Catalonia

We have arrived in Madrid and on the way to Barcelona

We have finally got some good WIFI so I can upload some photos. Up until now WIFI has been slow at best and mostly diabolical. Consequently posts have been rather mixed.

Spent an interesting day in the hills between Madrid and Barcelona - the hinterland of Catalonia. A heat wave has hit Spain so it was HOT - 38C and hotter in some of the rocky areas we visited. It has been a day of windy hilly roads, dry conditions and kms of olive trees. Just Olives with a few prune trees for km after km. In the more fertile areas where irrigation was available it was pears, maize and apples. A lot of the apples were covered with shade cloth. All of the maize was irrigated with fixed sprinklers. It must cost the earth to set up. The rest used flood irrigation.

Convention just north of Barcelona tomorrow

A shepherd watering his flock. The sheep were in good condition. No fences but they weren't going far from water.

Olives as far as the eye can see and further - right over the horizon

Parc Natural de la Serra Montsant SW of Barcelona - it would have been over 40C in among the rock faces

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Quitans - A Study of a Typical Galacian village

Image
Quintans is typical of the numerous villages we cycled through – small, quaint, interesting, a real mix of the old and the new, and seeming to doubt if it had a reason to exist in future. There were really old skeletons of houses hundreds of years old, old houses built of stone and still occupied, new modern houses, large modern feeding barns for dairy cows, large maize silage stacks, modern and large farm equipment and hand carts. The missing element that was most disconcerting was the lack of children. We saw very few. There were lots and lots of elderly sipping their espressos and smoking but very few young families. The countryside is rolling hills clad in forest – pines, eucalypts, cedar and native species   - and green productive valleys. They don’t lack rain but they do seem to lack fertiliser. The maize crops looked malnourished and the pasture was disastrous. But it was all green. There are lots of granite rocks and outcrops - hence the stone houses - which mak...
Read more

Atlas Mountains and Desert in Morocco

Image
Inland Morocco As we left Chefchaueon we headed into the various ranges of the Atlas mountains. The most surprising aspect of this transition was the green and productive valleys  running through the yellow-brown and red-brown eroding hills. Berbers 60% of Moroccans are Berber. they are a first nation people who have originally been nomadic herders. Some still keep to that lifestyle. Others have settled into farming the fertile valleys. Others are moving to the cities for education and jobs. Schooling is gradually coming to the remoter areas and even to the nomads, although only 3 years of education is compulsory at this stage Morocco - Photographing People A common belief amongst the Moroccans, particularly the village Berber people is that if you take their photo it steals their soul. Our guide, who was a Berber, stressed that we should not take photos without asking permission. In several cases, particularly with older villagers, he would not even ask....
Read more

Sailing off West Coast of Wales

Image
We arrived in London and traveled straight to the far west of Wales to Fishguard to meet up with Robin & Brigette and their new boat Ruby Tuesday. It is a Jeanneau 39 ft 6 birth yacht. Very roomy and good for cruising. They have been sailing for the past 2 months around the south coast of England and are now heading up towards Scotland. The sailing has varied from dead calm motoring to some nice sailing days. Some days warm other quite cool. Not Greece but a very good UK summer. England is DRY. All the parks in London were brown. the countryside also very dry. The west coast of Wales greener. Robin & Brigette have had beautiful hot weather for the past month or so - most un-English! We have stopped at a few small villages like Aberdyfe and Pwllheli (wondering how to pronounce those? - Try Aberduffy and Perfwhelly). Also stayed at Aberystwyth, a town of maybe 15,000 people, where Robin did his PhD 40 years ago. Quite a few of his lecturers and staff are still living...
Read more