A Week in Scotland

Smoked salmon and cream cheese for lunch

I don't think Scotland should ever be allowed to leave the UK, I enjoy visiting it too much! If you ever feel that there are too many people in London and you need to get away from it, just visit Scotland. The mountains, the wild camping, the wilderness, the no people. It is really such a great place to visit. True the weather kind of sucks, and it's cold and wet a lot of the time, and when it isn't, there are thousands of midges. But the times when the clouds lift just enough to see the tops of the peaks is really something special. And being able to stand on the top of a mountain and not see any signs of humans; no roads, no villages, no paths, that is so good after Bank underground station. I'm not sure where else in the UK something like that is possible.

Heading for the base of those mountains - I love these glacial valleys

We spent 2 days camping in the Cairngorms, I love the Cairngorms, the wide, glacial valleys, the complete isolation, the mountains. It's really great having this so close to us. Flights leave Aberdeen from City airport and then it's about 90 minutes drive to the entry point to the park. I definitely have to get back there more. There are way too many places to visit in just this country, let alone Europe! Our first day was a pretty long one, along a path for most of the way. Then right at the end we headed up this valley, with an elevation gain of a couple hundred metres. Which was a bit tough coming at the end of an 18km walk. We camped by the shores of a mountain tarn. A beautiful spot, it was just a bit of a shame it was so incredibly windy that night. I've never had it so windy, at some points I was a little worried the tent was going to be torn apart. But everything held together nicely. 

Slowly approaching, we turn left at the base of the peak

It was our first trip in our new tent, and I have to say, after this one, bring on the camping. We spent way too much on it, it's Swedish, and it's just so well designed. After many trips in slightly crappy tents, I don't think I'm going to need another one. It's big, it has this massive vestibule, so even if it's pouring with rain, you can make dinner and not get wet. And then there's heaps of space for your bags and boots and everything. So the actual tent just has you and your clothes. It's so luxurious, but still light. I think there are going to be some fun times had with this. 

Our beautiful campsite on the second night

After a rather sleepless night we decided we had to get lower for the next evening, preferably with some trees, always a bit of an ask in the Cairngorms. We had to ford the river Dee, which was actually quite wide. I got a bit worried about wet boots, but really, it wasn't that cold. Then we had the best campsite I have ever walked to, it was amazing. In amongst a little pine forest, flat, grassy patch of ground, with no stones. Right next to a flowing river and views out over snow capped mountains. So good. That really was a perfect campsite. I hope I visit that one again.

I wasn't expecting so much snow on the peaks, it was the last weekend in May, which I thought would have been late enough in spring that everything would have melted. But as the ranger told me, the Cairngorms are the only sub-arctic region in the UK, and they were really arcticing it up. I'm not so experienced in snow, especially when it's on really steep slopes, and since the avalanche forecasts only stopped being issued a fortnight before we visited. With one of the last forecast being for a high likelihood of avalanche, that freaked me out a bit. Aaah poor Scotland, such a short window to visit, it's either covered in snow, or when it's warm enough that it melts, it's covered in midge. Perhaps autumn is the time to pay another visit. 

Walking the Grand Canyon - Part 2

On the way out of Monument creek, view of the Colorado, it's the brown river

After the really long first day, I think it was something like 17kms with the heaviest packs of the day, it was a nice short day for the second. Just a stroll really, down to the Colorado River, though we did get to slide through some canyons. That was pretty fun, especially since we were already hot at 9am.

I think camping on the shores of the river was the best night. The river was not what I expected at all. For some reason I thought the Colorado river would actually be quite shallow and narrow. I think because we had been spotting glimpses of it for so long. But these were from so far away that it looked pretty calm and not that big. And then you got down there, and it was pretty scary. It sounded like a jet engine, it was roaring, and bubbling, a real chocolate milkshake - but a scary one. It was also freezing cold, I can't think of a less inviting place to swim, and given it was so hot otherwise, with not a cloud in the sky, it really felt a little unfair. We had to camp a little away from the water, just because there was no way you could sleep through the noise, and I have never thought that of flowing water before, normally it is quite peaceful. Wowsers.

