"A walk could cure most all my blues
bare feet or in my two shoes.
I think I'll go on a walkabout
Find out what it's all about."
~Excerpt from "Walkabout" by Red Hot Chili Peppers
(click to enlarge)What does one do for fun when they have a three day weekend, and a tight budget. Walk. I suppose there are many other things to day, but walking is what I chose.
From the edge of my town,
Lerbija, you can see some "mountains" in the distance, I have wanted to go explore a bit, and decided to make a weekend out of it. Well, a fellow teacher recommended that I make it to
Arcos de la Frontera.
Arcos is in the same direction as the moutain/hills I want to go to so I figured I would B-line it over the hill/mountains and walk to
Arcos. I looked at Google maps and such to consult distances and how long to plan for, etc. A professor volunteered to drive me to the next pueblo,
El Cuervo, because the walk from here to there is rather boring. Half way between
El Cuervo and
Arcos, is a small town called
Gibalbín. It is at the base of the hill/mountains I was walking towards. Google said that the first half was 16km, the second stretch was 14km. I planned to split it up into two days to take time to read and wander.
So Friday morning I packed up my things and arrived at school. After his class, Juan Viel drove me to the next town. There in El Cuervo I picked up €9 of fruit, bread, cheese and started along the road. Not 10 minutes down the road and someone pulled over asking if I wanted a ride to Arcos, which I turned down because I wanted to walk to see the country side at a slower pace. I was surprised, because I had heard that hitching was difficult in Spain these days. We chatted for a minute or two until the car behind him started honking, he ended up being a good friend of the PE teacher here at
El Fontanal, my school.
I continued down the road until I cross there highway, where then started to make my way through the country side, mostly farmland. I ran into one of the owners at a gate and asked if I could pass through. She said no because of the bulls in the fields, it would be too dangerous. But the bulls are in their pens so I walked a little further down the road and jumped the fence when she was gone.
I could see some bulls up ahead and tried to make sure that there weren't more than I knew about. As I was walking up the fence row, in case I needed to get on the otherside quick, I saw a few lumps in the shade. I had seen some lumps early in the distance and when I had passed them made sure they weren't bulls, but I didn't want to assume the same about every lump. So I pulled out my camera and took a picture and then in the preview mode zoomed in to get a be view. I couldn't quite make it out what it/they were. It was then that I saw these tracks.
I stood and thought for a moment and couldn't decide if they were bull or not so I figured I better just keep going and make for the fence if the lumps in the distance move. Upon closer examination the lumps were just logs, so no problem there. On I went until the next fence, where I started up a water channel in a vineyard.
I had to duck and run the first bit because there was a farmer in a tractor below. I quickly realized that the countryside was not the fastest route. The brown countryside that I thought would be covered in dead grass was mostly dirt, or at least it was dirt two days before, but it had rained the previous day.
After crossing through the vineyard and another mucky field or two I was considerably closer to the mountains than I thought, and that they didn't seem like mountains at all from the new proximity. They were just hills, but at least they were greener and that meant less mud. I started up the greener fields and found a service road that went to the cell phone towers. I didn't get on the road because I think from that side of the fence there was nothing stopping the bulls from wondering my way. I was walking and heard a vehicle coming up the road. I debated running to a bush or something but it sounded too close, they would probably just see me and be more pissed that I am on their land and trying to hide it. It is better to just claim ignorance. The man asked me where I was going and what I was doing and where I was headed.
I couldn't tell whether his response was that I couldn't go that way because a. it was his land and he didn't want me on it, or b. there just isn't a road that goes to the town I was headed to. So he said to turn around and take the road, but at this point I had already invested 2-3 hours walking through the countryside and wasn't going to backtrack. I waited for him to leave and had lunch in an abandoned shack. I continued up the hill and found something that put me both at ease and on edge, a horde of used shotgun shells. 1. Comforting because it meant that people walked there and didn't get gored by bulls. 2. It meant that the people whose land I was trespassing were armed.
Well kept trekking and crossing over the ridge wasn't as easy as excepted. It is not that it was steep or anything, just that I was neck deep in thick Holly-ish-painful bushes, but I wadded through and crossed an Olive grove, and through a field of dead sunflowers until I finally made it to
Gibalbín. I arrived in the town around 4:30 and was tired. Kicking the mud off my shoes every 5min will interrupt the flow and joy of walking. I wasn't thrilled with the country route not only because of the mud and torro scares but because it felt dishonest sneaking around hiding from farmers, and I
hate dishonesty. I found a bar to rest in a while to think about the weekend.
