Several years ago, while we were looking after el perrito in Jalón, Francine and I found what looked like a modest walking route starting from Senija, one of the Spanish villages close by. The walk climbed a hill behind Senija  a hill which, in common with quite a few hills in Spain, is topped by a cross. The Spanish definitely enjoy putting crosses on hilltops. The walk then continued down to the cova garganta, the giant’s cave, overlooking the A7 autopista.

Things went well to begin with; despite someone having chosen to mark the path with circles of yellow paint on rocks. The difficulty with this is that there are yellow lichens which tend to grow in a circular pattern. Nonetheless, we avoided a few confusing splodges and found our way to the cross.

After this things went horribly and inexplicably wrong. We certainly set out on the path towards the cave but ended up descending a rough scree slope with no sign of any cave, giant’s or otherwise. We’d ended up quite low down near the autopista and somehow managed to work our way back to our start point in Senija. Failed!

So, when the Costa Blanca Mountain Walkers promoted a Saturday walk taking in the route we should have followed, I was keen to join in, hoping that I’d find out where Francine and i had gone astray.Unfortunately, Francine had pulled a muscle in her back so dipped out. I joined in on my own.

My walking companions were mightily amused by my tale of failing to find the cave and ending up almost beside the autopista instead. Still, they took pity on a poor learner and, once we were atop the summit at the cross, carefully showed me the correct route to get to the cave. It was a bit of a scramble at one point. Exactly where Francine and I had gone astray, I couldn’t precisely remember, many bottles of rosado having dulled the memory, but I think I  could now find it again. It was quite an impressive cave, too. I really expected to see piles of bat droppings in it but I didn’t, and there seemed to be no strong smell such as might accompany deposits. Here’s a couple of phone camera shots, just to prove I eventually got there

Once back for a refreshing beer, the leader suggested that I could, perhaps, lead the walk next time. “Not unless you want to end up down near the autopista”, I replied.

We were continuing our familiarization with the Costa Blanca Mountain Walkers terminology today, as well as continuing our exercise in preparation for our impending Andalucian walking trip with Explore!. Overhearing a few conversations between longer standing members of the CBMW, they are having a little trouble with “easier” walks, where easier seems to be defined as that which is possible by a human, without the need to be a mountain goat. Today, they were advertising a Benigembla Stroll, Benigembla [pronounce it Benichembla and you’ll be close enough for an Anglo-Saxon] being a village a little further up the Vall de Pop from us. We popped off to join in for a relaxed 10:30 start.

Once assembled, we sauntered out of the village on the flat. Very soon, though, we turned right and headed up. We continued up for about the next hour. The walk had been described along the lines of a walk around the Benigembla bowl, which did sound gentle. Far too gentle, I suspect – quite clearly we were heading for the rim of the bowl, or close to it. It was pleasant enough though, and nothing anywhere near as strenuous as the Col de Rates assault which left legs screaming. Our second hour continued the circuit and descended back into Benigembla.

‘T was a good wander but still caused the lungs to puff on the inclines. The CBMW brigade continued their emphasis on the “M”. Most walkers repaired to a local restaurant, as usual, for a menu del dia lunch. Francine and I dipped out. Menus del dia are excellent value but simply too much food for our tastes in the middle of the day.

Instead, the sun was out and we tried our luck Odo-hunting at a couple of new pools in a different location along the local river at Alcalalí. Our meagre haul amounted to a couple of uncooperative Red-veined Darters (Sympetrum fonscolombii) – uncooperative in that they were posing only on the ground – and an Emperor (Anax imperator),  which did at least offer a chance of a flight shot. A female also put on an ovipositing display, which I snagged. Only back at home base did I notice that my ovipositing shot included a resting Bluetail (Ischnura sp). It’s amazing how the mind focuses.

The dragonfly situation is depressing; I’m seeing hardly anything and there appears to be more action back in the UK. I can’t work out what’s going on.

