets, and we discovered a delightful restaurant in the park. The village had once been the home to the Bragança dynasty and has some amazingly huge buildings
We left Sanlucar de Barramada and our visit to Anne and Neil’s lovely house and entered Portugal, travelling to Evora, the capital of Alentejo, a place I’d visited many years ago in the 60s and 70s and has remained in my memory ever since.
Evora is a medieval walled town. It was a centre of trade during the time of the Moors and had its hey-day in the 14 to 16 centuries when it was favoured by the House of Avis, as well as artists and scholars. Then in 1580 Spain seized the throne, the royal court left and the town started to waste away. Its very fine old centre has been left undeveloped.
The narrow windy streets have white washed houses with either blue or ochra painted around the windows and doors.
Towering in the old town is the Templo Romano which is said to be a temple to Diana. It’s extremely well preserved and was apparently walled up in the Middle Ages to form a small fortress and then used as the town slaughterhouse! It’s pretty impressive. Throughout the whole Alentejo region you can find loads of Roman remains.
The Termas Romanas is easy to miss as it’s inside the local town hall. It was only discovered in 1987, includes a nine meter laconicum (steam room), and in 1994 they discovered an open air swimming pool! It’s quite surreal as you go into the town hall and there’s the laconicum and there are windows into people’s offices so you can look across and see them working and of course they have a window into Roman times.
All over Alentejo they have quite recently discovered both Roman and Moorish artefacts when carrying out developments.
Termas Romanas laconicum
The Capela dos Ossos is a very strange place. It’s within the Igreja de São Francisco and is a room lined with the bones and skulls of about 5000 people. It’s said it was the solution to overflowing graveyards decided upon by three 17-century Franciscan monks. It’s fairly creepy.
Capela dos Ossos
The Igreja de São João is a beautiful little church and well worth a visit. It has extraordinary azulejos(wall tiles) from the 18-C. It also has an underworld of an ossuary full of monks bones, and a deep Moorish cistern.
Azulejos in Igreja de São João
Ossuary under the church
We stayed in the campsite on edge of town. It’s one of those quite old tired campsites but it was perfectly ok and an easy 20 minute walk into town. There was also a sports area nearby where we could go for a pleasant morning jog!
We’ve discovered a whole area of Spain we’ve never been to before, and it’s fantastic ! We’re staying in a campsite just by the National Park – walking, cycling and guided tours in a 4×4 to see the birdlife.
Young griffin vulture with parent
Black stork sitting on eggs in her nest on the cliff face
Group of vultures
River Tejo
The griffin vulture has a wing span of almost 2 metres – they are huge. When you stop at viewpoints you can see dozens of vultures circling overhead.
Gum rock-rose
Wild lavender
Black stork sitting on her eggs
This is definitely a place we’re going to visit again … many times
Hurrah, back in Orgiva in the Alpujarras after an absence of several years.
Lovely walks around the beautiful hills and villages. Four walks in six days is pretty good for us! On one walk we decided to try to walk back on the GR-7 path but kept losing the waymarks finally realised there was far too far to go and we needed to catch the last bus down the mountain this involved us climbing over a barbed wire fence and sliding down a steep bank to get to the road where we were able to wave down the bus!
Also went to a yoga class in Orgiva
And now off to Extremadura where we’ve not been before but has been recommended to us by people we’ve met on the campsite.
This is a strange place that some people on a campsite told us about. It’s a commercial Aire situated at the port of the town Almerimar which was created some decades ago specifically as a tourist town. We met several people there in their vans who’d been there for months! calling it ‘velcro city’. We just stayed one night but it has a certain attraction. The weather is about 18C in the winter; there are cycle lanes everywhere – for miles along the coast; a nature reserve; loads of restaurants; lots of water sports (if you’re into that), and a swimming pool 10 minutes away in the main town. It could possibly be a place to spend some time over the winter!!!
Cabo de Gata is Europe’s only desert. It’s a Nature Reserve and people say that this is what the coast of Spain used to be like. Of course it’s a little sanctuary in the corner of the ‘garden’ of Spain, so you have to drive through wall-to-wall ‘plasticos’ before you reach it. But once there, wow it’s beautiful.
We visited a few years ago but it was in late June and it was much too hot, but early May is a good time. Lots of walking routes, temperature low to mid 20s with a lovely breeze. 12 miles the first day, 7 the second and another 12 miles the third. The campsites there are all fairly large but at this time of the year there are not many people and the facilities are good.
Water wheel
Windmill
The morning’s catch
View from the restaurant
Plenty of windmills as it’s a pretty windy place
For our last night we stayed on a camperstop – the car park by the beach of a fishing village, intending to buy some fish in the morning. But they were all much too big for us!!!
We stayed three nights in Madrid mainly to visit the museums.
We re-visited the Reina Sophia to see Picasso’s Guernica and a multitude of other modern artists including Salvador Dali, Georges Braque and Madrid-born Juan Gris. The Prado gave us the Spanish painters – Goya, Velazquez, Ribera and El Greco gets included), and then we went to the Thyssen-Bornemisza museum for the first time. What a collection! Here are a few photos.
Kandinsky – Delicate Tension No. 85
Picasso – Bullfight
Lichtenstein- Woman in Bath
Georgia O’Keeffe – White Iris No.7
Dali- Dream caused by the flight of a Bee around a Pomegranate a Second before Waking up
Chagall – The Grey House
Picasso – Harlequin with a Mirror
Hopper – Hotel Room
Van Gogh – The Stevedores in Arles
If you are going to visit these galleries and you’re over 65 take your passport as you’ll get in half price.
We stayed in the Osuna campsite which had mixed reviews but we found it absolutely fine and positively leafy.
We got the metro into town very easily.
And of course not to forget the Sunday morning market
