El puente de Andalucía

February 28 is el día de Andalucía and the city organized a night hike around town as part of the different festivities. It was 14 kilometers through the olive groves around town with a local guide who told us all about the history of the different caminos and cortijos along the way.

This area was home to bandoleros through the beginning of the 20th century. At the first cortijo we visited, the guide was telling the story of the feared bandolero "El Pernales" when suddenly there was a gunshot in the dark outside the walls of the cortijo. Our group jumped and turned to the big wooden doors of the cortijo to see three "bandoleros" race in shouting and waving their muskets! They took two from our group at gun point and then asked for a ransom. We didn't have any money...so rather than turning them over, they were converted into bandoleros as well! :) It was quite a show, and quite a surprise.

The man in the middle is our guide. On either end are the captives turned bandits, and the three remaining men are the authentic bandoleros.

This was inside the cortijo. It was amazingly preserved/restored...although you can't really appreciate that in this picture. My friend Jesuli and I were drooling over all the antiques and the well preserved structure itself.

You can see the huge cooking fireplace in this picture. The entire length of the wall above the fire was a chimney to keep smoke out of the rest of the kitchen. On the right you can see the iron stove top. The drawer below is filled with hot coals from the fire to heat the stove top. I would love to cook over that fire!

There was another very impressive cortijo on our route. The owner has gone to great lengths to restore and improve upon the existing structure. He's planning to create rooms to be rented as a rural hotel! When he's finished it will be a really amazing place to stay. There's an enormous patio with palm trees and a reflective pool surrounded by arches and flowerbeds planted with rosemary. He has an amazing collection of antiques: huge clay containers used to store water, wine or olives; a wonderfully restored carriage from the 19th century, a piano, old cars and tractors... The cortijo even has it's own chapel that we weren't able to see because we were so many (61 people) and it's a very small space; but apparently he has quite a collection of saints and religious art/sculpture.

The trek was nice since the weather cooperated. It's been unseasonable warm lately and so we weren't too cold at all as we walked from 8pm to 2am! Still, on our many stops we did get a bit chilled and this seemed to be just enough to knock my immune system over the edge: I finally have come down with the cold that Angelines has been fighting now for a week! I seem to be keeping it at bay for the moment so perhaps I won't get all the way sick, but that remains to be seen. All the same, I had a great time on our hike even if I've now got a stuffy nose!

Tuesday we went up to San Pancracio to eat paella with our friends. Bela came along too and had a great time sniffing around and eating rabbit turds! ;) We visited Drew's tree and she promptly fertilized it! What a well-trained puppy I have. The tree looks good despite our dry, dry weather and the nasty cold snap a few weeks ago. I watered it before we left so it is in good shape.

Bela and I with Drew's encina.

Bela was not very happy about being relegated to outskirts of the action...

so we finally gave in to those cute puppy eyes and let her sleep in her favorite place of all: a lap!

It was a beautiful day for a picnic although a little bit windy. We hung up a blanket to block the wind from the fire for cooking and around 3:30 feasted on delicious paella. Food always tastes better out in the country. Even though Angelines and I were both feeling a little under the weather it felt good to get out of the house, spend some time in the country and laugh and chat with friends.