We’ve done quite a few walking trips (8-ish) in small groups organized by Explore! – up to 16 folks and a leader in each group. Now we’ve been out a couple of times in similar sized groups with the Costa Blanca Mountain Walkers. For those interested in taking their time to photograph either scenery, in a considered fashion, or wildlife in a patient fashion, depending on the lack of cooperation of the critter, is that you simply don’t have time. Given a “proper” camera, by the time you’ve extracted it, thought about your shot, lined it up and pressed the shutter in an unhurried way, the rest of the group will be about 100m ahead. Wait for a butterfly to settle, or think longer about a landscape shot and you’re even further behind. Oh, and you have to put the cmaera away again, as well.

Francine had read about a walk involving “Els Arcs”, a couple of natural rock arches, which was supposedly a decent place to find orchids. The thought of doing a walk by ourselves in our own time was quite appealing. The walk sounded relatively straightforward, certainly by Spanish standards, with a start point just beyond Castel de Castels, about 30 minutes further up our valley We set off looking forward to time by ourselves.

We parked at the start of the track. Before I was ready, still preparing my rucksack, Francine had found a Bee Orchid in the rough ground by the “Usted esta aqui” [You are here] map. We set off up the track.

Very soon an fabulous critter crawled quickly across the track in front of us. It was black with striking red bands across its abdomen and had trouble hauling its bulk up some of the stones. Beetle sprang to mind but it looked more the shape of a larva than a fully grown beetle. It was big, though, at about 3cms long. Francine’s swift search on the Internet back at home base quickly revealed our critter to be a red-striped Oil Beetle (Berberomeloe majalis). This is a full-grown one – they’re wingless.

Continuing our path we played leapfrog with a Dutch family, alternately in a car and then walking. Where the track eventually became a footpath, they had to abandon their car and let their two blasted King Charles Spaniels run along the path disturbing any wildlife. fortunately they were slower than us – the people, not the spaniels – and we managed to give ‘em the slip. The “easy” path became a little more Spanish, rough and a tad slippery, as we approached Els Arcs themselves Unless you’re looking at, it takes a while to realize that you’ve arrived. Eventually, though, you see sky and the ground beyond through the two arches. It’s quite a spectacular natural formation.

The slightly trickier path to the arches is a “there and back” side-excursion from the circular route. we retraced our steps to regain the main track.

Approaching the end Francine found her highlight. Nestling beside the rough road in a patch of grass she spotted what looked like an orchid, yellow in colour. I know just what she felt like. This was a new orchid ofr her collection and I’ve been similarly excited when I first see a dragonfly that’s new to me. She knelt and snapped away, incurring a blood-letting injury for her pains. The bleeding soon stopped and we returned for her to consult the books. It’s pretty self-descriptive, really: it looked like an Ophrys and it was yellow – a Yellow Ophrys (Ophrys lutea).

It had been very pleasant being able to take our time over what we wanted to do, and we’d got a new orchid, to boot.

I’ve been getting to grips with Spanish painting gear. I tried not to, it has to be said. The internal paint, pure minimalist white, is in pretty good condition and really doesn’t need re-doing. Apart from which, we’ve owned Casa Libélule for a little over a year now and I thought it was high time we were able just to play and enjoy it rather than work on it. Francine disagreed and, naturally, I was outvoted 1:1 – again. The rationale behind painting over the existing white is to use a fungicidal paint to try and discourage the formation of mould when Casa is shut up over the colder months. We’d had a touch of mould last winter. So, I did understand the reasoning.In the interests of harmony, I bowed to female pressure.

I had originally intended to bring my own painting supplies from the UK. That was before I attempted unsuccessfully to rebel. Now I was tasked with finding local Spanish equivalents. We went to one of our favourite stores for such things, Aitana in Calpe. Brushes and rollers were plentiful. I selected a brush then, given the size of some of our walls, selected one of th eslightly larger rollers. On to a roller tray.

