Tuesday, March 3, 2015

WALKING FROM FRIGILIANA

WALKING FROM FRIGILIANA


The largely ancient village of Frigiliana stands on one side of a fertile valley in the foothills of the Almijaras mountain range near Nerja, in the province of Granada in Spain. The valley is thickly dotted with modern houses, and one or two older farm buildings. ( Photographs from the 1980s show uninterrupted cultivated fields and groves.) At the back of the village is a steep rock, upon which once stood a Moorish keep or fort, the site of a desperate late c16 siege. On the other side is a precipitous gorge, in which flows or, in dry periods trickles, the Rio Higueron.

The gorge marks a sharp boundary between timeless, rugged, rural Spain and the “Costa” Spain of tourist and retiree development.  Most of the hilly or mountainous land around Frigiliana lies in a National Park, so there are no buildings to desecrate the pine-covered slopes and valleys, unless you count ancient Moorish stone watercourses (acequias) and ruined shepherds’ huts.

Thus, on one side of the Higueron gorge near Frigiliana the landscape is green and wild. But on the other side, modern expansion of the village has roared right up to the lip of the gorge, there to halt precariously, with a screech of architectural brakes, and await the day when the face of the cliff (a mixture of limestone and softer rock)   will surely crumble and send swimming pools and terraces into the abyss. (At the siege mentioned above, by Christian troops of Moorish rebels, many of the defeated Moors did throw themselves into the gorge – see blog…)

One odd effect of this arrangement, “Costa” crowded up against “Campo”, is that one can be walking on the Park side of the gorge, picking a way along the ridge, with wonderful views of mountains to the East and North and sea to the South, when suddenly the view to the West opens up: a row of stacked white holiday apartments at the same eye level and seemingly only a long stone’s throw away. This is disconcerting; but also provokes the thought that, should one suffer an accident, help could be halloo’d for, if the wind stood right- and the season was one when the apartments are occupied.

The gorge of the Higueron is deep, but mostly wide enough not to provoke claustrophobia. There is at least one exception: to the south of Frigiliana the gorge (though no longer extremely high) narrows to a vicious canyon (I am prejudiced by vertigo) where there is no way forward for a walker, or mule, except by an artificial open ledge on the rock face, ending in a long, arching, open on both sides, stone stair over the torrent.

By contrast, the valley floor North of Frigiliana is, for several kilometres, wide enough at most seasons for the river to share space with a dry stony track, though the proportions of river and dryness alter very frequently.

On either side the cliffs, covered in vegetation and tough trees, rise up, mostly pretty vertically. But there are opportunities here and there for steep paths.

One of these goes up not far North of Frigiliana, just past what is claimed to be a Moorish reservoir, which has the present appearance of a ruined and mis-measured lido (big notices forbidding swimming reinforcing the illusion).

This path is part of the “Gran Senda de Malaga” (a big circular trail) and also serves a network of local walks. It is steep and twisting, and involves some rocky scrambling. Walking up is a 200m plus ascent, with a slow emergence into the sunlight towards the top. Pine trees and wildflowers and herbs, and a changing vista back across the gorge are the pleasures of the climb.

One doesn’t often meet any other hikers, so a sense of romantic isolation is rapidly manufactured (remember Frigiliana is not far away).

There has been recently one notable interruption to this idyll. As we walked one day up the gorge towards the path, a small convoy of four or five off-road motorbikes roared past in a smelly cloud. When we turned up the climb, we could still, annoyingly, hear their echoes in the gorge. As we laboured up the path, we gradually realised  that the revvings and stutterings were coming from above: the wretched machines were somehow being ridden or coaxed up the trail we were also climbing.

The mechanical ascent must involved a lot of dismounting and manhandling bikes over rocks, so we foot-sloggers were in fact overtaking the bikes. This meant that, in addition to the ghastly noise of distressed engines, we were eventually inhaling, not the clean smells of the valley side, but undispersed diesel fumes.
We had to halt several times several times to allow the vandal column time to get ahead to a tolerable nasal and aural distance. When we emerged at the top onto the valley ridge with its spectacular views, there the riders all sat, eating oranges. A Spanish-speaking member of our party remonstrated with them politely concerning their various pollutions (not to mention the damage caused to the path).

They shrugged and, discarding the orange peel, soon revved off down the Gran Senda. Luckily we were then headed in a different direction.

March 2015

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