Feelings of the Day: Directions give you the ability to know how to get to where you want to go. It can be taken literally, when making a physical journey, or figuratively, when making an inward path in life. The most important part of directions is knowing where you are, now. Without that crucial information you cannot proceed. So where are you and where do you want to go?
Full Day’s Events: Today was the start of our three day excursion from Almazan. Before we could do so there was breakfast, laundry, tidying up, firewood redistribution/drying, and light packing.
The scenery that we drove by was of low roiling hills with occasional mini-canyons. The ground went from lush green to bare red earth and back again. Farms, in a state of thriving to ruins, dotted the landscape along with the occasional tower, castle, or church in similar states. Each of these are, or were, part of communities of people and they had a purpose. These thoughts led me to imagining what these places were, are, and could be, which led to a nap. Good thing I wasn’t driving.
We saw it well before we got close, stopping not once but twice to take distant images of this past guardian of the area. Early afternoon sun mixed with dark dappled clouds heralded its presence. Soon we had parked at the base of the entryway, after driving up its terraced and scattered stone slope, to walk into this fortress open 24 hours a day: Gormaz. There had been buildings and defensive structures before the current fortress was built in 965-6 CE by the Umayyad Caliphate, against the smaller Christian kingdoms to the North. Lost and retaken several times, it fell to Fernando the First in 1059-ish (accounts are not explicit). It was fixed up in the 14th century, during the battles between the two Pedro’s (Pedro the first of Castile and Pedro the Fourth of Aragon), and again switched hands several times. Afterwards it was used as a prison and a variety of functions before falling into disrepair. At 380 meters long and between 17 and 63 meters wide when built it was the largest fortress in Europe.
Inside the tall walls I felt like a kid in a medieval candy store. You could go anywhere and see anything. The Eastern citadel was the more interesting part and you could walk on its battlements. I saw fragments of rooms, wells, storage, towers, and portcullises that were long gone, but in my mind I could see them whole from what we saw on our previous trip to Spain. The Eurasian Griffon vultures were held up by air currents blowing up the hill and castle walls as they sought out prey on the ground. As I looked out over the surrounding land, as I also did inside, their memories of times long past remained.
On the drive to Avila the scenery was more of what we saw although more solitary towers were seen. Some advice when traveling to old towns with small streets and pedestrian only areas; be careful when using map apps to guide you. It may try to take you to places you should not or cannot be accessed by car. Also, ensure your accommodations give you detailed and explicit information on how best to park your car and/or how best to walk to where you are staying.
After a turn in the bend and driving out of a steadily increasing urban environment we saw it. The Walls of Avila. The Vettones fortified here, in the 500’s BCE, then the Romans came and called it Abila (or Abela) that gave the town some of its original streets. After being a Visigoth stronghold, it was conquered by the Moors until attacked by the smaller Christian kingdoms when it became uninhabited. Around 1088 it was conquered, and repopulated, by Raymond of Burgundy who ordered the walls to be built in 1090 that stand today. The perimeter is 2.5km, enclosing 31 hectares, with walls of 12m average and 9 gates. It is an impressive sight and is a feat of engineering.
After settling in we realized the accommodations were quite central to the city and the places we wanted to walk to, especially as many of its streets and squares were only for pedestrians. That evening I suggested a few places and we settled on “La Bruja, Carnes, a la Brasa” (The Witch’s Restaurant with grilled meats). Just outside the walls, it did not have a lot of patrons as it was a very windy night. Once seated, we were served a plate of house made crackers with red pepper paste. For supper I chose the Gredo snails (broth of chorizo and paprika) and for a second course had Castilian soup (pork broth, bread slices, garlic, paprika, and scalded egg in the middle). Paired with the meal was a 2022 Grenache made by Paso de Cebra. The snails were soft and warm and so so good that only snails can be. The soup was the best of the Castilian soups I had and even better than when I was last in Spain, two years ago, because of the quality of the broth with its rich pork bone flavour, just right soft eggs, and great bread.
That was the end of the day: 3.7 km walked and the equivalent of 15 flights of stairs climbed.
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