Fiesta de las castanas

Wednesdays walk down to Yator past Ermita de San Sebastian

turn right onto Calle Era Alta

up the footpath to Era Alta

with seats and the tv/phone masts

and a view to Yator

the path towards Montenegro

first glimpse of our house

The fiesta of the castañas  - sweet chestnuts - starts today in Mecina Bombaron.  And presumably in other places too,  the day on the ayuntamiento (local council) calendar is November 1st but that is another holiday too,  Fiesta de todos los Santos,  or All Saints.  Hard to keep up with all these fiestas isn't it!!

Back to the chestnuts...

1º de Noviembre: Fiesta de las castañas
El sentido de la fiesta de las Castañas hay que buscarlo en la antigua costumbre que tenían los labradores Alpujarreños de festejar la recolección de las cosechas como muestra de agradecimiento a los frutos recibidos de la naturaleza, es pues desde este punto de vista una fiesta pagana. La celebración actual data del año 1986, año en que se recupero la tradición de pasar toda la velada tostando castañas mientras se amenizaba con cantos y bailes la fiesta. En Mecina Bombarón, según los más antiguos, existen los castaños más antiguos de la Alpujarra, algunos de ellos incluso del tiempo de los Moriscos. En torno al fruto de la castaña se ha desarrollado una amplia cultura gastronómica, en la que muchos platos tienen como ingrediente principal la castaña.

And a rough translation is..
 
The meaning of the chestnut festival must be sought in the old custom that the Alpujarreños farmers had to celebrate the harvest of the crops as a sign of gratitude to the fruits received from nature, it's therefore from this point of view a pagan festival. The current celebration dates back to 1986, a year in which the tradition of spending the whole evening toasting chestnuts was recovered while singing and dancing.  In Mecina Bombarón, according to the oldest people, there are the oldest chestnuts of the Alpujarra, some of them even from the time of the Moriscos. Around the chestnut fruit has developed a wide gastronomic culture, in which many dishes have the chestnut as the main ingredient.  (Source:google translate)  as a double check with my translation!

Moriscos were former Muslims converted or coerced into converting to Christianity. (source:wikipedia)

On to All Saints day,  celebrated in various forms all over the world.  Lots to read about the various customs on this wikipedia link here..  

Tuesday's walk

I managed to get out Tuesday morning for an hour before lunch,  if Pip sees me anywhere near my shoes she gets all excited, but if I've got a bucket of compost, or weeds and garden prunings then that is ok.  So bucket in hand,  phone in pocket,  walking shoes out of sight on top of the bucket, bottle of water and off I go.  Easily fooled this dog!  Leave  the bucket over on the top terraces and collect on the way back.

The 'road' to Yegen

Looking up to the left

and down to the right,  the poplars are changing colour

the stream runs through at the bottom, with Gypsies Leap above.

When I got up to  the cemetery at Yegen  I sat in the new seating area   and looked at Sierra Gador.  Yegen is about 1000 metres above sea level,  we are 890,  but  from this seat I am looking at a mountain that is 2000 metres high.  And the clouds rolling up from the coast today must have been huge...

The new seat..

and the clouds in the distance..

How hot you may be wondering?  At 4.30 in the afternoon it was still 23 degrees in the shade, so quite warm at midday after an up-hill walk. 

My morning walk.

Most mornings we all go out for a walk at the same time,  Pip and I go for a brisk walk and John keeps an eye on Monty as he (Monty) is very slow and not aware of any passing cars so needs a minder!  But occasionally Pip doesn't want to go very far,  there is no apparent reason why,  but then during the day we find she doesn't eat much either, and sleeps a lot so maybe there is a reason that only she knows.

So on days like this - today being one of them - I go out later on my own for a walk.   Today I went up towards Yegen, as far as the cemetery,  and took a series of photos, just about a 360 degree view. 

I started taking photos from the left of Yegen cemetery,  then left again and so on until the final picture is back to the cemetery.  Some of them overlap - if you look closely!

The forecast said 19 or so in the shade,  a lot warmer at midday walking uphill!!

October update.

At the end of August I added some photos of Paco's kittens,  another kitten appeared recently although there is still no sign of a mum.....  this new addition is almost all white but with ginger ears and a ginger striped tail.  Doesn't play or mix with the other ones...

2 of the other kittens,  the one we call Minky and one of the tabbies,  followed us home last week.  We made our breakfast coffee and were sitting on the terrace and heard little kitten cries.  They were outside the gate, then climbed up onto a branch of the mulberry tree.  After I'd finished my coffee I picked them  up out of the tree and took them home,  they stayed where I put them on the chair outside their house and haven't followed us again.  This new one isn't  big enough - or brave enough - to follow us yet!

The moon is setting after the full moon around the 8th of October....if you click on the photo you can see the moon just above the rocks on the way down to gypsies leap / salto do los gitanos. 

and looking the other way the sun is just rising above Sierra Gador. 

It's daylight for quite a while before the sun rises here,  Sierra Gador is about 3000 metres high so there's quite a way to go before the sun pops up and we can see it.

The first big autumn rains came on Wednesday,  it was my birthday and we had thought to go out for drinks and lunch to a local restaurant,  eat on the terrace in the sun, but no.  Woke to clouds and then rain followed by thunder, lightning and torrential downpours.  It eased off during the afternoon.  Today though was back to normal,  clear blue skies and wall to wall sunshine with temperatures in the low 20's.

And that was September....

Mostly photos again taken  - and forgotten about - during September.  We had some wonderful weather,  we think September and October are amongst our favourite months as it's not too hot, not too cold, not too windy.....   We probably have a temperature of the mid to high 20's so it's still plenty hot enough to swim, walk, start the autumn garden tidying but without being unpleasantly hot.

At the beginning of September we woke to a low cloud bank which ran along the valley below us,  from left to right was a shiny white cloud.

08.11

08.18

08.18

08.22

A few days later Pip and I were on our early morning walk in the direction of Yegen while Monty pottered very slowly up through Montenegro with John keeping an eye on him.  As we came up the new  concrete road and turned the corner to head down to the stream - the area know as Gypsies Leap - salto de los gitanos - there were 3 mountain goats just to our left.  Normally very shy,  they leap and bound away but these just looked at us curiously.  A few photos,  then we carried on walking down to the stream, and on our return about 5 minutes or so later, they were still there although higher up the rocks.

We went out a bit later this morning,  these were taken about 8.30 - 8.40.  The sun is up, the sky is blue!

And our neighbours yucca is blooming again..

Now we are into October,  it is still very  warm and although we had a half hour shower last Wednesday,  that bit of rain wasn't much.  A couple of cloudy afternoons too,  but still warm enough in the pool to swim every day.  Today was 25 on the shady terrace,  but the forecast for the next few days is a little bit cooler,  a little bit cloudier,  autumn is coming.