Extremadura

Heading south west from Segovia you travel parallel to the Sierra de Guadarrama through the town of Avila. Eventually we turned left (south) and aimed for Puerto del Pico in what must be the same range of mountains. This area is called Sierra de Gredos and they form a seriously high chain with plenty of peaks at 2,300m. Even during this last week of May there was a lot of snow on the peaks - not just patches. I think they must have been the same slow start to Spring as in the UK.
Having gone through the pass, we traversed the southern side of the mountains and wandered through lovely villages that sit between mountain and plain. This is La Verra, an area of Extremadura, producing Pimentón (Paprika) and the half timbered houses are beautiful.

We camped in Madrigal de la Vera but had to position the Landy very carefully between four trees - exactly specified by the campsite owner. He’s almost certainly related to the family of UK Caravan Club wardens.

We had bought fish from the supermarket in Segovia - Dorado, which is a Sea Bream as far as we know. The nice fishmongeress offered to de-head it, de-fin it and then she opened it up without de boning it. So we cooked the two “spatchcock style” on the bbq.

This site was empty, save for a few Spanish families already occupying their homes from home. The kids were playing outside until 10 or 11pm and didn’t make a sound in the morning until well after “normal” get-up time. Were are quite close to Madrid and Toledo so I suppose this is their country weekend and holiday area.
I got excited as a whole load of ex-US Army trucks and jeeps turned-up at a large resturant just outside the camp gates. They must have been coming to a rally but even by the time we left the next day, there was no sign of activity.
We stopped in Jarandilla de la Vera and the guy in the tourist information centre on the main road was almost falling out of his kiosk to say hello - he’d seen the Land Rover as we drove past and parked just along the road. Short of having small children in tow the Land Rover is the best conversation starter there is!
This guy was an expert at drawing and writing - across the counter and upside down on the area map that he gave us. There’s a myriad of things to do - one of which was to not be phased by the Paradores hotel entrance and go inside the castle, grandly titled Castillo de los Marqueses de Jarandilla y Condes de Oropesa.

So we did and as it was pouring with rain we stayed inside and had morning coffee in the public area cafe. We actually stayed for ages as every time I looked outside the water was cascading through the tree by the door. Once we had really been in for quite long enough I stood up, put-up the umbrella and went outside only to find that it wasn’t raining at all and the water was coming off a gargoyle thing on the roof gutter.
The next stop recommended by Señor ƃuᴉʇᴉɹʍuʍopǝpᴉsd∩ was to the hill village of Guijo de Santa Bárbara where the village fete was in full swing. Nothing was really happening except that there were a few little stalls, the village lads were outside the bar and there was a huge queue for something.

So we had a wander and asked what the queue was for. It was for lunch - so we joined in and spent the next 45 mins in the queue watching everyone else greeting each other in that nice “European” custom of a kiss on each cheek - irrespective of gender. The food was a plate of Migas and washed down with a plastic cup of local wine.

Migas is an ancient dish made with stale bread (ha ha just realised how that reads!) soaked in water and then fried with garlic, paprika, bacon and olive oil. Unsurprisingly it tasted a little dry but the wine helped. There wasn’t another tourist in sight and we could have stayed all afternoon - something must have been planned as there was a stage set up but knowing how late it would probably be before things might have got going, we pushed on.
Just over these mountains at their south easterly end is another valley in which the Rio Jerte flows. This is major cherry growing country and we drove past a cooperative building with dozens of crates outside and people with vans. So, sensing a major cherry buying spree we stopped and walked back only to find that the vans were being load with empty crates rather than unloaded with full ones. Slightly a deflated we walked back to the Land Rover - victims of late Spring.
We moved on to a campsite close to the Parque Natural de Monfragüe where it was European Cup Final evening and who should we park behind? a Spanish watcher of the match, with his TV in the awning and on full volume. I believe that the match went to penalties but by then even I had dropped to sleep.
The next day we packed-up and then drove into the park and selected a short walk defined as easy. This would be a circular walk, taking us down to the massive lake and up to an eyrie crag which promised good views of the birds of prey for which the area is famous. There are about three hundred pairs of rare Black vultures (2.5m wingspan) which are the largest birds of prey in Europe and also Griffon Vultures.

The walk was easy enough, a bit narrow and a bit steep but the interesting part was when we got to a footbridge across one of the lake inlets. It seems that as well as a late Spring it must have been a wet one as only the handrails were visible.

Spurred-on by well wishers, I rolled-up my trousers, tied my boots around my neck and waded across. As I did, Dawn, un-deterred by on-lookers, took off her trousers, tied her boots around her neck and waded across!

Once over and appropriately dressed again, we climbed up the steep path to the top where we had amazing views of the birds, as the large Black ones soared above us and the Griffons soared below.