None of the roller trays on offer fitted my slightly larger roller. I looked questioningly at a passing Spanish assistant whilst waving the roller near the too-small roller tray. “Cubo”, he muttered. Fortunately I knew “cubo de basura” is a waste bin; I was being told to use a paint bin. There was one on the shelf complete with a washing-board affair, clearly intended to squeeze excess paint from the roller. It looked bloody ungainly but, hey, I had a job to do (courtesy of my slave-driver). I would also need a long pole to reach the higher, less accessible places but I left that thinking I’d try to walk before I ran.

My dear father left me about half a dozen 12’x12’ dust sheets, excellent for covering furniture, floors and the like when chucking paint hither and thither. How the heck do I ask for those in Spanish? I used my trusty smart phone translation app and was eventually understood by another assistant. He led me to a bunch of plastic sheets. The Spanish, it appears, have not invented dust sheets but use 4mx5m plastic sheeting. Hmm? I didn’t like it but I needed something so I bought a couple.

Finally, the paint. There is a reputedly decent paint supplier in Jalón itself so I returned there. Now we get really interesting. I had investigated fungicidal paint in the UK, keen to attempt to reduce our mould issue. Dulux, bless them, do actually make a fungicidal emulsion. For a 5ltr tin of this plain white emulsion paint, you are requested to part with the princely sum of £75. It’s an un-f***ing-believable price – £75 for 5 measly litres!!. I was gobsmacked. Back to Jalón, The white fungicidal emulsion here was in a huge 15ltr tin (well, plastic) and costs … 53€. That’s about half the price for 3-times as much paint. Deal! Of course, I cannot yet attest to the efficacy of either one of these products. Maybe this time next year I’ll have an idea.

Incidentally, have you ever tried to carry 15ltrs of emulsion in a single tub? It’s bloody heavy. I just about made it back to the car.

The weather was a bit grey – a bit British, really – so my fun was set for a couple of days as I set methodically about the house walls. Paint roller: fine. Cubo: OK but not the greatest. Plastic equivalent of a dust sheet [called a bloody drop-cloth, another blasted Americanism]: very far from OK. The advantage of cloth is that paint dropping on it soaks in a sticks. Replace that with plastic sheeting and paint sits on top, remaining liquid for longer, waiting for you to walk in and tread all over the house. Once it does dry, it cracks off said plastic sheeting to then sit on the floor making it appear as though you have chucked paint all over the tiles. Added to that, if you try to work in bare feet, the soles of your feet stick to the plastic and lift it, entangling your toes and tripping you over. Plastic SUCKS! Learn to use dust sheets, Spain. Or, it you absolutely insist on being American, use material drop-cloths.

I’ll get used to it, it’s just a learning curve. I’ve got a few days of grey.

After having given our legs a few days to recover from their first and rather strenuous work out with the Costa Blanca Mountain Walkers, we thought we’d try another jaunt that promised to be a little easier. To their credit, the CBMW group does an excellent job describing the severity of their routes – they are coded rather in the same manner as ski runs – but, with the best will in the world, it’s still darned difficult as an outsider trying to figure out just what you’re letting yourself in for. Basically, you need to try a few grades to pitch your own level. Today we joined them for the Font de Mata walk, described as Moderate. [Reminder: the Col de Rates had been “Moderately Strenuous”.]

This walk started out, rather ominously, at the Benissa cementeri [cemetery]. At least if we didn’t make it, we’d be in the right place. We began by driving to a suitable parking place beneath the A7 autopista, then struck out on foot along a dirt track. Apart from dodging an off-road motorcycle coming in the opposite direction, this was blissfully uneventful. Then we turned right and headed uphill, quite sharply. Clearly the operative word in the CBMW title is “mountain”. They are the Spanish walking equivalent of French cyclists who are not happy unless they are going uphill. A walk clearly must involve ascent.

Half way up our steep slope, we came upon a stretch of concrete. First of all, how did anyone contrive to stop the concrete flowing back downhill and ending up at the bottom? Secondly, who the f**k carried the concrete half way up a mountain in order to lay it at something approaching a 45° angle? I was a little bemused but grateful for the concrete, which had more secure grip than the looser stones we’d been walking on hitherto.

