December 1st - 7th 2006
Written by Geoff Forster
Up early. I worked all day on the PC.
Jane went to Algatocin to do some shopping.
Not a very exciting day, most of it was spent in the house.
The dogs got short walks and the donkeys got equally brief visits to feed them and give them a quick pat.
We've been sent some more photographs which were taken by Hannah Nichols on a recent trip to Andalucia.
Mesembryantheums.
Relections.
Relections 2.
Thanks to Hannah for three great photographs.
It rained overnight which is great news. The skies are grey but its not raining.
The donkeys must have been standing out all night. Their coats go wavy along their backs as they dry out.
I walked with the dogs up the track by the house everything is lovely and fresh.
I worked all afternoon on the property section of the website. I hope to add a property a day over the next few weeks.
I added a lovely riverside cottage with a productive orange grove in Jimera de Libar.
(Property Link removed after website redesign in 2008)
This is Gaucín castillo. We didn't go to Gaucín today ... I forgot to put this on Thursdays blog.
This superb specimen of a Sweet Chestnut tree is growing under an outcrop up the track behind the apartment. It looks beautiful at the moment, yellow, orange and bronze.
There are seedlings everywhere. The North facing crags are covered in lichens, mosses, ferns and lush green young plants.
Very soon parts of the campo will be yellow as the Gorse and Broom bushes come into flower.
There are lots of these bushes in the campo above the house.
This is the first and only flower that I could find.
As the sun set I took this of the last rays through the undergrowth.
We cooked a spicy stir fry. With tandoori style chicken, bacon, red peppers, potato, baby broad beans and chilli.
Later we watched '8mm' starring Nicholas Cage. An original and disturbing detective movie. We'd both seen it before years ago but really enjoyed watching it again.
We're off to San Luis de Sabinillas and then to Casares today.
We've fed the dogs and donkeys and set off around 11:00h.
Firstly we called into the Post Office in Gaucín to post Christmas cards to the UK.
Then we went to San Luis de Sabinillas, firstly to 'The English Bookshop' for another romantic novel for Jane. Then to Lidl's where we buy mainly dairy products plus some meat.
It's a beautiful sunny day. The temperature sign outside the Farmacia read 24.5°C which is 77°F.
We stopped on the road up to Manilva to take some photographs.
This is looking East along the Costa del Sol.
We stopped again just before we got to Casares and climbed a small outcrop to get a good vantage point for some photography.
The wind turbines and Gibraltar.
This is Casares.
There were a couple of benches up there, although the path up was a sheep trail.
There was lots of wild Alyssum flowering around Casares.
As I climbed higher I was aware of the aroma of Thyme, There were woody bushes of it all over. I picked a few sprigs for the kitchen.
Jane had her camera. Here are a couple of her photographs from the outcrop.
We parked at the entrance to the pueblo. Wise in Casares as the plaza has limited parking and beyond the plaza the streets are very narrow.
In Casares we walked up through the plaza and went into this pretty little Ermita.
La Ermita de la Virgen del Rosario del Campo. It had a torrid time during the Civil war and has been rebuilt.
We needed a coffee so we called into a popular bar, La Mesón los Claveles. In summer it is full of tourists (like the rest of Casares). A beautiful day in December is the perfect time to visit!
In the mountain pueblos houses are often built with rocks as part of the structure.
We'd never seen one with a boulder protruding on the second floor before.
What is this house like on the inside?
Christmas decorations are appearing in some of the villages. Casares had a purple theme.
This huge development has great views back across to the older part of Casares and West along the Costa del Sol. Not a pretty sight with the cranes on the once beautiful ridge, hopefully they are low cost housing for local people.
We walked up to the Castillo. We've been up here before. It's not much of a castle and what's left of the walls looks to be made of fairly modern materials. It looks better from a few km away.
It does offer some great views so it is well worth the climb. Which seemed a lot easier than the first time we made this trip. (Are we both fitter now?).
Jane spotted a brave female rock climber.
We stood in the sunshine and watched her progress. There were a hundred plus Crag Martins flying down below as well.
She got to the top okay.
We went exploring. A Griffon Vulture soared passed us.
There's also a church at the summit that is being renovated.
Lots more Alyssum in great white mounds.
This cat was enjoying the evening sunshine. There's a sheer drop on the other side of the wall but it looked pretty relaxed about it.
There are a number of other ruins near the ruins of the castle. Not a lot of privacy in this bathroom.
These Aloe Vera succulent plants were huge and have flowers like red hot pokers.
A very striking plant, one of my favourites.
We walked back down from the castle.
I saw this Spotless Starling perched up high on a TV aerial.
I always remember our friend Marilyn when we see Spotless Starlings. She made a very witty remark about them being cleaner than UK Starlings.
I was happy as I photographed this bird that it was a female or juvenile Redstart.
Since I've got home and looked in the books I'm a little less sure. It's very brown for a female redstart and I'm not sure what's on its beak ...?
We took this as we drove out of Casares.
Jane was being blinded by the setting sun, so we pulled over just before the bridge over the Rio Genal below Gaucín.
This is the Sierra de Crestellina.
We crossed the Rio Genal and drove up towards Gaucín.
We stopped again to photograph the Costa del Sol and Gibraltar just after the sun had set.
The Riff mountains of Morocco are visible through the orange haze.
The moon was rising above Gaucín.
