Costa Blanca Mountain Walkers

- 17 February: Barranco Encantada

16 of us set off, under Jon Lyon’s tender care, prepared to be enchanted by this beautiful barranco, hoping for decent weather, passable paths and not too much water in the bottom of the barranco – swimming not being considered de rigeur at this time of year.

We set off across groves, at the end of a ridge which gave panoramic views across the Embalse de Beniarres we came to easier ground and here Jon led the group steeply down to the barranco bottom and then followed it to emerge where it joined the river Serpis. A couple of us demurred here and sloped off in search of the wimps option to be detained shortly by an elderly Spanish farmer who gave us a short potted life history and then jogged off back into his farmhouse to return bearing poetic offerings (yes – in Spanish!) about the surrounding area. The Spanish sonnet we learned has 2 groups of 4 lines and then 2 groups of 3. Each line has 11 beats. I could go on, but the walk beckons……we emerged at said river junction almost exactly as the main group arrived.

From here a little bit of make it up navigation saw us tramping down a track with repeated warnings urging “privado”. We took this to mean for vehicles and continued with gusto until we reached a walled house where we tip toed around their garden to emerge on a good track leading up the hill on the opposite side of the barranco to make our return.

At last we reached our meandering high point for the afternoon – and indeed for the day – From here ‘twas but a straightforward trog down a few zig zags to regain our starting point and thence to the nearest hostelry, where, regrettably, round 3 of the inter- province smoking competitions were being held – another one off the list.

Thanks again to Jon for a fine day.