Deviating a little to see the ancient font of the title [Ed: just another pile of old stones], by skirting around the far side of the mountain we eventually arrived at the summit with panoramic views of the A7 autopista. Across the far side of the motorway, we could also see the so-called Giant’s Cave, a landmark that Francine and I had failed to find on a self-(mis)guided walk from Senija some years ago – we’d ended up on an uncomfortable scree slope near the motorway. Whoops!

We’d taken longer than had been anticipated to reach our summit on this day and someone with a clever GPS, including maps of footpaths, decided there was a useful short cut for our return to our cars. This route was un-scouted; decidedly off-piste. However, with just one rather tricky short section of descent involving hands and bums, it was otehrwise a decent route and we got back unscathed.

We’d survived outing #2 with no need for the Benissa cementeri.

Our main event during this visit to Spain is to be a 1-week walking tour based in Andalucia. We thought a trial outing up a Spanish mountain might be a good idea, partly to test our legs and partly to test some new equipment, like photo rucksacks. The Costa Blanca Mountain Walkers were advertising what looked like a suitable candidate walk today up the Col de Rates. It was billed as “Moderately Strenuous” and “B”, meaning:

Up to 600 metres ascent and/or no more than 15 km with some rough going taken at a reasonable
pace.

and

Less than half the route on rough ground

Specifically, we were in for 12kms and 5+ hours. Let the fun commence.

We’re familiar with the Col de Rates; we stare at it from our balcony. The col is the saddle between the two high points in this picture. There’s a German-run restaurant up there that apparently has excellent apple strudel. Maybe another day. The walk was to begin in Jalón, which is where we met our leader, affectionately (or not) known as Galloping Gordon. That sounds a bit ominous.

So, if this works, here’s a stitched panorama showing, very roughly, our route. It might’ve shown our route precisely had my stupid new GPS app worked sensibly, but no. [Now deleted.] Starting from the extreme left in Jalón, the red line indicates us in front of the ground and the pink is intended to show us behind the foreground, going round the back of the mountain itself.

Galloping Gordon’s pace was, shall we say, brisk. The man is a mountain goat and keeps various different groups of leg muscles in trim by cycling up some of the mountains, too. A few seemed to be more or less at their speed limit to begin with. Happily, my plantar fasciitis continued to improve and my foot kept me going. One lesson we quickly learnt is that Spanish bushes do not take prisoners where the track narrows and we both picked up a collection of scratches. A second lesson is that Spanish “paths” are quite rocky, too. It’s necessary to watch every footfall; do not stare at the view whilst walking but stop first, otherwise disaster can result. I decided that we are somewhat coddled in the UK with relatively groomed tracks.

We did stick with it and reached the col just before which we found very neat piece of cultivated ground. It’s in a sheltered trough between the two peaks on the pano where our line is pink. What a place to farm. Lunch break overlooked this ground as the incurably energetic went on up the the peak beside the col.

We were now about two thirds of the way around our route and we now headed downhill back towards Jalón, Downhill might seem like a rest but it isn’t, the muscles have to hold you back.  Our knees and thigh muscles continued to be tested and certainly knew they’d been used when we got back for our post walk beers, which went down very well and rather swiftly.

Indications are good for Andalucia.

At the first sensible opportunity, Francine was go up to base camp on the Bernia to comb the edges of the roadside for orchids. Today was that first sensible opportunity so off we set.

We parked near the entirely wood-fired restaurant and began searching. It wasn’t easy, a start was slow in coming, but we did eventually find some examples of Ophrys. I’ve chosen my phraseology carefully because Francine has been tearing her ever so curly hair out with the identification conundrum. There are lots of Ophryses to choose from, many looking pretty similar. Just to make it more interesting, the markings vary considerably so it can be a tad difficile to know just what you’re looking at. To keep you on toes, they probably hybridize, too. Great!