Photographed through the first Almond blossom that we've seen this year.
Jane took these.
We'd enjoyed our day out.
We watched a film 'Loaded Dice' on Movies4Men. A quite entertaining low budget film, made all the more entertaining by some terrible special effects and bad timing of sound effects.
We spent most of the day working on our new websites and the new property section of this website.
The dogs got walked up the track and the donkeys chomped their way through more straw and seed supplement. Rosie also had six small windfall oranges as a treat.
We cooked a chicken curry.
Later we watched 'To Catch a Killer' starring Brian Dennehy as John Wayne Gacy, a clever and ruthless killer who tortured and murdered 33 young men. Michael Riley plays Joe Kozenczak the cop on his trail. It went on for four hours, which we hadn't realised when we started watching it a 23:00h. So a bit of a late night.
A guest photographer today is our good friend Marilyn O'Loughlin. We're publishing her photographs of a windy day at sea, taken on Jersey because we've heard some great news.
Michael has got a transfer to Gibraltar so they'll be moving here early in the New Year.
Which is fantastic, we're both so pleased for them. Hopefully this means that we'll be seeing a lot more of them! We expect lots of photo's of Gibraltar in the New Year please.
Marilyn and Michael O'Loughlin.
A windy day off the coast of Jersey.
I love the last two of the ships in a stormy sea. Thanks Marilyn.
Today was a special exception ... we'd love to see and possibly feature your photographs of Andalucía. We're running out so if you've taken any photographs which you'd like us to feature please send them to us.
A beautiful day. A fiesta day in Spain, Día Constitución.
I woke up with a really bad headache (not a hangover!) which I couldn't shake all day.
I made a start on the Casares photographs that we took on Monday.
We decided to get some fresh air and went for a stroll around the village at 17:00h.
We called into Andrés Sánchez. A few people asked where we'd been as we haven't been down there for a few weeks.
We had a coffee in Pub Bar Dami before going for a walk.
It was getting dark but wasn't too cold.
We walked up to near the school.
This beautiful mare trotted across to see us.
The sky had a pink tinge as night fell. The lights were just coming on in Jubrique across the Genal Valley.
Looking North up the Genal valley to Alpandeire.
The plaza in Benarrabá.
We called into Café Bar Guayacán for a coffee.
Francesca, Caty's mother had been baking. A lovely Swiss roll. In Spain it is called 'Brazo de Gitano', arm of the gypsy, because usually they are chocolate flavoured and coloured.
The cake was very sweet and the sponge light, Yolanda added some cream and 100's and 1000's for the photo.
We walked home and took a couple of night shots of the village.
Newcastle United beat Reading 3-2. My headaches gone ... the pressures lifted.
We watched a film 'Mafioso' which was quite good, but not in the same league as 'The Godfather'.
A lovely day. We drove to Algatocín to buy groceries and a large sack of dog food.
On the way back we parked at a new 'Mirador' which are lay bys with views.
The Valle de Guadiaro.
Certainly a great view. West to Cortes de la Frontera and the magnificent Sierra de Libar.
This Griffon Vulture flew overhead, swiveled its neck down and round. Checked that we we still breathing and flew on.
The view over Salitre and the Valle de Guadiaro.
We turned off the A369 at the Benarrabá junction. We stopped to fill our water bottles from a spring not far down the road.
This is Genalguacil.
The Sierra Bermeja is the distant range beyond the Genal Valley.
At 16:00h. we decided to walk the dogs.
There was 90% cloud cover with strong sunlight coming through the gaps. This was creating wildly fluctuating light levels. The clouds were moving fast and the sunlight and clouds were creating stunning contrasts of bright light and deep shadows.
Here's Jane on the way down to el Chorruelo.
Splashes of autumn colour across the Genal Valley.
Love it or hate it ... Oxalis Pes-Caprae is everywhere, more than ever this year. When it flowers it is going to be incredible. This is one of the first.
I'm not sure what this plant is but it has very small beautiful star like flowers.
Genalguacil.
Jubrique.
Jane's teasing the dogs with a stick. It's one way to get them to stay still long enough for a photograph.
A shaft of sunlight hits the valley bottom. The Rio Genal flows left to right through this point.
Jane again. We enjoyed our walk so much that we carried on passed our usual turning point. We went on to a small copse of Cork Oak trees on a circular mound where the track begins to drop down to the Rio Genal at San Juan.
The Cork Oaks are beautiful. These were stripped of their cork earlier this summer.
Another in the ongoing faces in wood series .... Horse head ...?
The skies were begining to darken. It was just after 17:00h. The sun doesn't set until after 18:00h. but the heavy clouds were cutting out a lot of the light.
A few seconds later and light levels changed.
Benarraba and Mount Poron.
The distant Sierra de Crestellina.
The weather forecast had predicted 80% chance of rain. The clouds were coming in from the West very quickly, although there was no wind at ground level. They were looking heavier and blacker by the minute.
Jubrique.
We were still around an hours stroll from the house. This is Algatocin through a gap in the trees near 'La Piedra del Reyes'. Which you can see to the right of the track.
A gap in the clouds and its a lot lighter again.
A white horse in the twilight gloom. We got home just after 18:00h.
Back home we were both hungry so we had a pizza with lots of extra toppings.
We watched 'A Touch of Frost' followed by a Triad movie 'Carnival of Wolves' which was quite entertaining.