In the Alpujarras and onto the narrow winding mountain roads. Average speed 40Km per hour. However, you can spot the locals, whose average speed appears closer to 80Km per hour. Its more of a formula one track for me, meaning no place for overtaking. Unless you're a local. We were witness to a couple of dodgy overtaking manoeuvres. The best being by a local white van man trying to pass an obvious Guiri in front. Said Guiri was carefully negotiating the bends and seemed to be cautious of the drop. That must explain his driving in the centre of the road. Surely he wasn't blocking white van man from overtaking? With a loud blast on the horn and a creative piece of overtaking on the bend, white van man was gone. I decided it would be more prudent to stay well behind the Guiri.
We arrived in Trevélez after 2 hours of travelling. Trevélez is split into 3 sections or "Barrios". Bajo, Medio y Alto, meaning low, middle and high. An increase of 200 metres in altitude between the lower and upper sections. Our hotel was in the middle section, Hotel La Fragua II. However, we didn't have a map and Tom Tom just represented the town of Trevélez as a dot. We stopped at the first bar we saw in the middle section, Meson de Julio, what a good name!
In the bar.
We asked the girl behind the bar for directions. She directed us to the plaza and told us to ask for directions there. Its a bit complicated. Doesn't sound good. After finishing our beer we headed to the Plaza. No one around but I saw a sign for the hotel. A very narrow road on the left with a no entry sign that read "Excepto Residentes". Well, we are residents so lets go for it. How narrow can the street be? Too narrow it turns out. How people manage to drive down them is beyond me. I hate to thing what would happen if you met a car coming the opposite direction. But the narrow streets was not the hardest part. That was reserved for the driveway to the hotel. The steepest driveway I have ever seen. Think "Quickedge" and imagine it steeper. Much Steeper.
The driveway.
The trouble was there was no where to turn around. I wasn't reversing back out of the streets. It was hard enough going forward. So we went for it. The car stalled half way up. 3 attempts later and we gave up. The smell of burnt rubber mixed with a near burnt out clutch polluted the air. We ditched the car at the bottom of the track and went to the hotel for help.
Hotel La Fragua II
Help came in the form of Miguel. Obviously a veteran at parking Guiri cars at the hotel. He reversed the car down the track and back up the street and stopped. Surely he is not thinking of taking a run up, turning a near 90 degree corner to go up the drive? Yes he was and yes he did. He grinned at us as he passed by to park the car "Es facil". The car is staying put for the weekend.
The track leading to the driveway.
Monica was made up with our room. The terrace had wonderful views of the mountains. The room was decorated in a rustic way. She was ecstatic when she found a few complementary items from the hotel. A sewing kit and a compact mirror. Two things to scrub off the birthday list.
Nice one!
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