The chocolate milkshake of the Colorado

These gullies were serious, you wouldn't want to go wrong.

That was a bit of a lazy day, with a paddle in some pools, away from the river, and a relax in the sun. Really quite pleasant, with yet more delicious food cooked by our awesome guide.

The next day we were off to hermit camp, this was again on the banks of a creek, and yet another great camp spot. The national park has really done a great job at choosing these camp spots. I wish the national parks in England and Wales had these as well, campsites that you had to walk to. Scotland has the wild camping, which is great, but England and Wales don't have anything like that. It's a real shame, since it also has great open spaces, but you are not meant to sleep out there. Perhaps people do anyway, so long as they are away from paths and not really visible, perhaps they don't care. Because Wales has some great beaches, and I'm really dreaming of finding an overnight walk to some beach that you can only access on foot. How great would that be?

Last view of the monument

The lovely sunset colours in the canyon

Apparently there used to be a hermit, Louis Boucher, who lived in the area for 20 years or so, though I'm not sure how much of a hermit he really was. This region of the park has all these trails and campsites named after this guy. This part of the park also used to be in private hands, and the trail down was built to service a luxury campsite. In fact there used to be a tramway from the rim, as well as a car for transportation and a chef. It must have been some campsite. This was all back in 1910 or so. And there is not much remaining at all. The trail has seen some serious rock falls, nothing major, but you couldn't even get a horse along there now. At the time they really wanted to capitalise on the canyon, luckily tourism has moved away from that style of enjoying the wilderness.

You have to visit this place, it's amazing

Not a cloud in the sky at sunset. The top cliff is 1000m above.

This was our last night in the canyon, and the next morning we were getting up at 4:30am to try and beat the heat when we slog our way back up the 1000 metres to the rim. Again this is when the guide is so good. You didn't need to worry about having the will power to get up that early, since it was up to him to rouse us all. I am such a fan of guided walks, at least where I don't know the flora, fauna or terrain.

We had to pick our guide's brain too, since this had been so amazing. Everywhere you looked there were fantastic views, just the scale and the colours, everything about it. So we ask him which is his favourite national park, and he doesn't even say the grand canyon! He likes Glacier and Olympic national parks more, so guess where we are off to this summer. If they are better than the grand canyon, then I have high hopes!

Sunrise at the canyon

The cathedral steps go through the pass - fantastic sunrise.

It was quite fun leaving before dawn, we had our head torches on and it was so still and quiet. And then the sun started to come up. I really should have got up earlier during the trip, the colours at sunrise were amazing. We had breakfast at the top of the Cathedral steps. I don't really remember going down these on the way in, but they were super steep, a lot of switchbacks. It did mean though that most of the ascent was done before breakfast, which is a nice way to climb out of the canyon

One last shot on the way out

Then it was just the slog back up to the truck, and since we were going up the way we were going down, you knew how far everything was away. It was still nice to finally reach the top. You start to pass other people the closer you get to the carpark. I always find that slightly strange after a few days away from people, where I am all smelly, in the same clothes I was wearing 4 days ago, and they are all nice and clean, and in jeans and stuff. Thankfully it wasn't that hot, and our packs were light, and we were enthused for more back country adventures in the US. Before we left the canyon for good we stopped at one of the lookouts for some photos. We could see the whole route we had taken, even the paths that we were walking on, that was pretty cool. And actually having been down there, amongst it, that's not something you forget.

View from the lookout, you can vaguely see the trail if you look closely

Walking the Grand Canyon - Part 1

A very small part of the canyon

Driving up to the Grand Canyon was an interesting experience in itself. You are quite high ~2000m, and the land rises a little up to the Canyon. Basically though you are driving for about 2 hours through very flat desert with no trees or anything. Then just before the Canyon the land rises very gently and you drive through a scrubby forest. This means that you can't see the Canyon at all until you are right on top of it. You could be a kilometre away and have absolutely no idea that there is this wonderful natural phenomenon so close by. It must have been annoying for people trying to expand south (or north) as it's about 450kms wide and 1000m deep. And it's not like a gentle slope down to the Colorado River, it's cliffs and then the Colorado River is this raging torrent. I can't imagine you getting an expansionary force across this without some serious effort.

