The charm of nowhere in particular.

Well, here we are camped in nowhere in particular, just across the road from a thin strip of greyish sand called Niza Playa. The road, N340 used to be the main route south connecting Valencia, Murcia and Alicante to the coastal cities of southern Andalucia. Most people now use the nearby autovia, so the old places on the original road have that slightly empty, half forgotten feel of by-passed communities. Well, at least the communities that still exist, most on the coast have been gobbled up by urbanisations and apartment block sprawl. However, a few miles to the east of Malaga, on the 'Costa del Sol Oriental', not everywhere is built up like Torremolinos and Fuengirola. Not that the coast is packed full of undiscovered picturesque fishing villages, it's more ordinary than that. Take the campsite we are staying on, next to the road, beside an underwhelming beach, in all likelihood you would drive straight past without a second look. But it is worth a second look. The place has unexpected delights. For a start, the tall palm trees at the entrance are home to a flock of bright green parakeets; that gives the place quite an exotic air for starters. The people who run the campsite are very welcoming and the place is really well looked after. Even at this time of year it has a lively mix of guests - young families, extended families with grandparents in tow, motor-bikers and cycle tourists in small tents, as well as the inevitable tribe of grey-haired winter refugees in their motorhomes.

We unloaded the bikes and went for a bit of an explore in the hills behind the site. A minor road just beyond the site leads up a small valley, through fruit farms and orchards. Beyond these the snow-capped peaks of Sierra de Tejeda glistened under the clear blue sky. The sun was strong, but an icy northern wind made it a day for 'doing' rather than 'lounging'. 

After climbing steeply for a few kilometres we reached the small village of Cajiz which tumbles down the valley side, an avalanche of white among the deep green orchards. We stopped briefly, but it was Sunday, and nowhere seemed to be open where we could have had a coffee.

One sure sign that Andalucia's short excuse for a winter is on the wane is the sudden appearance of lots of wild flowers by the roadside. We particularly liked these big daisy-like flowers, we have no idea what they are - so big daisies they will remain until we can find a reference book to look them up in.

On the road back we had a good view across to the mountains above Velez Malaga. The farms here are different to the industrial scale plasticulture you get to the north of here. There were farmers out in the fields checking the crops. I sensed that small growers still prevail. Each neat, well tended group of fields had a finca in its midst, kid's bikes parked at the back door, these were family farms. It was nice to see a working rural community.

Gill disappeared down the steep hill back to the camp site on coastal plain. I stopped to take a few photographs of the sea which was silvery and glittering in the distance. I'm experimenting with the still image function on my camcorder rather than lugging it and the bulky Canon SLR around. The manual claims that the camcorder still image function operates at 24m megapixels. It certainly is impressive; the picture of the pink buildings and the palm trees below was taken on maximum zoom, The group of houses must have been half a kilometer distant, yet the result is quite sharp, good enough for blogging anyway. Of course the downside is you can only use a landscape aspect ratio, I'll have to see how it goes.

Next morning we pedaled a couple of kilometers down the coast road to the nearby village of Benajarafe. It's still a working fishing village with small tourist developments and low rise hotels.I n a quiet understated way it was lovely. We stopped by a small beach-side cafe for a couple of cortados, then headed back to the campsite for lunch.

I had already decided that if the wind dropped and the temperature did remain around 21 degrees, I' d go for a swim later in the afternoon. So we packed the beach chairs, a couple of books and spent an hour or so wave watching. I donned my trisuit and jumped into the winter-cold sea. The beach had quite a shelf to it; 15 meters or so out, waves, about a meter and a half  high were breaking in an torrent of white foam. They curved across the bay like a taut bow. I swam on the cusp of the wave. looking down its length; the sea glittered towards the horizon, in the distance I could see blue mountains behind Malaga, As I swam along the crest of the wave I could see it breaking further along the beach; the white foam fizzed toward me like a fuse, then exploded over my head sweeping me shore-wards, and dumped me unceremoniously in the shallows. It was exhilarating.  After a few goes at this I was exhausted, but I felt great. I wandered back to where Gill was sitting reading. In homage to The Boss, the mighty Brooos, I yelled "IS THERE ANYONE ALIVE OUT THERE?" to the wind, sea and empty beach.

"Just a few fish, I would think." Gill observed.

man stares at sea...

then jumps in.