(there aren't really many restaurants, mostly bars that serve tapas)For €1.50 in
Gibalbín you can get a glass of wine, refill you hydration system, refill the ole TP stash, and find out which road goes to
Arcos...really the only thing that you have to pay for is the wine. After a good sit and the wine, I felt much more energized and ready to walk some more. Back to the road and I planned to stay the the roads from then on...I think it is fast the trying to walk as the crow flies anyway. The road after
Gibalbín was much pretty which is also a great motivator. Well it was nearing 6:30 at that point and sundown is 8:30 so I was starting to look for a place to pitch a tent so that I would have time to read a bit before the light went away, but at the same time I wanted to make it to
Arcos in the first day. So I stuck my thumb out and a few cars later I was traveling 100km/hr as opposed to 6km/hr. Curro picked me up and we made it to
Arcos in no time. He was very knowledgeable about the trees and wildlife and pointed out what tree was what, all of which was forgotten in a matter of seconds because I can't learn it unless I see it spelled, but cool nonetheless. He is a Geologist in
Sevilla, which explains knowing of the name of every tree we passed.
Well, he didn't just take me to
Arcos but about 20km further, to a campground in a gorgeous area called
Algar. I told him how very grateful I was for the lift and he said it was nothing. He was just driving home and didn't mind taking the long way since it had been a while since he had been in that area and it was a beautiful drive. He had been in my same situation before, a poor traveling 20-something, and every country he visited there was always someone willing to go out of their way to show him the best of their country, I suppose the one redeeming thing about patriotism, and they are his examples about how to treat a foreigner. You really couldn't ask for a better first hitching experience. In
Algar I walked down to a lake to camp for the night under a cliff. I did a little exploring before sundown and found a lot of what I am sure is natural marble.
Super guay.
I stopped in the town of
Algar the next morning
and had the cheapest
cafe in Spain thus far, €.80. The bar was full of old timers with the sweater vests and wool caps, and then there was me with my frisbee jersey, short athletic shorts and chacos, and my backpack in the corner.
Back on the road I was able to see all of the beautiful things we had driven past the night before but at foot-pace. The area was beautiful.
Grazalema, a mountain, was off in the distance, there are fields of sheep, and old timers ridding their bicycles around the roads, it seemed to have more of a Irish feel that Spain.
I walked and walked and walked. I stopped to take pictures of a cow here and there, or the Eucalyptus trees (brought here years ago).
Algar is the only area I have seen those. When I got tired I would stop for some avocado on bread, or a plum, or whathaveyou.
Finally I arrived in
Arcos de la Frontera, a beautiful small town on the top side of a cliff. I arrived at siesta time so I had to sit and wait a while to get into the tourist center to get a map and a find the nearest cheapest campgrounds. I was directed to the Lagos de Arcos Camping, really close to a lake. I spent the evening reading and drying wet clothes.
The last day, Sunday, I walked up into town in search of the bus station. Curro, my hitching guide, told me to call him because he was going to return to Sevilla that Sunday and that I could ride back if I wanted. I tried calling numerous times but it always said that he was unavailable and to call back another time. I debated walking out to the highway where he found me and waiting until he came by, but by this point I was tired and just wanted to get home. So on the next bus I hoped. Of course, 5 min after leaving, he called and said he was going to be leaving soon if I wanted to come. Oh well, the bus back was only €7.60. So in all my weekend cost me around €20 I think including 2 nights of camping, my meals and 156km. Not too bad.
It wasn't the most eventful of weekends, but that isn't what I was looking for. I was once railed for expressing my opinion that exercise is great for mental health, and happiness, which I still stick to, and the beginning of the week I noticed I was happier and more energetic...however, I am biased and could have been looking for my confirmation. The comment was made to a group of female friends, so suggesting more exercise to girls was maybe not the smartest idea, because the word is inextricably connected to physical fitness and body-image, touchier subjects for women than for men...I could have worded and prepped the thought a lot better, but I am pretty sure it is
scientific. I need to find more things to do to keep physically active and now that I am moving to Lebrija, I will have considerably more time. I think that I would like to get a road bike while I am here...I could see a lot more in the same amount of time. Our apartment is right on the edge of town so I could be touring the countryside in a matter of minutes if I decided...perhaps once I start doing the private English lessons I can save up for one.
See the rest of the journey HERE.