Great views around every corner

The canyon must be amazing for geologists to visit, I feel like I was missing a dimension because the timescales we were talking about as you descend into the canyon are crazy.  The 1.5km from rim to river extends back something like 2 billion years. Everything about this place is indescribable. The other great thing is that each layer seems so distinctive from the next, you can really feel that you are walking back through time as you descend.

The features were so deep and so massive

Our guide was so good, they really do make these trips, he was a real bushman this guy. I don't think he officially rented a house any place, he spent all his time in the back country, as they call it, so on the few nights where he wasn't out on a tour, he would sleep in the company's warehouse, or with friends. He also worked with this other company that would do month long hikes with teenagers. That must be something else, they would be out there so long they would need food drops. So anyway, guiding with 4 adults must be a total holiday for this guy. He was just so totally relaxed too, I think you would have to be, to deal with people all the time. And he was a really good cook too, no dehydrated meals for us! Real luxury camping.

I can never get sick of that view

Our first day was long, and hot, we started a bit late, after having to drive out there, and we really did drive to the end of the road. Then it was straight down from there. There was only one spot to get more water along the way, and that was really close to the start. And it was hoooooot. I can't imagine what this place is like in summer, since we were there in October, and even then the temperatures were high. It was nice not having to worry about where we would need to get water and how much to get, the guide knew exactly what to do, ah such a pleasure.

It's so hard to capture the scale

Our first campsite was Monument creek campsite, all the camp spots were great, they even had toilets too. I was thinking it was going to be more like Scotland, with the true wild experience. And they were all really quiet too, for one of them we were all by ourselves, right on the banks of the Colorado river.

The first night we were camping on the shores of Monument creek, which wasn't much of a creek. There was just a little trickle, really not even enough to submerge ourselves. And yet these creeks can be dangerous when it rains. Just a week prior to us visiting there had been heaps of rain, and lots of flash flooding. One of the guides from the same company had refused to take a group up one of the creeks, even though they were really pushing for it. A couple of hours later and the whole place was totally inundated, with massive boulders coming down. They would have been in real trouble if they had made the guide go up.

And yet another one

It is an odd relationship, that of guide and guidee, because you are relying on them to get you the places you want, safely. But then you have paid them money to take you there. You can start to understand how the whole Everest thing can be so fraught, since those people are paying a loooooot of money to get up there. I'm pretty cool with the guide telling me what is safe and not, that's why I get a guide, to outsource that worry about things. So why wouldn't you listen to them, if that's what you are paying for. If you are so sure you know what is safe, in a place you've never been before, then why bother getting a guide.

The monument off to the bottom right

Anyway, there were no problems like that on our trip. I think we were all pretty happy to go with what the guide was telling us to do, and nobody had to be a hero, though I doubt you could have out-heroed our guide. Seriously you feel like this guy could have gotten you out of any scrape. About the only thing of danger out there were scorpions, and the thing is they are really small. Not the big scorpions you see in movies. But some of them are pretty poisonous, they would require a helicopter lift if you did get stung. Another guide one trip got stung on the neck, I'm guessing not by the super dangerous one, because the next day, she hiked out by herself! Holy cow, now that is some hard-core human. So yeah, don't mess with guides.

The monument of monument creek.

We get to Monument creek pretty late, the sun is already setting just as we arrive. And we were all really buggered. We didn't really spend the time we should have admiring why it was called Monument creek. The next morning was a bit better. There are all these freaky columns around the place. And by now we are past the really red zone, and are into more of a sandstone layer. Quite a different colour.

