I wrote about the station a couple of weeks ago, saying it still looked good but not as good as when it really was blooming.
This brought an admonishment from one of my readers who slightly misunderstood what I was saying. My words were not a criticism but an observation and now a group is coming together to do some planting and to make the station resplendent again.
And talking about volunteers. I realised a few days ago that the Hethersett Hearts charity has been in existence for some time now but I have never really featured them in either my blog or publications. I think the group started in lockdown and I might just have taken them for granted.
This is something I intend putting right very soon.
And so I continue the travelogue.
So do you know in which country the largest pyramid in the world is located?
Probably not. That was one of the questions on a family quiz at the complex.
We had a hard day on the road. Actually it wasn't all that hard. We picked up a car from the local bar. The car wasn't actually in the bar but the paperwork was. It was a virtually new VW Polo automatic. I think the last time I drove an automatic was in New Zealand and that was on the left side of the road. It's strange how your mind adapts to driving on the wrong side of the road (which is actually the right if you know what I mean). Suddenly as you approach a roundabout you look to your left rather than right which of course helps to avoid a nasty pile up.
The complex where we are staying is pretty much in the middle of nowhere so a car is necessary if you want to get anywhere and see the area.
I don't want to drive large distances but we are between the mountains and the sea so there's plenty to see (or should that be between the mountains and the see so there's plenty to sea)?
So on car day one of three, we went to a trio of places. The first was a sizeable town with the interesting name of Cuevas Del Almanzora, a name you instantly forget as soon as you leave the place, that is if you remember it at all.
We parked at the start of the town and walked through largely deserted streets. It seemed very quiet and peaceful and there were religious symbols everywhere and not just because Easter was approaching.
Then we got to the castle with an impressive market in front of it which was alive with noise and hustle and bustle. We climbed up to walk along the walls of the castle with steep drops and see through walkways - best not to look down.
All was safe. So we bought a load of fruit and vegetables at prices we could only dream of in our country. Coffee turned out to be just under £1 a cup. Cuevas simply means caves and there are plenty of cave dwellings in the nearby hills.
From the 17th to 19th century Cuevas relied on agriculture and then mining took over. Today the town is renowned for its ironwork balconies and doors and you might see some of this in my photos which I will start posting shortly. There was an interesting museum that had models made out of recyclable materials and there will be photographs of this as well.
Next stop was the strangely named town of Vera. I suppose on entering it you should simply say "Alloe Vera". Nowhere near as attractive or old as Cuevas, Vera now relies very much on tourism as the town leads down to the beach although we found this rather confusing as walking to the beach didn't seem possible and our car journey seemed to be a good four miles. Perhaps we had missed a short cut.
Vera again boomed with the mining of lead and silver and the development of agriculture and just outside of the town we saw people working in the fields, harvesting goods for the various markets held in the towns around the area.
Our final stop of the day was at Garrucha - a sturdy seaside town with a whole host of bars and outdoor restaurants where we had a tapas blow out which lasted us until a small late supper.
Garrucha was the main port for the mining industry but is now known for its massively long and wide beaches and its seafood. The width of the beach reminded us of those at Great Yarmouth and Gorleston back home.
We were back in time for a read and rest before the evening quiz in which we didn't do badly but didn't trouble the top three. "I bet there were some boffs" I said to the others but I don't think any of them had a clue what I was talking about.
As for the question at the start of this blog. The world's largest pyramid as you might have suspected is not in Egypt but in Mexico. I wasn't too far out with my guess of Peru but a miss is as good as a mile as they say (or in this case a few thousand miles). Eldest son thought it was a trick question and wanted us to put France which we duly did, possibly causing some confusion for the people marking our paper. "These loonies have put France," they probably said. He argued that the massive glass (or is it plastic) pyramid outside the Louvre should have been included.
Tomorrow we are going to take a short trip to see one or two mountain villages.
I have posted the first set of photographs from the trip in a separate entry. These cover the first four days of our trip and the places already mentioned.