Feliz Navidad

Reading “Watling Street” after my book expert cousin referred to it on Facebook, I am in reflective mood. Friday 13th 2019 was a disaster for some and a cause for celebration by many others. Boris Johnson’s government has achieved the necessary majority for a mandate to finally “get Brexit done”. Sitting here in Spain, idly looking for a glimpse of what life is supposed to be about, John Higgs’ words capture my thinking : “Perhaps our current division is a necessary stage in the emergence of a new national story. Other countries think we are crazy, of course, but haven’t they always? It would be a small price to pay to find ourselves part of a new, living myth”

The Witches’ Cave

The Witche’s cave, El Berro

The theme of Watling Street is that if there’s such a thing as a British national psyche, it has evolved out of stories, myths and legends that go way back in time. It is still evolving, of course; fed by the stories, myths and legends of our present times too. And in so far as it could be a shared psyche, the tendency of mohomers to gravitate towards fellow countrymen (and women) when abroad has been borne out by our time in El Berro. The election result was inevitably a talking point, and given that those of us Brits here enjoying Spain are clearly Europhiles (or at least Spain-o-philes) we all groaned through last Friday morning and felt embarrassed in the company of our Spanish and other European companions. Keeping our heads low, we all shuffled about our business hoping no-one would again ask us “Why?”

The good news is that sterling is up and suddenly we have more Euro’s to our pounds. Let’s see how long the bounty will last.

We have definitely fallen in love with El Berro and the mountain park it nestles in, Sierra Espûna. It has many stories of its own, of course. We’ve learned how people had to move away in the Franco era, many to France, and how the children and grandchildren have started drifting back, reclaiming family property and finding ways to make a living. The old men and women we see around the village will all have tales to tell, and I would love to hear them.....if I had enough grasp of their language to understand. We were given a link to a YouTube film of El Berro in Spanish, but which was, nevertheless interesting to see. ( You Tube: Contrastes - Guadrilla del Berro)

One the greatest stories (THE greatest?) has to be the Nativity story and, as we discovered last winter, the traditional way to celebrate Navidad in Spain and Portugal is with nativity scenes. Gareth and I were awed by the one we saw in Mertola last year (see Jan ‘19 blog) and here in El Berro I was privileged to share an invitation to view one in the local church (Iglesia Nuestra Señora De los Dolores De El Berro) . The tableau ran the whole length of the church, each part of the story told in intricate miniature detail. The work involved is mind boggling, especially given the fact that after a couple of months it will be dismantled. I am including in this blog some photos of the tableau taken by, and kindly sent to me by Sue, our British camping compatriot.

Iglesia Nuestra Señora De los Dolores De El Berro , miniaturised and placed in the Nativity

The Nativity is a wonderful story to remember each year, whether you believe it or not. It is one of those stories that reminds us to be more than just human. It reminds us to reach into that better part of ourselves in wishing for peace and goodwill to all mankind. And it goes far beyond Britishness, linking us across many cultures.. I am very grateful to the people of El Berro for letting me see their beautifully modelled re-enactment. And on that note, I wish everyone a very happy Christmas.

El Berro, miniaturised 

Rock on El Berro

It was all change here last weekend. We’re still in El Berro, enjoying the mountains and the convenience of this campsite, but the peace and quiet was shattered when the Spanish turned up in their hordes for Constitution Day. It was also Feast of the Immaculate Conception so feasting and socialising spilled into the village and all around. The weather did the honourable thing, too, bringing sunshine and warmth to the occasion. 

Apparently, the warmth we’re experiencing now is more typical of this place than the colder, wetter weather of last week, and now that we’ve surrendered the car we are back to lazing in the sun and planning hikes that we don’t need a car to reach. Before returning it, we took the opportunity of driving up to where the road reaches its highest point in the park and then hiked out to the ridge for a spectacular viewpoint. At 1450 metres on Chico we had the best seat in the house, so to speak. It’s a shame the cloud blocked our view out as we got to the top; just our luck, though we did get some glimpses of the village way down below and the plains of Murcia further down and beyond. My vertigo kicked in at that point. We got a bit lost on the way down too. Gareth, with the map and the camera, worrying that we might still be walking in the dark if I didn’t hurry up, hustled me downward as I tried to keep my footing on the steep, loose, rocky paths. I really didn’t fancy a long painful and ultimately fatal tumble down into the canyon below. Whether it was because he kept stopping to take photos or had misread the map, we lost our way and ended up retracing our steps and then labouring up a long steep ascent back to where we’d left the car. Phew! Yes, we managed to get back before dark - just, and the bar did well that night as we sank some of their painkilling alcohol.

From Mount Chico looking down across the Leiva canyon

We also managed a hike up into the canyon itself, the Barranca or Valle de Leiva. We watched little colourful dots on the 200 metre cliffs - climbers whose ascent was painfully slow-going and giddyingly high. And then, to our surprise, a couple who we’d watched on the rock appeared behind us on the valley-bottom path striding along, their day’s climbing done. I just had to ask how they’d got down. Gareth asked if they’d abseiled but apparently they had simply come down ‘the path’. We have yet to find out where and what sort of path this might be, but it does boggle the imagination.