The scale was unimaginable

New House

I've been a bit quiet (ok a lot quiet) on here over the past few months. My excuse is that we've just bought a house so I think that was taking up a lot of mental energy. I gotta say the way house purchases are carried out here in the UK leaves a lot to be desired. Not that I've ever bought a house anywhere else, but man I just can't imagine it can be this bad everywhere. The weird thing is with almost every other purchase you make, a pair of jeans, a washing machine, or any service that is provided to you, there seem to be all these consumer laws designed to protect you, the purchaser. If the jeans are the wrong size you can take them back no worries, if the washing machine breaks, it'll be fixed, if you go to a restaurant you are probably not going to get sick. And yet a house, which costs hundreds of times more, there are no protections whatsoever. It feels like everyone just wants a piece of you (or rather a piece of your money), but if anything goes wrong you are the only one who is liable. And if there turns out to be something wrong with the house, too bad! It's so weird that the biggest purchase of your life has zero protection around it. And don't even get me started on stamp duty.

The last week before completion was pretty stressful because at that point you have signed the contracts and are legally bound to complete the sale on the date given. The thing is at that point it's also completely out of your hands as to whether the money is actually transferred. You have to rely on the solicitor, the bank and the mortgage broker all being able to do their job properly. Which turns out to be harder than you think. I am not used to having such big decisions being completely out of my control so it was really hard to deal with.

Also because I rang the bank on the Monday (we are completing on the Friday) and the bank tells me they have no knowledge of my account. The solicitor and the mortgage broker seem completely unconcerned. So you try not to stress about it, thinking there must be something else going on, but it sure was hard to sleep properly after hearing that. Then Thursday comes round (when the money from the bank is meant to be transferred to the solicitor for the Friday completion) and it turns out that the bank really did have no knowledge of our account. It took 45 phone calls between us, the solicitor and the mortgage broker to get it sorted out. And I'm thinking if I ever did that in my job I'd probably be fired. And yet these retail banks can behave criminally and get away with it. Because you know if the money hadn't gone through it would have been us paying the penalty for breaking the completion contract, not the bank. So like I said, some sleepless nights.

But now we are all set up in our house, and it's just something I like to think about when I need to fuel my rage fire. English houses are funny, they have to have stairs in them to count as a house, otherwise it's a bungalow, which I find hilarious. I think I would much rather a bungalow, I'm going to build massive calf muscles with the 3 flights of stairs I now have.  The house is 100 years old though, so that has been a bit weird for me, all the floors are at an angle, so your sitting in a chair and you can feel that one side of your body is bearing most of the weight. And you put bottles on the ground and they'll roll to one side. We may look at fixing that, at least all our bookshelves stand up properly and don't appear as if they'll crush us, so perhaps it's not that bad.

It's hard to get into the homeowner mindset, I do wonder if my interests will change now that I have this massive debt millstone. I am certainly invested in society staying the way it is, no anarchy or revolution for me please, unless retail bank debts are the first thing destroyed, then I'm all for it. But I wonder if I'll really get into gardening or something. I always liked the idea of a veggie patch say, or flower beds, but having only been in rental houses, it was hard to put much effort in, since you were only ever going to be there for 2 years at most. And for the last 8 years I have only lived in apartments, so not even the possibility of a garden. Now I have a place with a garden shed, it's definitely going to take some getting used to.

Grand Canyon - Or How I Learnt to Love Back-Country US

Our trusty vehicle - it actually had two rows of seats in the back. Everything's
bigger in the US!

We were back in San Francisco late summer last year. Well it was really Sonoma Valley, but since we'd done a bit of Yosemite last time, and there are direct flights to Phoenix, we thought - Grand Canyon, why not. How can you turn down the Grand Canyon, it's like a wonder of the world. I always like hiking too, and camping. Waking up early in the morning, and there is always the possibility of a bit of fauna when you are camping. And the Grand Canyon promised all of that.