After due consideration and looking decidedly thin on top, Francine seems comfortable that this particular example is a Bee Orchid (Ophrys apifera). I love it to death; it looks like a little chap lying on his back chuckling because his tummy is being tickled. Hardly a scientific description but it seems to sum it up to me. Glorious.

Now, compare and contrast. There were others that were not, perhaps, Bee Orchids. I must apologize for this photographic effort, hardly in the same class ‘cos it’s taken on my new travel lens – nothing like as sharp as Francine’s macro job. Anyway, we (i.e. Francine) think this is a Woodcock Orchid (Ophrys scolopax). It does look quite different but remember the variation and the hybridization tendency. Awkward little beggars.

Fortunately there were some easier-to-identify old favourites up there too in the shape of Pyramidal Orchids. However, since they were only just bursting forth, I’m not convinced that I’d have recognized some of them. I did recognize this one, though, with just a few flowers open.

I was thinking that I might take up flowers, which have the advantage that they don’t fly away when you try to photograph them, unlike dragonflies. However, if they are this tricksy, maybe I should stick to what I know. Still, everyone gotta start somewhere.

With a fully sunny day, not just an interlude, I tromped off down to what I regard as the main bit of river flowing through Jalón, in the hope of finding more Spanish dragonflies. Pool #1 produced a cruising Emperor Dragonfly/Blue Emperor (Anax imperator) but nothing else. The river by the ford produced even less: nothing, nada, nichts, pas un chat [as they say in France for “not a sausage”]. Most surprisingly, to me, anyway, considering this is just coming out of winter, was a complete lack of water in what I normally regard as fairly reliable pools. In one of these last year, I had found my first Orange-winged Dropwing (Trithemis kirbyi). Now all was dry.

I crossed the river to the north side where there was some reeded habitat that looked good, perhaps, for damselflies to lurk. This is where I’d found a Willow Emerald (Lestes viridis) last year. Now, life appeared scarce. There was another Emperor Dragonfly cruising up and down the main body of water but, at first, that’s all I could see. Then Francine spotted a movement in the grass which turned out to be a Blue-tailed Damselfly. Not exactly an exciting haul and, even worse, nobody was posing for pictures. I was disappointed considering the reported activity elsewhere in Spain.

There was some consolation. Another movement that Francine managed to spot in one of the plants beside the water proved to be a mantis  It wasn’t posing as well as it might but at least I managed to get one half-way decent photograph of it before it hid deeper in the herbage. There are several mantids that might’ve been possible so, given my very basic Chinery guide [Insects of Britain and western Europe], I wasn’t hopeful of anything concrete. However, as luck would have it this particular example had a diagnostic feature in the form of a tall crest on its head; this intriguing looking critter was a Conehead Mantis (Empusa pennata).

Praying Mantises are renowned – or is that notorious? – for the female’s habit of devouring her mate after, or even during copulation. She starts by eating the male’s head but mating continues, I guess his brains really are elsewhere. 😀 There’s a video here, showing this somewhat macabre occurrence,

Fortunately for the male Conehead Mantis, the female of the species apparently never devours her mate. Much more civilized behaviour. Or perhaps she just can’t get her jaws around his head with that crest in the way. [Just kidding.]

I had been hoping that I would see my first Odo of the year in the UK before we left for Spain. However, although there had been reports of sightings from several counties, and not even only the most southern ones, I managed to find nothing in Bedfordshire with winter apparently reluctant to loosen its grip. Perhaps I’d have better luck in Spain.

As we drove through central Spain through thrashing rain with the mercury hovering around the 7°C mark, albeit at 1000m altitude, things weren’t looking much more hopeful, though the species list of reported sightings had been considerably more impressive. Today, though, the last day of April, the Spanish gloom parted in the afternoon and the sun shone. As soon as that happened we went to investigate a pool only recently discovered by us in neighbouring Alcalali to see if anyone was about.

