Rambling 31 Safety Notices

Rambling for this season has now come to an end but here are a few of our May walks which, due to the easing of restrictions, was a nice change and allowed us to ‘stray’ further from home and explore less well known areas.

Castellar de la Frontera

The terrain, overlooked by the old fortress at Castellar, was very varied, from brushing through tall prickly undergrowth (scratched legs for those of us in shorts!) to striding across glorious flower-filled meadows , then scrambling a short sandstonehill to reach a lovely high ridge, with fantastic 360 degree views, where we were very happy to sit and have our picnics in the shade. A lovely stroll skirting the lake (reservoir?) in the afternoon just about finished us off (literally as it was pretty hot ) but again, the terrain changed dramatically with a “ tree graveyard” and a boulder strewn landscape to negotiate until we climbed up back to the roadway to return to our cars (total distance almost 12k). Flora and fauna were abundant and much appreciated -we were constantly surrounded by hundreds of beautiful butterflies (Monarchs I think, mostly) Eagles circling over the lake looking for fish, a lovely friendly donkey who came running to his fence to greet us (sadly we had no fruit to give him) and a particularly evil -looking red-striped oil beetle all grabbed our attention. We later found out that the beetle is highly dangerous, thankfully none of us wanted to stroke him!

Los Reales

Eleven of us assembled for our Saturday ramble in the heights of Los Reales. Nice to see more people joining us, including old friends returned to Spain after being away for ages! Again led by Brian, who told us it was ‘a nice flat walk’ -those of us who are old hands always take Brian’s descriptions with a pinch of salt -he is well known for his undulations! However, the real highlight of this route was the fantastic views east and west along the Costa, across to Gibraltar and beyond to the Atlas Mountains in Morocco.

Benahavis

Our final ramble of the season was a comparatively short one, in order to rendezvous in the centre of the Pueblo by lunchtime for celebratory food and drinks with our non-walking friends. However, what the ramble lacked in distance was more than compensated for in its beauty and relatively easy strolling on a hot day. This 11th century Moorish village set at 500 feet above sea level offers stunning views of the Costa and surrounding countryside. Our 90 minute " stroll " took us up across the Guadalmina river and through lovely shady paths bordering a series of very attractive acequias threading along the side of the valley. Once again we were treated to a variety of wildlife -mainly waterborne-including frogs and toads, terrapins, colourful dragonflies, numerous butterflies and tiny darting fish. Having reached the entrance to the Golf Course at the halfway point we crossed the river again and meandered back along the other side of the valley, stopping to admire the natural dam and deep inviting pool along the way (fancy a dip anyone?). Finally, hot but happy we made our way to the centre of the village for lunch in the main square. Looking forward to the start of another fabulous rambling season in September -come and join us!

Submitted by Rachel Lucas