Monfrağue Park is a mere 8 km from our campsite, although the centre, where the Tagus (in reservoir format) winds excitingly through the rocky ravines, is perhaps 17 km away. It’s time for a visit!
First a walk along the side of the snappily named Embalse de José Maria de Oreol-Alcántara II. The River in these parts is really just a series of reservoirs. The one upstream holds back the flow to “ours” in the Embalse de Torrejón. The water level in the lake of José Maria (and we’ll come back to him later) remains much lower than originally planned. As with many such empty reserves, this has revealed old structures previously flooded. Like the old road and bridge.
The Spring flowers hereabouts are beautiful. Lots of wild lavender, white broom, various spiky yellow-flowered jobs and huge-flowered rock roses – just like in gardens back home.
I’m just going to step back a few days for a moment:
When we were touring the Palace in Aranjuez, we read a bit about the Royal family. I had meant to include some of this information. Frankly, I didn’t believe it, so I’ve had to check it out. I can now reliably report the following…
Maria Isabella, daughter of King Carlos IV…
Clearly not my photo!
Maria had thirteen siblings of whom seven were called Maria (including two blokes!). In addition, one of her brothers married a Maria and he had a niece called Maria as well. Incidentally, Maria’s mother and grandmother were also both called Maria! Family gatherings must have been fun. “Anyone seen Maria? “Yes, she’s looking after Maria for Maria and Maria.” “By the way Maria said Maria, Maria, Maria and Maria were going to be late.” “Does anyone know if Ferdinand is coming this evening?”
It’s now ten o’clock at night and we’ve just had our neighbour knocking on our door (and this is really true) to tell us our alarm is going off. I assured him that it wasn’t our alarm! “The noise is all around. It’s in the trees. It’s insects!”
“Really?”
“Have you never heard of cicadas?!!!!”
“Oh, I’m very sorry! Please will you come and explain that to my wife!”
Some Germans must lead very sheltered lives!
You can imagine the build-up to this interaction. Fritz’s wife (I think she may be called Maria) would have been saying, “Those bloody Brits and their caravan alarm. I can’t sleep with that racket going on. Get dressed, go and wake them up and tell them to switch the bloody thing off!”
“No. I’m not going to do that!”
“Oh yes, you are Fritz, or else you’re sleeping on the couch tonight!”… We had a good chuckle about that – and they snuck of early this morning with an embarrassed wave!
OK, now back to the recent past. Where were we? Yes, birds. Being so close to the Monfrağue National Park, we had to revisit the Gypsy’s Leap.
The fantastic rock formation on a bend in the reservoir. The full story about this was told in a blog from previous years! Suffice it to say that the huge cliffs hereabouts are home to about a hundred pairs of vultures, several pairs of black storks and peregrine falcons as well (allegedly) as one pair of eagles. Fabulous viewing. But there are a lot of noisy bird watchers about – on this occasion, mainly German and Danish – with monster telephoto lens. I know I take a lot of photos, but compared to these guys, I’m a total novice. The German beside me must have taken at least 500 photos during my 20 minute twitch! And he’d been there all day! That’s digital cameras with motor drives and massive memory cards for you. It’ll take him a long time to view and delete all but the best 10 shots. It takes me long enough to deal with my little collection!
The Embalse de Plasencia, a short distance north of the town of Plasencia, is just waiting to be walked along. The EU money spent on the superb pathway alongside the Eastern Bank of the reservoir was money well spent. The track meanders in and out of the side branches of the water and allows for an easy stroll or bike ride.
We can only manage the stroll option because our bikes are safely stashed with the gas BBQ in our garage back at Galmpton! We made just over four miles – almost alone, but the wind off the mountains down the lake was bracing! Maybe that was why we were almost alone!
A lot of the rocks in the shallows were decorated with little turtles or terrapins – until we got close when with a couple of splashes, they were gone (the turtles, obviously, not the rocks).
Now then, I’ve done some more research and José Maria was the boss of the hydroelectric scheme when the dam was built. But with a name like that he was clearly related to royalty!
That’s enough for now. It’s the middle of the night and our Spanish gas has just run out. I’ve got to find my head torch and get the cylinder changed before the freezer un-freezes!
Just caught up with your travels. Chuckled at comments about loud Spaniards etc. Like you, had never heard of Aranjuez. Appears to be worth a visit. Marie and I stayed in a camping ground just outside Toledo in April 1978. We ventured into town and bought a sword (to fight off hijackers) and took it back to Australia. It hangs in the garage here at Grange in Brisbane, and was recently ‘discovered’ by one of the grandsons, who wanted to play with it. We brought it back to Australia in June, ’78 in a suitcase and did not declare it. Times have certainly changed.