We found this awesome company - Wildland Trekking. We were actually going to the US for a wedding, so we thought it was easier to use a company. That way we didn't have to take a whole bunch of hiking gear with us - as well as wedding stuff. And that was such a good decision. It helped that the guide was just so good, and the other people in the party were also Australians which just made the whole experience so much better. I can see that if you were stuck with a bad group of guests it could get messy pretty quickly. But we had chosen the hardest route we could, so thought that should winnow out most of the chaff. And in the end there was quite a gap between our capabilities and the other two people with us, so it meant that we really were doing the walking on our own. But had the navigation, route planning, food buying and meal preparation all taken care of. It was like luxury camping. I would definitely use this company again, in fact we are planning a trip to Yellowstone for that very reason.

Fossilised animal prints

But before the Grand Canyon there was Phoenix, hmm what to say about Phoenix? Not sure I'll be back, I guess it's just a US city? I think I've figured out my strategy for the US, avoid the cities, and spend all my time out bush. Because their national parks are amazing. I thought Yosemite was something special, but then the Grand Canyon blows it out of the water. And if you camp or do anything involving a bit of physical exertion, there is nobody else around. Fantastic!

One weird thing is the incredibly poor transport links to the Canyon, you'd kind of think it would be super easy. Maybe everyone goes via Vegas, but I think that goes to the north rim, and the south rim is where it's at. I guess it is the land of the car. We managed to find this really weird shuttle bus, and when I say it's a shuttle bus it's actually a big SUV that's been converted to have 3 rows of seats. It's not even a van. And that is the only way to get from Phoenix to Flagstaff (which is the closest town to the Canyon). And even that is still a 2 hour drive away from the Canyon. It's incredible just how big the US is, it's much bigger than Australia.

Weird flora in the canyon - but check out those
rock colours!

With my southern American prejudices I was kind of expecting Arizona to be a real gun-toting state, I mean they do border Mexico and don't they have really weird paper checking powers there? But anyway I wanted to see how safe I would be walking around the streets, like is everyone going to be carrying a gun? Whilst they basically have no gun ownership restrictions, I'm talking assault weapons, concealed carry, open carry, it's all good in Arizona. They actually have only a median percentage of gun ownership. About 31% of people own a gun, that's 38th in gun ownership rates by state. So relatively low given how easy it seems to get a gun. I feel like I should have visited a Walmart whilst I was there now. I was a bit disappointed with my Walmart experience in California. Not a rifle to be seen, just military-grade crossbows.

Flagstaff was a much prettier town, much, much colder too. Phoenix was hot and this was at the very end of summer too, more autumn weather. I was expecting temperatures closer to London range, and it was high 20s. There were so many cacti too, I was not expecting that, it was really the west there, just driving along the highway and there are massive cacti, like ones you would see in old western movies. So cool.

Anyway Flagstaff was much cooler, but then it's at 2100m, which was another shocker. I really had done no research into this trip. Dave had done all the planning. I think I managed to find the shuttle bus and that was the extent of my contribution. Anyway 2100m is pretty high, that's almost higher than Kosciusko (which I think will always be my level for something being high). And you really felt the elevation, a little harder to breathe and crisp, clear, cool air. Really very pleasant. And the town was quite pretty too, with a nice main street. Not that we spent a lot of time there. Because the evening we arrived was the pre-trip meeting and then we were off again very early the next morning. This was exciting, a 2 hour drive and we would be at the canyon. And I really didn't know what to expect. I feel a bit bad now, I hadn't even checked out pictures on the internet. I guess I knew it would be big, that's about it. I was in for a shock I can tell you that!

So one teaser photo before the next instalment

2014 - A Year In Review

A weekend in Prague

I guess it's that time of year where you start thinking about what you have achieved in 2014, and maybe plan for things to do next year. I think 2014 has definitely been the year of travel. I get a bit exhausted just thinking about it. In 2014 I managed to get to both the US and Australia twice. That's a lot of loooong flights in one year. I've also visited Japan, Czech Republic, Austria, Germany, Luxembourg and Spain. Inside the UK we've been to Cardiff, Cotswolds, the Lake District, Isle of Skye, Cambridge many times and the Brecon Beacons. That's also a good number of train miles.

