Day 34 - 2845 km Danger - 29.12.2022

With a heavy heart we had to leave the beautiful Playa de la Galera at Cabo Cope left. We stayed here for six days, just because it was so beautiful. A Christmas by the sea without Christmas. That was just to our taste. Little Youma had to continue recovering from her operation and so we went on one or two little hikes.

Off to Almería

So now it was off to Almería. Once again we set up at a campsite, this time the Camping La Garrofa, just outside and west of Almería, in the middle of a small bay surrounded by high cliffs, and our Dexter got a great spot directly under an ancient viaduct. Our original plan was to visit the city of Almería and fill up on electricity and water. In the end, the plan was just to fill up with electricity and just stay on the campsite for another whole day and let the time pass, as the desire to visit the city had suddenly vanished. Filling up with water was also cancelled without further ado. Unfortunately, there is no fresh water here, only treated seawater. It is a bit strange to taste the salt of the sea in the shower. The small restaurant at the site offers simple but reasonably priced food with very nice hosts.

The Tabernas Desert

Now it was off to the Tabernas Desert to the film legends. Only about 30 kilometres north of Almería is the Tabernas Desert. It is considered the only real desert in Europe and is one of the hottest and driest regions on the continent. The landscape is barren, marked by the erosion of the last 100,000 years. Again and again, fascinating rock formations and so-called "rock formations" can be found. Ramblas, i.e. dry rivers that only carry water periodically during heavy rains. The widely branching ramblas have transformed the area into a bizarre landscape. There is much to marvel at, whether the landscape itself, or smaller highlights that can be easily explored on foot, provided you are a little interested in geology and are not put off by the barrenness of the desert.

For a short excursion to get an impression of the area, the car park at the Oasis Mini Hollywood an. The car park is free of charge and also offers enough space for campers. We have added a small round trip of 12 kilometres at the end of this article. It leads through the Badlands, to the Las Salinas, special stone formations created by erosion of salty rock. The route also passes through the valley where the film Lawrence of Arabia was shot many years ago. Here, the palm trees and a few remnants still remind us of the filming back then. If you are interested in old film sets, there are various opportunities to visit the locations of many of the films. Film classics to visit. Whether it's the Oasis Mini-Hollywood, Fort Bravo, or the Western Leone, scenes for Two Glorious Scoundrels and Indiana Jones, for example, were filmed here and in many other places. But even today, new shoots take place every now and then, for example some scenes from Game of Thrones or also Black Mirror. So we spent the turn of the year lonely but very beautiful, without any fireworks and banging, very idyllic and lonely in the desert - Feliz año nuevo!

Picture Gallery Tabernas Desert

The Gorafe Desert

As Sepp Herberger said back then - "After the desert is before the desert". So we went desert-hopping from the Tabernas to the Gorafe Desert. So our Dexter had a lot of work to do with the 130 km route and at the end of the day he groaned with great difficulty up the steep ascent from the small town of Gorafe up onto the plateau. And while we were driving up the mountain in first gear, curve after curve, we saw an orange car at the bottom of the valley. MB407 take the same arduous path. Already at Tabernas we learned Isabel and Steve know with her pretty 407. We knew that we would somehow be going in the same direction, but we didn't expect to see each other again so soon. In any case, we were very happy to see them again. Greetings to the four of you!

So we stood for two nights on the beautiful plateau, surrounded by almond tree plantations and had a magnificent view over the desert and the snow-covered Sierra Nevada. As little Youma had to continue wearing her neck brace and relax, Masou and I (Carsten) set off on a long tour through the barrenness of nature. Apart from desert, there was not much to discover, but of course plenty of it. Many bizarre and colourful Rock formationswhich are very reminiscent of a well-known desert from the USA. Probably for this reason, the Spaniards called a certain area within the desert Los Coloraos, i.e. in the style of the famous rock formations in the Grand Canyon of Colorado.

It was a quiet tour characterised by loneliness. I didn't meet any people, only one or two off-roaders covered the dry track in a cloud of dust for a short time. The way back was rather difficult. According to the map, a path turned out to be a small, wet creek bed that was so overgrown with metres of grass that I briefly thought about turning back. But since the destination was not far away and darkness was approaching, I somehow made my way through the undergrowth in the truest sense of the word (see picture above right). Masou and I arrived at the camper in time for sunset and were able to admire the last beautiful light over the desert.

Embalse de Negratin

Our next destination was Granadabut before that we treated ourselves to a short detour to the Embalse de Negratinone of the many reservoirs here in Andalusia. As with almost all the reservoirs in Andalusia this winter, the water supply in this one is already very depleted. Andalusia, and Spain as a whole, has had a record summer in 2022 with extreme heat and hardly any rain. So the water temperatures here in January are hardly inviting for a swim, but one can well imagine how pleasant it might be in summer to cool off in the emerald green water at temperatures above 40 degrees.

So we made ourselves comfortable with our little house directly on the cliff to the reservoir in the pine forest with a great view. Not a soul in sight for several kilometres - another campsite exactly to our taste. We could have stayed here a few days longer, but Granada was on the agenda. We had already made an appointment with a vet in town for Youma's check-up. So we had to leave on time, so that the little one could soon be released into freedom without a neck brace and we humans could be sure that her eye was fine again and everything had healed nicely.

In the next article you will learn more about Granada, the Alpujarra and we will meet old friends again. See you soon!

Hikes in this area

The route on Google