From Gelves marina to Presa de Beznar embalse

Gelves Marina 

I'm linking up with The Sunday Post at Caffeinated Reviewer.

I struggling to get my head around it not yet even being a week since we left Sevilla after our weekend there! It hasn't felt like a particularly busy week, but we seemed to have crammed a lot into the time. On Monday we returned to Gelves Marina where we had left our motorhome. We were parked up between the marina basin and the river with boats either side of us. It's a fab location for visiting Sevilla - the bus takes about half an hour and costs just €1.60 each way and the marina parking is €12 per night without electric hookup.

Tuesday saw us driving to Olvera and their municipal Pueblo Blanco campsite. Situated up on a high plateau, it had long views across the countryside but, probably due to the time of year, was ridiculously windy. We managed to get one reasonable walk in but, despite having gone there for the Via Verda cycle path, our bikes stayed put on the bicycle rack! We stayed three nights in the hope of the weather easing before we gave up. A shame as it was a nice campsite, albeit a bit pricey at €18 per night.

We had Olvera campsite pretty much to ourselves! 

Our destination for Friday was the Presa de Beznar embalse - a free motorhome parking spot on the edge of a dammed up lake. There are absolutely no facilities here because it isn't a campsite as such, just a place where motorhome parking overnight is allowed. It's beautiful! We thought we'd only stay one night, but actually stayed there for two - the sun being higher in the sky than at Messines in December means our solar panel charges up much better. We had a great walk aross the top of the dam - scary for height-phobic me! - and then down into the river valley from where we could look up and appreciate just what a feat of engineering it is. We saw and smelt lots of wild rosemary which got me thinking how I should pick a little for delicious fresh rosemary tea. We gleaned a handful of leftover almonds too. The trees are in blossom now so last year's nuts definitely won't be part of any harvest. We need to add nutcrackers to our travelling kitchen utensils though. The two almond shells I did manage to open yielded perfect nuts with an unbelievably strong flavour!

Dave by Beznar lake 

In bookish news, I've just finished (about 20 minutes ago!) reading Lost Children Archive by Valeria Luiselli. Wow! Just wow! I don't think this is one that will appeal to a wide readership, but I loved its dense prose and stream of consciousness style. I had thought that The Night Tiger by Yangsze Choo was probably going to be my Book of the Month, just ahead of The Swooping Magpie by Liza Perrat, but now I have this other contender as well. 2019 is shaping up to be a great year for bookishness :-)


Giveaways closing soon
None closing this week
(All current giveaways here)

On my blogs this week were:

Stephanie Jane
Books From The Backlog - Above The Bridge by Deborah Garner

Literary Flits
The Sign of the Serpent by Majanka Verstraete spotlight + #Giveaway + Author Interview
Love In The Time Of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez - vintage review
The Unwinding Of The Miracle by Julie Yip-Williams review - cancer non-survivor memoir
The Ghostly Father by Sue Barnard review + #Giveaway - Romeo and Juliet retelling
One Last Prayer For The Rays by Wes Markin spotlight + Excerpt
The Night Tiger by Yangsze Choo review - Malaysian weretigers!
The Migraine Relief Plan by Stephanie Weaver spotlight + #Giveaway + #VeganRecipe

Airing Out
None this week - must post soon before I start to forget where I've been!

Squint and you might just make out motorhomes above the dam wall 

Beznar dam from t'other side