My favourite trips out of all that lot has to be the one to Japan (skiing there was a revelation), plus the trips to the US (one because it was business class and the other because I visited the Grand Canyon). I also really liked the Isle of Skye and the Pyreneean adventures. I definitely want to do more things like that in 2015.

A week in New York

One of the other very exciting things is that we are in the process of buying a house!!! It's even got a backyard. But this is still early days, I am learning a lot about the strange English process of house-buying. It all seems very inefficient to me. You get all these surveys done, which I guess is common everywhere, one of which was a Radon report. Apparently Radon concentrations are quite high in England, though to be honest, London looks like it has the lowest concentrations of anywhere in the UK, you would not want to be living in Cornwall! I have to say it was a bit weird to be given this report from the lawyer, I honestly had not thought how radioactive gases would affect me if I bought a place.

Dominating Skye

Overall it seems that the process is very different from Australia, not that I've ever bought a place there. Here you get into these long chains, where we want to buy a house off someone who needs to buy a house off someone who needs to buy a house and so on, until you reach the point where either someone has died or is leaving the country. So as you can imagine they can be quite long. Luckily ours is only 4 people long, which we've been told is quite short, sounds pretty long to me though! It does mean though that once you've put an offer in and it's been accepted, you have to wait whilst all the other people along the chain put in offers that have been accepted. Bear in mind that no money has changed hands yet. Once the chain is finished you then get your lawyer and start getting all your surveys done.

Bagging Helvellyn

That's when we got the radon report, and a flooding report and a home buyers report. They even do a check on chancel liability. This is a good one. Turns out you can be liable for any repairs to the church in your parish, even if you don't go to church. Aaaah state religion, what is it good for? This all blew up kind of recently when a couple got a bill for tens of thousands of pounds to repair some church, took the church to court and at the end of everything they ended up liable and with a £100,000 bill. That panicked everyone and so to calm down the rabid lawyers the government told the churches they had to tell everyone whether they could be liable for a chancel repair bill by 2013. Up until this date nobody knew whether they were about to be hit with a £10,000 bill for some random church. After that date the only time the church can add liability to a house is between the exchange and completion period. You can get insurance to cover this risk. It's just completely insane.

Norway in Scotland

Family days in Cambridge

All everyone wants to do is just get a little bit of money from you. Oh you want to check for damp, that'll cost you, you want to make sure the roof isn't falling down, that'll cost you, you want to check if the church is going to whack you with a liability, that'll cost you. And all the while nothing is legally binding, it could all fall apart tomorrow. It's not until you actually exchange that you are sure that the sellers won't just change their minds. The joys of house buying. And don't even get me started on stamp duty!

Anyway I think the new house is going to be our main achievement for this coming year, if we ever make it to completion. Fingers crossed for a move in date in early Spring!

What else for this year? Hmmm maybe some more travel (though probably less than 2014), I'm hopeful for another trip to the US, maybe Yellowstone this time, another good 7 days out in the back-country with a few wolf, bear and moose sightings would be perfect, but no close encounters thank you. There was also thoughts of a week walking in Scotland and another week walking in the Canary Islands (that's for December to try and get us through another winter). I think that means no new countries visited this year. Hmmm maybe have to try and fit in some city breaks somewhere. I think I'd like to visit more of London, I feel like it was a bit neglected in 2014, so I'll have to try and make up for that. I guess we are trying to save a little money where possible to start paying off the house, so London visiting will be cheap. Aaah crushing debt, nothing like it to curtail holiday plans. Anyway I think this is going to be another great year, looking forward to it!

Tree on fire in the Lakes

Day 5 - Sallent to Sandinies

From Punta del Pacino - looking over the valley to where we walked 2
days ago

This was another great day of walking. It felt a bit wilder than the other walks we had done this week. I'm not sure why. It was another long day, 18km and 1000m of ascent, not insignificant after such a massive day the day before. We had seen the first part of this day when we were coming in from Panticosa. So we knew we were going pretty sharply up through a forest at the start, before the first ascent of the day. This one was really quite easy, probably the easiest ascent of the week. It just came after a really long slog to the saddle.

