Day 4: Alcala la Real to Alcaudete. 24 km.
We were both awake at 6am and made a cup of tea on the camping stove. We read for an hour in bed before getting up for breakfast. Looking out the window it promised to be another nice day but probably cold to start so on went the leggings again. We were all packed and ready for the off at 8am.
Reading the Cicerone guide I was under the impression that it would be a complicated business getting out of the town. They gave two alternative routes which seemed to involve many twists and turns while we followed the lines the man at the tourist info marked on the street map for us. This involved going up the main street to where we turned up to the Castle last night but instead carried on down the hill to a roundabout where we took the street named Calle Nuevo and from there it was straight. The tarred road changed to gravel and we could see it continue through the olive groves away into the distance.
Looking back we had a magnificent view of the Castle, Fortaleza de la Mota, on top of the hill silhouetted against the early morning sunshine.
This was not only an Arab fortress but originally the town itself up until the 19th century. The complex also includes the hilltop abbey, Iglesia Mayor Abatial and displays in the architecture and carvings innumerable examples of the scallop shell symbols of St. James.
Today's walk was through endless olive groves. The lines of olive trees stretched in lines in all directions and up the hillsides nearly to the tops. Workers were busy in many places pruning and the sounds of their chain saws could be heard for miles. With the number of trees to maintain this must be a never ending job. Alcala la Real seemed to be a centre for olive oil production as we passed a couple of factories, in an industrial area coming into the town, that were concerned with the pressing and extraction of the oil. At our meal last night the olive oil on the table was a variety locally produced.
Today's route was fairly straight forward and the waymarked course followed closely to that of Cicerone and the N432 highway. The only problem we encountered was the crossing of the N432 where it split with the N432A to Castillo de Locubin. The gravel path came down to the road side just before the split but there was no sign of where to cross or any obvious safe way over. The path then climbed up the hillside away from the highway and we could see on the other side of the road the path we should have been on. Our track now wound its way up the hill further and further away from the N432 and the tunnel under the highway at the split junction could be clearly seen. Cicerone, the blog we are following and now ourselves ended up scrambling down the muddy hillside to go through the tunnel and pick up a track at the other end that went up to join the waymarked route.
It was another nice wide track and it cut through between the hills to meet up with N432 again just before the village of Ventas de Carrizal. On the track before the highway we found an old abandoned cupboard which made a good seat to have a cup of coffee that I quickly brewed. There were Magdalena cookies to go with our drink that Moira bought last night, the first since our last Camino; they're light to carry. When we reached the N432 there was a shell marker on the barrier on the other side of the road, meaning we were to climb over the barrier to a track. This was where we went wrong yesterday and ended up walking along the hard shoulder to Alcala; there had been a similar marker on the barrier opposite when came to highway but we mistook its meaning.
Ventas de Carrizal seemed to be just houses and a few small farms set among the olive groves. There weren't any shops as far as we could see never mind a bar or an hotel. The only other point where we had worries was on leaving this village. When across the bridge over the fast flowing river at the exit from the village we arrived at cross roads. The yellow arrow was not very distinct but seemed indicated a turn to the left, the track ran beside the river and parallel with the N432 in the distance. We were a bit worried as the next waymark was a long time in coming and were nearly at the point of turning back and checking again at the cross roads. After that it was more or less a straight gradually climbing track into the hills through more and more never ending parallel lines of olive trees. It was 10 km to our destination and even though it was nearly all uphill we set a good pace and covered the distance in 2 hours.
Coming round the side of a large hill we met a tarred road with houses and below in the valley was the large town of Alcaudete. This was another fortress town and the Castle dominated above the houses. The route seemed to be heading straight down into the town centre when we were directed to the left at the Santuario de Nuestra Señora de la Fuen Santa a very large church with lovely gardens and benches. We thought it was a detour to visit the church but the route turned right along a delightful wide tiled tree lined walkway through a public park. The street we arrived on was Avenida Andalucia and this was the one the hotel, Hostal Spa Rueda,we were looking for was on. We soon found it and got a nice double room. After dumping our bags we went to the restaurant for a late lunch; we can't be bothered with this late night dining that is the Spanish custom. We had the menu del dia which again was more than we needed but we ate anyway. This meant dozing on our beds for the rest of the day and reading.
I didn't go out again it was too cold but Moira went to the supermarket for bread and milk; she also got a couple of beers for later. We stayed in the room and didn't bother with anything else to eat, lunch had been plenty. It was just a cup of coffee and a beer while watching tennis on TV.
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