Pedalling around

These days, we've been using our bicycles to do most of our errands and shopping, and we've also kept our longer distance trips.

We've gone twice back to Montes de Málaga; the first day, it took us a little longer as we got a little lost going there from the flat, but we still did the whole planned route. The thing is, we have to pass a good part of the city to reach the entrance to the park and we were trying to avoid the busiest streets (no easy).

This route is very popular on weekends; on weekdays we hardly see one or two cyclists, but on Sunday, the trails were full of enthusiasts, most of whom passed us quite fast on the way up.



When we finally caught up with some of them resting, we chatted a little and they all say they've been going for a long time. So that's our consolation!


We then decided to look for another route starting closer to our place (or at least avoiding the city). We checked a very good and useful site, called Wikiloc, where people uploads the data of their routes, worldwide.

There, we found one route that starts about 3km from here and makes a 50km loop, following small roads, and trails and stopping by the village of Almogía. So, we downloaded the data to Micael's navigator and prepared for the trip.




That Thursday morning was quite nice and cool. Once we were out of the housing estates, we took a road that follows a river valley and we were pedalling through farms, where we passed olive groves, figs, vineyards, almond groves and lots of orange groves. Gorgeous!


Unfortunately, the navigator had a "crisis" and suddenly we couldn't see the route, though we could see our position, so we continued, trying to go in the direction of Almogía.


We went up into the hills and passed a couple of hamlets and several country houses, some abandoned, some very well kept and nice. I really liked one hamlet where they had their gardens made for the dry conditions: with cacti, aloe, and other xerophytic plants.

So, stopping and asking several people, we had an idea of the route to follow in the maze of little roads, but by then it was already 10am and it was quite hot, so we decided to turn back the same way.

Almogía at the distance

On the way back, we came across a sign for Camino de Santiago; imagine starting all the way from here...