Looking towards we we walked yesterday - up the valley in the middle

After the final ascent of the day - happy to be on flat ground

We started at about 1200m in Panticosa and then had to get up to 1800m in just a couple of kilometres, so a pretty steep start. The views from the top were definitely worth it though. We could see back to where we had been walking both yesterday and the day before that. It's always slightly satisfying to see the mountains and ridges you have scaled before to get some idea of just how hard it looks from a distance. And let me tell you, it didn't look easy. The first ascent was 1965m, it was steep at the start, but overall nothing challenging. It was then a bit of a descent to a lake and yet another dam, not sure why there are so many dams. It's also strange to think that the state we were in, Aragon, is meant to be known for it's drought, and yet we had just spent a week constantly surrounded by lakes, dams and rivers. Perhaps that's why the rest of the state is so dry, they aren't letting the water flow south to it.

Yet another dam - surrounded by great mountains

Crossing the dam we came across a couple of mountain bikers. One of them was a young girl of about 10, it's nice to see adults getting their kids out, especially into such challenging terrain. I mean parts of this walk were just made for bikes, but it was pretty steep. And this section where we passed them was a bit of a cliff face, so they had to really just carry their bikes up it. Still if this was Australia I imagine the cyclists would have been completely banned from this trail, so it was nice to see that's not the case in the rest of the world, ie cyclists aren't a hunted species everywhere.

The view towards the dam, the second ascent is to the left in the mid-ground.
The one that just looks like a rocky outcrop - we climbed that. 

After lunching in the shade of an abandoned house it was up to another saddle. This abandoned house was pretty weird, it was completely burnt out, but nothing else was burnt around it, and it was miles from civilisation, at the very end of a dirt road with nothing around it. It made me wonder who would live there and what caused the fire. Perhaps it was an insurance scam, maybe it got to them after awhile, living so far from everything, but who else is going to want to buy the place.

Looking down from halfway up the climb - there is a
path of sorts in there, but it's a long fall if you slipped

The next section of the walk was pretty tricky, there was no path, we could see very clearly where we wanted to go, it's just that this section of the ground was full of steep gullies and ridges which would lead to a dead end - where you either had to go down and up a very steep gully, or turn around and try to find another way through. It was a very strange little section. After navigating it we made it up to another saddle, where we could head up Punta de la Cochata. I have to say I wasn't that keen to head up, it was incredibly steep. It looked almost like a cliff. It wasn't very long, thankfully, but I just didn't want to end up stuck halfway up not being able to go further up or getting down.

But Dave started off the climb. I was surprised at this since he doesn't have a good head for heights, but he attacked it. Thing is, he could only get about halfway up and then he started to feel it. It was hands and feet kind of stuff, like climbing a ladder, but with much looser footing and the prospect of a fall onto sharp rocks. Luckily it wasn't windy or raining. But halfway up it didn't look like it was going to get any worse, certainly not any better, but at least no worse. So I was keen to keep going whereas Dave wanted to turn around. We managed to get to the top, I like to think it was a team effort. Definitely the scariest climb I've done. My legs were shaking when we got back to flat ground, and there was a very short period of hyperventilating, but other than that, all good :).

Dave at the base of Punta de la Cochata

After recovering from this climb there was another tricky navigational section, mainly because the notes gave everything in terms of trees, stuff like, at the rowan tree turn left, then skirt around some box trees before passing a juniper bush. Problem is I have no idea what any of those trees look like, and since there wasn't much of a path you kind of needed to know what they were to stay on track. Still I was pretty proud of us, since we just followed the map instead and we managed to come out right where we were supposed to, even without any directions.

And that was pretty much it for our walking in Spain, there was one more day, but we just smashed that out in 3 hours or so. I think it was 14km or something, piece of cake after the distances we had been putting in. I was certainly sore though.

I do like the walking in Spain, the people are friendly, and seem to like the outdoors too, the weather is fantastic, and the trails aren't too crowded. What's not to like? I just need to learn a bit of Spanish I think.