Just had my kids over for a few days from the UK. Hahaha I say "kids" but they are both in their 40s! You always see them as your "kids" don't you? Anyway, great to see them both and to chat about what ridiculous things we are each getting up to next 😂
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Since Dec 2022 we have been running our own Mastodon & GoToSocial servers. What a breath of fresh air the Fediverse has been. We have made many hundreds of new friends from around the world, mostly related to our mountain, tech and nature interests.
Connect with me/us on the Fediverse at:
Really enjoyed watching the movie "I Swear". Great acting performances all round but especially from Robert Aramayo as John Davidson, who was diagnosed with Tourette's syndrome at a young age. This alienated him from his friends and family. A stark and eye opening account of Johns life, his struggles, his wins, and the joy and grief in between.
Now reading the book.
Images from our Tabernas desert hike last Friday. I never fail to be inspired by this landscape and can see why it is used so much by the movie industry, set only some 25km inland from Almeria city.
Yesterday we were hiking in the footsteps of Clint Eastwood in this amazing place
Sometimes driving in Spain is so relaxing. Today at 9am we headed south from Guadix to Tabernas on the A-92 motorway. 80 kilometres of motorway on an Easter bank holiday. I kept to the speed limit but only passed 2 vans and was overtaken by 2 cars the whole way. I could have fallen asleep if it hadn't been for the marvellous scenery at every turn of the road 😀
This morning I rushed half naked out of bed. Must have been a funny sight! Why? For just a few minutes pre dawn we had this amazing lenticular cloud sat above town in the Alpujarra.
Yesterdays fine hike in the quiet and underrated Sierra de Huetor just north of Granada. Lots of interesting mountains, hillsides and forested areas.
It's a beautiful morning here in the Straight and for the first time this week we have light winds and a calm sea
After a hard week watching the bird migration it's an afternoon off from watching our feathered friends. Beer, sun lounger and distant view of Africa it is then
Well that was a day and a half. Woke up for an early start and found tyre of our car slashed. Took 3 hours to get fixed. Think we inadvertently got involved in a local parking dispute between the owner of the place we were staying at and a neighbour. Anyway all sorted now. Travel is such fun. You never quite know what is around the corner 🤣
No, its not the Namibian desert. It's the Duna de Bolonia.
"Hundreds of thousands of small, stinging grains of sand travelling at warp factor 4 directly into the face for the next 45 minutes wasn’t what I would call fun. Having said that it was a very cheap, complete and thorough exfoliation of the skin."
Blog post at https://elperronegro.com/2026/climbing-dune-bolonia-spain/
You might remember the conversation in the old Monty Python movie "The Life of Brian" that posed the question "What did the Romans ever do for us?".
Well, I have the definitive answer... they built the city of Baelo Claudia. What! ... Like me a few days ago, I'd never heard of it neither. It's a city built by the Romans in SW Spain (1st Century AD) The visit to the remains of the city yesterday honestly blew me away.
Full blog post https://elperronegro.com/2026/baelo-claudia-roman-city-spain/
Had a superb day at a little known place called Bolonia on the Atlantic coast south of Cadiz. Superb sandy beach, very quiet, apart from the howling wind. Also an incredible natural sand dune (Duna de Bolonia) and a town of Roman ruins dating back to the 1st Century AD (Baelo Claudia). History is so fascinating. Images and report coming in a few days when we have full internet.
I am losing it. Who'd come on a holiday which involved hiking up hills and forget their .... hiking shoes? Especially when I have checklists to remind me to do a checklist, so why oh why do I then forget the one essential bit of kit 🤣? Doh! Must be getting old. Fortunately found a HH shop on the beach which has some suitable footwear. Bad news is cost me 149€. But back in business
We're heading west today for a week. Going to watch the bird migration from Africa to Europe through the Straits of Gibraltar. Then we'll be beach bums on the Atlantic coast for a while. Some culture/history lessons at Trafalgar, Bolonia & Cadiz before returning via some mountain hikes in the Sierra de Alcornocales and Sierra de Grazalema
Well it's my 7th Heart Attack'Aversary. If you'd have told me, as I lay, wired up, in the ICU, that 7 years from now I would be still playing about in the snow of the high mountains, I'd have laughed.
Thanks to @khusky for looking after me and being my best friend.
Its a white, very white world! From yesterdays excursion on Veleta 3394m in the Sierra Nevada
View from the morning dog walk looking down the deep valley of the Rio Lanjarón. The cliffs of the Tajos del Colorado are to the left and small cortijos (outlying settlements of Lanjarón) on the sunlit shelf to the right.
The stunning winter mountain scenery of the upper Lanjaron valley looking towards the peak of Veleta 3394m. Taken from the Cerro de Caballo summit 3009m, a few days ago.
