Cazorla

This was parked by the local policeman who is ready to supervise another Church procession. Written on the side is ‘Local Cazorla’. Cazorla is the town. I wonder what would happen if we did the same in the UK?

Many towns and villages have scenes constructed using tiles set into walls. These describe an aspect of their history. There may be as many as a dozen spread around the town or village. I’m not sure how they survive the weather but they are nice to look at and to try to translate.

We arrived here in Cazorla for a couple of nights and we knew what to expect as we came four years ago. It’s an amazing town, hanging tightly on the flank of a small mountain range and looks spectacular in day but particularly by night.

The funny thing is that our first walk into town on Saturday evening, coincided with the town’s procession in honour of their patron saint, Virgin de La Cabeza. I think this translates to Virgin of the Head. Hmmm not sure what happened there. 

This procession was a little less formal than the one in Ronda a couple of weeks ago, some people were wearing jeans! We enjoyed watching with the same or enhanced concern for the ‘icon carriers’ who seemed to have adjusted their carrying height using their footware (or not)!

In our three road trips to Spain we have been slightly in awe of the way that the generations integrate during the evening. After the procession passed through the towns very narrow streets and finished at the spectacular ‘open air’ church, the town went quiet. We found a bar and sat outside with a beer and enjoyed the slight too-ing and fro-ing. One beer turned into a ratione of tapas and then another beer.

We walked back through the streets to the other side of town and as we wandered, tables began to fill up. It wasn’t long before we found it hard to find a free seat. Four generations were out. By the time we had eaten more tapas and were ready to walk back to the campsite, it was well after 10pm and the place was heaving, still four generations enjoying themselves together.

The Sierra de Calzorla continue from here to the north for many miles. It’s yet another huge range of rock pushing up through the ‘floor’ of olive groves, where cultivated and dense bush where it isn’t, as it’s too steep.

We moved a little north and planned a short walk up a valley with a rushing river, a popular spot when it’s busy, judging by the size of the car park.

It was already late morning but we just took water ‘as we are only going to walk a mile or two’. The scenery was terrific, the temperature was high but the track easy and we started off at a fast pace. We enjoyed this leg stretch and just kept going, looking at the deep pools, full of fish and interesting rock formations.

We turned around at the small hydro-electric plant and walked back at the same pace. In all about 11 miles at about 18 minute miles 💪

What idiots we were not to take a snack. We were nearly fainting by the end.