Someone was about, though not in anything approaching decent numbers. However, we did see some dragonflies – and they were dragonflies rather than damselflies – at least just a little before May. There were three individuals zooming about this one, modest pool, in the form of a male Scarlet Darter/Broad Scarlet (Crocothemis erythraea), together with both sexes of Red-veined Darter (Sympetrum fonsolombii). The male RVD was the only one posing advantageously for pictures, though, and I could see he was maturing – not yet fully red. He clearly thought he was already mature, though since he was in tandem with the female ovipositing.

The sun was relatively short-lived and, before the afternoon was over, the clouds rolled back in again. Still, at least I’d got my year started.

There was a highlight of yesterday evening’s slightly stressful approach to Grisel. As we were following Silly Sally Satnav on her route straight through Tarazona, as opposed to making the more sensible left turn, we were delighted to see many pairs of Storks building their massive nests of interlocked sticks on top of numbers of Tarazona’s high points. We’d previously seen Storks nesting on apparently dangerous high tension electricity pylons in the rural west of France but here they were in an urban setting. This morning the rain had dribbled its last overnight and had abated, for now anyway, so, grey and cold though it still was, after we’d checked out of our castillo, we set off first to a fuel stop – a full tank would be enough to get us to Jalón – and to try to get a better look at the Storks.

Free parking in a town/city: what a delight. We found a well paved free car park close to the centre of town to begin an exploration on foot.

We soon came across a modest river running through town. It was modest now but, given it’s deep side walls, I suspect this was doubling as a storm drain capable of channelling some serious flood water safely through town. Beside it was an “usted esta aqui” [you are here] map. I thought I recognized the junction where we’d driven past our nesting Storks on the previous evening. We began walking towards it beside the river/storm drain.

I have never seen such a large collection of Swallows zooming about low over the water in my life; there were literally hundreds of them. Every metre of Tarazona’s waterway was teeming with zooming, feeding shapes. I was mesmerized by the numbers. Actually, as we watched, I realized that this was a mixed swarm of (at least) three species. The majority were Barn Swallows (Hirundo rustica) but every now and then a bird with a white rump would swoop by; a House Martin (Delichon urbica). Then I noticed a slightly smaller, browner shape whizz past. This, I think, was a Sand Martin (Riparia riparia). The walls of this water channel were peppered with what I assume were drain holes for the surrounding ground and I spotted a couple of these opportunistic little birds enter one of the holes – ready made nest sites. A bird soon popped out of the same hole and I wondered if I’d witnessed a shift change sitting on a hidden nest, allowing a partner to come out and feed. The funny thing was, we couldn’t actually see any flies at all but there must’ve been masses of them, given the hundreds of birds feeding.

We could’ve watched the swarming Swallows for hours but we needed to move on to the Storks. These were White Storks (Ciconia ciconia).I’d have thought it a little disconcerting to have birds the size of a small private aircraft nesting on ones roof – these guys have a 2m wingspan – so the nests are necessarily rather large. I can’t help but wonder who gets to clear up after breeding season, assuming that someone does.

It was clear that the Storks did not mind a little noise; at least two pairs had chosen to nest on bell towers. As we wandered around the town, the bell in the tallest tower began ringing loudly but the resident Stork continued with its nest preparation apparently completely unfazed. Watching a 1m tall bird deftly manipulating twigs/branches that were almost the same length was quite fascinating. Such innate skill is remarkable.

Before heading back to the car to start out for Jalón, we wandered around, we finished our visit by wandering around some of the streets of Tarazona. It’s a pleasant town and in its network of narrow streets we stumbled across two fishmongers, alleyways, ornately decorated buildings and, of course, yet more Stork nests.

Back on the road, we headed off cross-country intending to call into Daroca, reputedly well worth a visit. Regrettably, though, the rain began again and, with temperatures topping out at 7°C, we bailed out and headed for the autopista towards Teruel. Here, what had been irritating drizzle became a thrashing downpour of biblical proportions. I slowed to avoid aquaplaning on the standing water in the tyre ruts. Welcome to sunny Spain. 😀

The weather had moderated as we approached Jalón. ‘T was still very grey, though. We’re here and this is the first time we have not been able to sit on our balcony on the day of arrival.