Week 2 at the finca and on Sunday we went on a trip to the
nearby town of Altea. We think it used to be a fishing village back in the day,
but is now more of a posh tourist destination. We arrived in the middle of an
eco-fair so had a bit of a wander round the stalls selling eco-friendly soaps, hippie
clothes, jewellery and little wooden animals.
We sat down on the grass for a while to listen to a bongo
band, and watch the locals dancing about.
While there we spotted another doppelganger
for our trip…..Hippie Steven Seagal. (see below)
There was also a guy doing some kind of
mime show/amateur dramatic performance but we refused to give him any of our
valuable attention.
Next we made our way through a series of cobbled streets all
lined by small whitewashed buildings. As we would alter see on our way back
through these were in fact lots of clothes and jewellery shops and several restaurants,
but this was about 4pm in the afternoon, so at this time everything was closed while
the Spanish had their nap.
Overlooking the town at the top of the hill was a large blue
domed church, and for some reason a fake-plastic castle sat right in front of
it.
All the signs asking visitors not to touch any of the religious ornaments
in 5 different languages made us think the church was open to the public,
however as I made my way round it became apparent that there was in fact a
coffin a the front and everyone else was stopping to greet and talk to the
mourning people on the front row. Now maybe that’s just how they do things in
these parts, but being unsure and not wanting to have an awkward moment when I
arrived at the front and was asked ‘Who the Hell are You’, I made a hasty
retreat….still at least I can cross ‘Crashed a Spanish Funeral’ off my To Do
list.
After a tour along the beach front down to the marina, we
made our way back to the eco-fair where we had arranged to meet up for a lift
back to the finca. However not conforming to our racial stereotypes in the slightest,
our German hosts were surprisingly unpunctual and were nowhere to be found.
Still on the bright side the delay did give us time to catch the Barca v Real
Madrid match at a local bar.
A couple of days later and we set off on another expedition,
our intention this time was to climb ‘Lizard Mountain’ which we can see from
the finca terrace. I’ve decided it’s called Lizard Mountain because the rock
faces looks like there are two giant Lizards crawling up the side, however if
you want to look it up it’s possible the Spanish may have named it something else.
We had been told there was a path up from the village round
the other side of the mountain, but that would mean at least a 3-4 mile walk
before we even started the climb (and the same back again) so we decided we
would see if there was a path up the side nearest to us……the short version of
the following story is there wasn’t.
Looking across from our side of the valley we could see a
path snaking its way up the mountain, all we had to do is find where it met the
road on our side. The first route we chose down the hillside looked promising,
but after 10-15 minutes of walking we came to a lone caravan sat on a dead end.
So back up a little bit and along the next path, this one came out into an orchard,
and at the bottom we were only about 20m away from the dry river bed which the mountain
path surely linked too. However that 20m was filled with a small cliff edge
(only the height of a couple of people but probably too high to jump), and rows
and rows of thorn bushes embedded in it…so back we went again to look for a
third path through. This one took us down into a ploughed field, but there did
seem like there might be half a path at the bottom and we weren’t going to turn
around and go back a fourth time so scrambling over a few rocks and ever so
slightly making our own path, we made our way down onto the dry river bed.
We then spent the next hour walking the length of the riverbed
looking for a way to get up onto the path we had seen earlier on the mountain
which we were now right next to. However our old foe, cliff faces covered with
thorns, blocked the way at every turn. However that said it was actually quite
fun going along the now dry river, clambering over boulders and pushing our way
through the overgrown plants made us feel like explorers searching for lost reassure,
we didn’t discover any gold, but we did find this rock shaped like PacMan which
in many ways is just as good.
Eventually we arrived back at the point where the river
flows again (where we started our trip to the waterfall last week). Although we
could now have continued on up to the mountain path by this point the journey
had put a strain on Becki’s back so we would have to leave it there for today,
but for anyone who remembers the rule about mountains you know we’ll be back
here before we move on.
This last part is a bit like those ‘and finally’ sections
they have on American news, so here are a couple of little random things I’ve found
over the last week.
1.) After being given this coin in change in the ice-cream shop
in Altea, I assume pirate money is legal tender in Spain.
2.) While doing my morning sweep of the pool area, I found a
perfectly formed outer shell of a cricket. Now my theory was the cricket shed
it skin leaving this behind, but according to Svenja and Thorsten, the crickets
here don’t do that, which if they are to be believed only leaves the
possibility that something else sucked out all the insides!
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