Las Sierra Nevadas

During our stay in Granada, my friends and I traveled out of the city to a small town on the edge of the Sierra Nevadas called Monachil to go on a hike. Monachil was quaint and it's winding streets and houses tucked into the hillsides make you think you could take a romantic getaway there. We walked to the entrance of the national park and in. We first hiked/climbed a steep trail up to a view point where we got to see how beautiful the place is. The rough rocky surface of the mountains is exposed in many places and the foliage consists mostly of stiff bushes and trees. Some of the trees had changed colors at this point, giving the mountain sides and gullies an orange and yellow cover.

We wondered around the sides of small mountains and down through the gully where the path consisted of a thin elevated cement surface clinging to the side of a rock face that rose up and above while a small river flowed by about a story down on the other side. The walkway was so narrow at some points that we had to shuffle sideways and stop and reverse when someone was approaching in the opposite direction. The rock face also leaned over so far in some places that we had to get on hands and knees to crawl along. There was also a rope bridge! A freakin' rope bridge! This was my first time traversing one of these. A small line of people piled up on each side as only 4 are allowed on the bridge at once.

About 3 or so hours in we climbed up another ridge to steal a good viewing spot for our lunch. After this we hiked back down and began a long loop back on the other side of the ridge. Here, the winding path was much wider and we were up high enough to get some impressive views. I made sure to take a rock from the gully below and leave it at the highest point I reached here (a cool habit I picked up from one of my former anthro professors). We wandered through an olive grove and followed haphazard signs back down into town where we enjoyed a drink or two before heading back on the bus to Granada. It was great to be out in the nature as I have found I do not make a lot of time for this in Huelva while I am on my teaching schedule. We didn't last very long in the nightlife that evening with our tired limbs.