The dinosaur footprint in Valle de Leiva

Having done a stock-up shop while we had the car, we don’t feel any compulsion to leave El Berro. We will, though, next week. We will shake off the tentacles that are tightening their grip on us and look for a new stimulus, as was our intention with this ‘travelling life’. Mind you, I’m a bit suspicious that, really, Gareth wants to go shopping for a mountain bike and that we’ll be back here again for Christmas. He’s now had a taste of the trails having been loaned a bike and taken to one of the top spots by one of our neighbours. Mike, the generous guide, has, for the past 20 years spent every winter here in his caravan. He hikes, bikes, climbs, swims and he’s 76.

What else have we done? Well, we’ve been enjoying the company of other long-stay campers here and it’s a great way to learn about a place. The noisy throng in the bar is a great source of information, gossip and amusement. It’s a small village where everyone, Spanish as well as  numerous British and other settlers, knows each other. The campsite is very much part of the community here too. The other evening, over quite a lot of vino tinto, it seemed relevant (to me anyway) to explain the meaning of one of Wales’ most rousing songs. I’m not referring to Calon Lân, my nation’s anthem, but another, sung with great gusto at Rugby games and with a fervour that suggests the Welsh should not be tampered with. New Zealand has the haka, Wales has “Sosban Fach”. As I did for our companions the other evening, here is a translation:

The little saucepan is boiling on the fire

The big saucepan is boiling on the floor

And the cat has scrammed (scratched) little Johnny

Mary-Anne’s finger is hurting

And David the servant isn’t well

The baby in the crib is crying

And the cat has scrammed little Johnny

(chorus) 

There you go, boys; that’s told you! 

It’s the altitude, stupid

Stupor or stupidity? I’m not sure which best sums up my state of mind at the moment. 

Parked up on this mountain top we have fallen into a sort of routine that isn’t marked by the time on our phones (we rarely check). We wake when the light through the gap in our skylight blind finally filters through our eye lids. We batten down the hatches when the sun has set behind the mountain and the air temperature drops. We wander into the bar when the sound of cheerful voices drift up with the seasonal scent of the log fire. We fall asleep when the wine bottle delivers drips instead of a glassful and we eat when the stomach juices tell us to (it’s usually Gareth’s stomach that signals mealtime, by the way, and on my time-scale those mealtimes seem to come around rather quickly). The things that intrude on my mental vacuousness are pings and pangs related to the family at home.......plus a howling dog guarding an empty house on the mountainside and mourning its lonely state. 

El Berro is a rather special place. Most of the other campers here are keen mountain bikers, well equipped for this far-ranging, steep and rocky terrain. The age profile of the active hikers, bikers and climbers around here makes us wonder what happened to us, given that we have only two good hips between us and one of those is a metal one. Each morning there’s the regular sight of Lycra-clad skinny septuagenarians bootling off in search of a new trail and ridge-top. We’ve had to hide our one-and-only bike rather than risk derision - it’s an old one that Gareth has fixed up as ‘emergency transport’. It wouldn’t even cope with getting us safely around the village here, given the state and incline of the roads. The bike written off and Hymer still resting after her own ‘hip operation’ (the wheel bearing) and from the shock of the road to this place, we’ve nursed our arthritic limbs and wondered how to explore this beautiful place. Our solution? No, we didn’t head off to Decathlon, the sports shop in Murcia, in search of some high-tech mountain bikes; we hired a car. 

There’s always someone around who knows a-man-(or even a woman of course)who-can and Pitu (his nickname) duly arranged for delivery to the site of a diesel Renault Cleo that enables us, with the dogs, to get up on some of those ridges ahead of the aged-but-super-fit scramblers. It’s a pretty good scrambler itself, as so many of the roads around here are dirt, gravel and steep. We’re rather glad now that we didn’t bring the car we bought with a view to towing it behind the MH; it would not have coped in this environment. 

So the hire car has enabled us to get about and see this part of Spain without dragging Hymer into inaccessible places. We’ve driven all through the forest park right to the top of the mountain, Espuna; well, almost to the top, which is a military communications site, so entry is barred. We’ve driven out into the Barranco (canyon) Gebas, a huge and fascinating moonscape-like area which channels the water from the mountain. We marvelled again at what the geology shows of its own timescale compared with ours and wondered when this place gets the sort of rainfall that carves out such a landscape. Last night we found out, and it’s still bucketing down! We had intended going down to the market in Alhama de Murcia, the ‘local’ town, but the thought of getting caught in a landslide has rather put us off!

The car enabled us to wriggle into last weekend’s Black Friday shopping mayhem in Murcia when we went off in search of our dogs’ special food (as I said, stupor and stupidity sums up our present mind-set and we hadn’t absorbed the hype). We’ve been able to scout for our next camping spots along the coast, and have found some very promising ones. We were able to park up at the sea-front in Aguilas where motorhomes would not be allowed and enjoy a paella under the shade of a seafront cafe awning (it was actually more a rain-cover on this occasion). 

                                              

Next Monday the rental company come to take back our little Renault friend. As with all things here, the longer you want something, like a campsite pitch or a car rental, the cheaper it gets. We’re already wondering why we didn’t ask to have it for longer. As regards the Hymer and the pitch she’s on, she seems pretty settled and in no hurry to negotiate those hairy, scary hairpins back down the mountain, so........maybe we’ll stay a bit longer. We came for the sun but hey, ho -  it might be stupid but even in the rain I’m enjoying the stupor.