(12-05-2010, 01:50 PM)anlu247 Wrote: Congratulations, B.B. You seem to be quite fit for the Aquilanos.
Saludos desde Almería
Quite a few people from Andalucia came for the 101 peregrinos last weekend, I wondered if you knew any of them Antonio?
Ultras seem to be the order of the day.
Last weekend was the “101 peregrinos” (101 pilgrims) in El Bierzo. This is an offshoot of the famous Ronda ultra-distance trail race organized by the legionnaires in Andalusia and that a bloke called John wrote about on the forum a few years ago... I wonder what happened to him? This year the Ronda event wasn’t held as most of the legionnaires were in Afghanistan. Instead a northern version was staged and more than 1000 hardy mountain bikers, runners and walkers embarked upon 101 hilly off-road kms which were to be completed within 24 hours.
I didn’t fancy it, too far, too long, bordering on the masochistic... mmm, maybe?...no, don’t even think about it!
Anyway, I had another section of the Aquilianos on the agenda so at 7 am on Sunday I was parking my car in Toral de Merayo and setting my sights on Guiana, the last and most accessible peak we visited on the previous week’s excursion.
Set off and immediately crossed with one of the tail enders of the 101. Covered in thick, sticky mud from the waist down, the guy was trudging along, barely walking and with big glazed eyes fixed on some indeterminate point on the horizon. This must be what battle fatigue is like, not surprising as he’d been on the trail since 11 am the previous morning. He stared at me blankly and asked if he was going the right way. I said yes and calculated that he was on for a 21 hour finish.
Took the steep road to Ozuela and left the 24 hour madness below. My target would be a shorter, sharper one than theirs.
The great advantage of the Guiana route from Toral is that I can ascend from 450 to 1850 metres virtually from my doorstep. It’s a straightforward journey, mainly along trails and firebreaks to the summit, followed by the long, long descent off the Aquilianos and back to civilization.
And it was an atypical May morning, damp, unseasonably cold but not unpleasant for run-walking. Whisps of cloud stroked the foothills and the mountain streams bubbled and roared, swelled by rain and snowmelt from higher up.
I had no human company on this occasion although I was never alone. Nearby, a rustle in the undergrowth, a bushy tailed fox slunk into the shadows, a deer darted into the conifers, a solitary cuckoo chimed and 2 lanky dogs came out of the abandoned village of Santa Lucia for a quick sniff. Behind them, the ruined church stood forlornly in a well watered meadow. Once when I had investigated I found it was full of goats.
Just after Campo de las Danzas I glimpsed Guiana briefly. Then it was gobbled up by mist, blown across from the south where the snow-capped Vizcodillo would be next weekend’s destination.
It was cold at the top and I’d left my gloves at home. So as quickly as I could I wolfed down some jelly babies, tightened the straps of my rucksack and braced myself for the descent. It felt like I was preparing for a parachute jump. My plan was to run for as long as I possibly could.
Swiftly I reached the meeting point of the Aqilianos short and long routes. Here I had stood with my dad last June as the lone mountain runner stormed past and raised a hand as I took his photo. Only I will make the return journey next month...incredible, we are like almond blossom in the wind.
Just above Ferradillo a posse of longhorns stared at me disconcertingly as I passed through the middle of them. They didn’t seem at all bothered by my presence. Fortunately I’m yet to meet an aggressive cow.
After 45 minutes descending, tired legs and an increasingly clumsy gait reduced me to walking again with the confirmation that prolonged downhill running is just as knackering as climbing.
Arrived back in Toral de Merayo nearly 5 hours after I’d set off and came across the man from Ozuela and his family dismembering a pig. The man from Ozuela is a slow, cumbersome figure on the road with the shoulders of a prop forward and the heart of a lion. But he’s no slouch on the hills and has certainly left me behind a few times (Alto Sil, Truchillas, Los Aquilianos...) I ventured into the basement under his house and in the murky half light nearly tripped over a dog.
“This is authentic” he said to me grinning and gripping the poor porker’s ears.
1500m ascent.
Distance; difficult to calculate without a map and a piece of string. Probably between 20 and 30 k.
Truchillas this Sunday.
