Faraján
Written by Geoff Forster
Faraján:We reached Faraján at around 2pm on a hot June afternoon. we were travelling on the MA-515 road and had just visited Alpandeire. We parked our car in a wide plaza and walked around the town.
At the bottom of the plaza was a pretty church.
On one side of the plaza is a recently built Ayuntamiento. (Town Hall) Of all of the pueblos we have visited so far have Faraján had the newest and biggest Ayuntamiento.
We headed off down a side street, a few streets later and we were starting to realise Faraján was very different to any pueblo we had visited before. Its streets were flat! They had all been resurfaced in an identical fashion. We wandered around & around .. hot work so we looked for a bar. Ten minutes later and still no bar .. we asked a local builder who left the site and walked through the streets with us for a hundred yards or more and pointed to the road not far from where we were parked. We thanked him and headed for the bar.
Refreshed after a cool beer and tapas. We headed for the car.
Faraján has been modernised! It has none of the charm of the other villages. Its streets are flat, bland and boring.
It must have money though, the Town Hall must have cost a lot as would the public works resurfacing all the streets.
We both voted Faraján the worst pueblo so far. We will return to give it a second chance. The photo below is about the best shot I managed.
I usually find something to photograph, in Faraján there was nothing, no flowers growing up twisting streets ... just a sad ginger cat in this doorway.
Still as usual the people were friendly and went out of their way to help. Something we are finding all the time. The Andalucian people are generous and so friendly. This photograph was from a 'Mirador' on the A369 road looking across the Genal Valley towards Faraján.