LBB Note #7: Granada (Day 1: The Trip)

I hate to be reduced to a stereotype, but in this particular case the journey was worth more (or as much) as the destination.

I have, at this point, four weekends left in Spain. Having spent my first two in Valencia, I thought it was time to head out and explore. The IRES guys set themselves up in a buddy-system type arrangement, with Brandon being kind enough to stick with me. My plan, I told him, was to go to Granada. After 15 minutes of research, he came back with a few questions: A five hour drive? A Medieval town? I'd lie if I'd say that I didn't have doubts as well, especially considering the more glamorous trip to Barcelona the others were taking, but as far as I know, coming to Spain is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Every weekend is a gold mine.

We set up transportation through Blablacar, a carpooling app that lets people schedule trips and share the costs of gas. The room was reserved through AirBnB, which is pretty much the hostel equivalent of Blablacar. Using these apps that were recommended to us by people we had met at this point, we just spend just 40 euros for transportation and accommodation for the weekend.

We got off of work at 1:30, quickly got Bocadillos (Spanish sandwiches made of a medium sized baguettes and various protein options) and quickly walked to the meeting point with our driver. Lougan drove up in his tiny silver Peugeot. He seemed pretty friendly and not very serial-killer-y, so we got in the car with him and started the long trip. He said he grew up around Granada, but I honestly doubt this since he spoke with Spanish with a Pepe Le Pew-style accent. He was a genuinely happy person, always laughing and blaring music the whole way there.

The scenery transitions I saw on this trip are like nothing I have ever experienced before. A short drive outside Valencia, it was just wide coastal plains peppered with random outcroppings of rock. These mountains, or rather cerros, weren't organized in any particular mountain range, instead just jutting out of the surrounding plain on their own. They were covered by next to no vegetation, just bare rock.

Coastal plain and outcroppings, along with a couple of giants.

As we drove down to Murcia, the standalone cerros now lined up neatly and weren't as tall, but they provided a nice backdrop for the many, many orchards and crops that were on either side of the road.

The whole road was littered with your odd church or castle, nestled up on a very sharp hill. I must have seen easily 10 or so castles and 20 or so churches perched on top of cliffs. I find this interesting, because anywhere else in the world, the sight of castles would be quite a big deal, an anthropological site with droves of people walking up the hill to visit a true Medieval castle. Here, many people dismiss them as part of the normal scenery.

...but what a scenery.

 




After Murcia, we crossed into Andalucia, and we were immediately greeted by a large sprawling plain that only reminded me of Texas. It had large squares of crops that changed from the gold of wheat to the green of whatever leafy vegetable they might have been growing. It gave the terrain a sort of checkerboard look.

        

Turning into Andalucia

 





Andalucia was a world unto itself. The plains spread wide and into the distance, while the shadows of truly large mountains rose in the background. This became especially true the closer we drove to Granada; as the plains gave way to uphill roads and our ears began to pop. We could see slivers of snow up on the peaks around us.

We came to an area of the road about a hundred kilometers from Granada where the scenery again changed, this time into something similar to the Dakota Badlands. Red earth pillars, sharp and uneven, rising into the air.

Some of these red earth mountains had caves on them, and some of these caves had nice wooden doors. From what was told to us, people have been settling these caves for centuries now, and they have been modernized into what you would generally think of when it comes to a house: Wi-fi, running water, drainage, electricity. The only main difference is that it's built into a cave.

We finally came to a point where the road stopped climbing, and then we began our descent through steep wooded forests down into the Vega in which Granada was nestled. After four long but incredibly rewarding hours, we arrived in the narrow, steep streets of eastern Granada.