the place called Montejque

We drove the short distance past Benjaojan, back up to Montejque, the village higher into the mountain side…we had a few very bad maps from a climbing book they loaned us at the hotel,  and we were looking for the highest crag I could find, called Tajo Alto. We found a dirt round that wound around the village, then turned off onto another dirt and rock road that was very rough, then followed this up the hill until we thought the car might die. We should have called the two truck before we left.  So I hiked up to the mountain, eventually finding the bolts and figuring out where we were on the map. We drove the car up to the top of the pass, it barely made .  

So we hiked over to the mountain, where lots of sheep lived, there was a broad ledge below the climbs with lots of sheep droppings.  The climbs were difficult, 7a+ range,  a difficult and scary challenge.  There were plants and lichens growing on the climbs, a real mountain adventure.  We left a bail biner all of the  climbs.  But it was a beautiful day up in the mountains, We enjoyed hearing the bleating of the sheep and seeing the vultures swooping around making vulture cries.  We could see all the way to Ronda, a rare view.  We drove down to the only place that is ever open in Benjaojan, and tried two new tapas, the  lady there is always nice to us, helping us figure out how to say little shrimp, the two Americans among the bunch village men, all men, having their 4:30 drinks and tapas. 

 This is el cuevo del gato, cave of the cat, a strange and mysterious place where a river runs out of the mountains.

the little village of Montejque, on the way down from the mountain, and the car, which survived the mountains, the 2nd car. 

Andulusia

 Olive tree and the lake with the huge fish where we like to swim, also the endless walls of limestone above the tine village of  El Chorro.

    cave drawing Cueva del Pileta 

 The gorge at Ronda.

 We stayed Benaojan station, down the hill from the regular Benaojan, a tiny village. the nice man gave me directions in the morning and made a reservation for us for the Cuevas de Pileta.  They also had a great breakfast with 7 kinds of jam...I don’t even know if that hotel is real it was so nice, I must have dreamed it.   And it was raining, I did not think it ever rained here.  We went out in the pouring rain, drove for about 8 minutes up the road to the parking lot for the Cueva (cave), ran up the path, and made it just in time for the tour.

 

This cave has been kept in one family for a long time. And it was the perfect cave.  First, the very pale blond girl who handed out lanterns, which cast ghostly shadows on her face, was also our guide.  It did not look like she got outside very much, but she did speak English.   The cave was enormous, with huge stalactites hanging down and best of all, no one could take pictures.  But I had my sketchbook and was trying to draw the gloomy dramatic scene of people carrying small lanterns into the huge cavern, up steps, into narrow passage ways. 

“Here is one skeleton we found”…it was like the haunted house tour, except for real.  “And by the way, 10,000 bats live in the cave” We could see them hanging from the ceiling and flitting around.  Then there were the cave drawings, very old, 7, 8, 10,000 year old, 25 or 30,000 year old drawings…”on the left a kind of animal, we don’t know what kind of animal”.   I was trying to make a drawing of all the drawings in my book.  “There are 250 steps carved into the limestone by the first owner of the farm and his son. It took them 30 years”. They must have really loved this cave.  When we were done, she told  me that there were other parts of the cave where they can’t take the tours because there is not enough air, but she showed us pictures of the paintings in these areas.  When we got out, the rain had stopped and it smelled just like the desert after the rain, we saw a few goats on the hill.  

 Ronda is build up on a big cliff escarpment, with a gorge running through it, surrounded by olive and almond groves with mountains in the background, not so big as Toledo or Granada, but still big enough to make it difficult to park in the medieval streets.  And like most of the cities in Andalusia, it has strong Moorish roots,  this is a part of the world where the Christians made a big fight with the Islamic Moors.  The moors made houses and palaces like Riads, enclosing a central area, then the Catholic kings turned them into their own palaces.  

But this is the gorge at El Chorro, with the Caminito del Rey, famous walkway into the gorge, and that is the beginning of the famous climb Amtrax, which we did. 

El Chorro via Ithaca

Climbing Frontales, El Chorro limestone

Ancient Arab ruins, from the 9th century, cut from the rocks

 Massive piton on the long climb Amtrax,   The climb reminded us of Devil's Tower, when we ran out of water and finally getting back to the ground, surrounded by tourists with so many water bottles.  the lake has very large fish ...

  This is the famous Shockley's ceiling in the Shawangunks, 

 along with winter squash grown nearby. Then there are tapas. Why? Actually octopus tapas, the lady at the bar was nice to me and gave me some ice.  Maybe they were octopus, but who knows for sure, I was having none of it. If I ran a market or a little tapas bar, I would be nice to people, and give them advice about places to camp.    

 We stayed in a little village north of Alora, I don't know how I found it, one  bed but no breakfast, but we did find figs ... 

 Back in Trumansburg ... down the road from Ithaca, the old Masonic Temple

 Shawangunks

 Famous climb on the Frontales area, called Putifiero, all the climbs can  be famous for me 

the long view of the gorge 

a garden in Benaojan Spain and the fig tree ... and the pomegranate tree...Jakob stops every 10 feet or so to look at the plants, smell them, taste them and then tell the story about them. Today we gathered pomegranates, figs, dates, limes, and almonds. 

The cliff early in the morning, where everything ends up in the sun.  
It is sunny and hot and dry in the afternoon, so we walked over to El Caminito del Rey, the large walkway through the gorge that I climbed to last December, which has become a huge tourist place, since it was rebuilt, attracting  large buses of people. We could not do the walk because they only allow it from the other end, it was too hot to scale the dangerous looking fence.  We found that people made reservations months in advance!  

This was the day of breaking things, Jakob said it was because I was driving off the edge of the road, which was true, but I thought the car had troubles before I got hold of it, also the day I broke the washing machine, the handle of the door came off, how was I supposed to know you cannot open the front loading washer when it is running?  

The beautiful rock escarpment as the sun goes down, It was  beautiful and we wondering where to sleep since the car had completely broke down, coasting to this spot and refusing to go any further. We walked in the dark back to the Chorro train station, to meet the tow truck, which was supposed to be coming all the way from Malaga.  When the tow truck actually appeared,  the driver was very nice and friendly as he was glad to see us (not that many people are glad to see us here, not like the grandmother and grandfather in Ecuador), and I was very glad to see him, he was the most friendly person I ever met here.  And he brought another car along, which meant, sleep or no sleep we would  climb the big climb the  next day. The next morning at 6 or 7 I was sitting on the back porch  looking at Orion and the other stars, listening to the sounds of the mourning doves and watching the shadows of the palm trees on the wall. We drove to El Chorro, about 10 minutes away, found the road to the parking, but  there was already a car there. I said Jakob, they are on our climb. He said impossible, but it was true, the only people climbing anywhere that day, on our climb.  But it did not matter, it took us awhile to get there, I got so excited I just start heading up the mountain, and naturally overshot the climb, had to rappel back down, then go up the right way, then we started.We were already in the sun, but it was not too bad at first a little breezy, this was 5 pitches, not counting the scramble and the extra off route climb.   It got warmer and warmer the higher we went.      Jakob had collected some limes and made limead, I carried about 3 liters of water and limeade up the climb. It was really exciting climbing whole way up, great rock with unusual features. Wherever we climbed, the rock changed. . At the end of the second  pitch, just as I was getting to the anchors, I took a big circus fall, and had to do half of the pitch again, and banged my hip during my downward acrobatics, which I did not really notice until we were going back down and the rock was too hot to touch.