Day 51 – to (above) Torox

PART FOUR

Day 51 – to (above) Torox

I was keen to get into these Sierras and had a recommendation from a workman at the site that the mountain just above us was well worth the effort. It’s name, I only discovered on reaching the peak, is Peñón de los Calimacos. Similar to some of the peaks in the Sierra Cazorla it has a fire watch point at the top, this time called a Cabana de Bomberos. The guy there gave me some information on the surrounding area, that there is actually a rewilding project attached to the replanting of Spanish pine over the last ten years, as I mentioned yesterday. Someone is on duty here until the end of November, and they do have the occasional fire to report. August is the busiest month, but only this last weekend a group had camped actually here, just outside the gate of the building after the officer had left, and lit a fire for a barbecue. The officer needed to return to disperse them.

It’s initially a steep climb on very loose dusty rock, but then much more gradual. I returned a different way, keen to try out a run.. the first since April. It went okay.

Then I drove on past Malaga on the autovia which was every bit as busy as I expected. I stopped for fuel, and at a Mercadona supermarket, along the lines of a Booths or Waitrose. Their salmon is wonderful.

Then to the Sierra de las Nieves, established as a Natural Park in 1989, and as a biosphere in 1995, north of Marbella and east of Ronda. Endemic here is the Spanish Fir tree, and a very special type of it, only found here. I will be amongst them tomorrow. The reason for this is that, for geologists, it is the largest peridotite massif in the world, and has a very different climate to everywhere around it, with plenty of water, and correspondingly, lush plant life.

I was headed for a relatively high spot, at 500 metres, above the town of Tolox, which is a spa town; the spa at a hotel a few zig zags up the one way road from where I was based. I settled in for that special salmon, and some World Cup cricket.