A desirable diversion.

We just fancied another day at the beach today, so set off on the road to Malaga about 120km away. However the sky was increasingly overcast and as we drove the temperature actually dropped from around 23'C starting to just 20'C as we neared Antequerra on the A92.

Not so good for the beach we decided (little did we know).

So Chris looked up a route to the El Chorro canyon, with its spectacular and previously highly dangerous walkway, attached to the rockface high above the canyon. I say previously, because thanks to the miracle of EU funding, a new, shiny and safe walkway has been built, in places directly on top of the previous version that still remains underneath. The route to reach the southern end, with it's spectacular gorge and hydro-electric power station took us through tiny hamlets, swooping up and down on narrow roads past precipitous drops and yet more amazing views. The sun came out, providing more amazing and constantly changing lighting through the rapidly moving clouds, and eventually the day heated up to about 30'C again.

So we arrived, hiked a couple of kilometers to the start of the trail only to find that, being Monday, it was shut (all activities of interest are shut on Mondays in Europe - it's a rule apparently). The smells of hot pine trees and local herbage were wonderful, but it was bloomin' hot and there wasn't much shade.

We eventually returned and drove on toward home, passing a variety of, once again, spectacular landscapes, huge reservoirs of water high in the mountains and a previously unknown (to us) water sports area near Ardales. At this point both the map and satnav failed us (road signs worked OK though) and while the roads seemed to be where we expected, reality broke down with a lake on the wrong side of the road! We also drove back through a windfarm accidentally on the way to Campillos.

Eventually we got back to the hotel for showers, rest, image uploading eventually (shortly) dinner.