South of Granada

Getting closer:

I spent the night at truckers type hostal near the motorway about 20 miles west of Granada.  The room was fairly abysmal but after a day when I'd had to travel further than intended to find a room it was welcoming enough with friendly staff and generously sized tapas so no need to buy dinner as usual.

The view of course was beyond reproach!

I tried the next day to follow the 'Canal de Cacin' which is an irrigation system rather than a navigable canal.  It ran west to east, parallel to and a mile or south of the motorway so would suit my purposes for getting 15 miles or so closer to Granada before heading south.

I'd reluctantly decided not to visit Granada on this trip.  I'd spent time there a few years ago with Claire and have seen the main attractions including the incomparable Alhambra.  I didn't think I'd make the best of it on my bike so I skirted Granada to the west to head towards my beloved Las Alpujarrras.

I had thought of crossing the main Sierra Nevada range on my bike but my legs and lungs thought better of it.  I was also concerned about the breaking spoke situation, I'd had a third in recent days.  It was always a long shot anyway as there is normally too much snow on the route in early June, I was informed that this probably is the case now.

The canal wasn't easy to get started on, I'd been told the accompanying route was a good road although it was shown as a Camino on my road map.  I started on a road but it soon turned off in the wrong direction. 

I found myself on rough, shaley tracks which climbed and descended steeply as the canal went through a series of tunnels and over aqueducts.  The 15 miles would take all day at this rate.  At every property I passed I was welcomed by barking dogs, this gets fairly tiresome after a while.

I stopped at one house where 4 dogs were complaining about my arrival.  I asked a chap in the garden for directions.  He came out and pointed my in the right direction, I had to descend most of the height I'd gained.  He didn't seem to think there was on onward route by the canal so he directed me to the motorway where there is a camino running along side.  This is what they do in Spain when roads get upgraded to motorways, there is usually, but not always  a camino alongside for use by cyclists and local farm traffic.

It was very rough in places, my 'bits' did not approve of the route and it was very time consuming.  The camino came to a sudden end where I had to cross the motorway and continue on roads on the other side.

I crossed the motorway a 2nd time at a junction where I wanted to head south, a few miles west of Granada airport.  Again the roads didn't quite fit in with my map, I was going in the right general direction though and in fact ended up on the canal camino again for a good few miles.

As I got further east, towards Granada I caught my first glimpses of the distant Sierra Nevada range, still with snow on the tops, they were barely visible in the afternoon haze but I could see enough to reminisce about my days on these big mountains and I wondered if I'd get to explore them again.

I headed south with views of the Cumbres Verdes, the limestone foothills of the Sierra Nevada and saw the familiar profile of the impressive hill Trevenque, more memories of days in the hills.

I knew it was just one more night before I'd enter Las Alpujarras, my adopted second home and in particular the high village of Bubion.  I was like a kid on Christmas Eve!