The Escarpment walks

          There are two escarpment walks. Both start at the same place. As you drive into Torre Aláquime from Olvera there is a right hand turn with a bus shelter in front of you. (see photo). Just as you pass the RH turn into the pueblo there is a track that goes straight on. This is the track you take. From this point on both walks you will rise gradually to a high point of 180m (590ft.) higher than where you parked the car. If you choose the short route you will cover 5.7km. If you choose the long route you will cover 8.4 km. At the end of both walks you must walk from the riverside to where you left the car, a distance of half a kilometer winding through the pueblo, but a climb of 50 or so m. (165ft.)

                    The long escarpment walk.

                The short escarpment walk.            
For parking just find a place off the road here where the photo is taken and make sure you are not blocking anybody's entrance. You won’t need boots if it’s dry, but there are patches that are muddy after rain.  The photo shows an arrow going to the left to the radio towers walk. This is the next walk on the blog.

          The walk rises up the hillside until you are walking beneath a cliff of yellow sandstone. The track turns right here and you follow the base of the cliff for two kilometres. The cliff is made up of the broken fossils of seashells. Further to the south-east at Setinil the seashells become more pronounced and identifiable, making dating these sandy rocks easier. They are from the Tertiary period around 200 million years ago.

 

          You will follow the base of the cliffs till you come to an old farmhouse on the right.

                To shorten the walk you must cut across the olive grove to find the other track lower down. From the RH corner of the farm house turn almost 90 degrees right and follow the rows of olive trees which descend down the hillside. If it has been raining it can be very muddy amongst the olive trees so you will need boots.. When you reach the bottom of the embankment you must turn left and follow the 4x4 track which you should be able to see to your front left. This will lead to a concrete road and take you back to the main road into Torre.

 

           The river in the valley below is the Guadalporcún, which is fed by tributaries in the flat land above Setinil. The gorge at Setinil was cut by of one of the faster flowing tributaries of this river. But here it is slow and quiet. The valley is green with fertile soil brought down over the millenia. Torre Aláquime is on a bend in the river. Torre means tower and Al-Haquim was an overseer who was held in high esteem by the ruling Caliph. He was granted lands around the high tower which he built here on top of the peñon at the bend in the river. A perfect defensive point, covering the river and the track up to Olvera. Torre was supported by the other two watchtowers. One on the Peñon de Pruna and the other just off the Campillos road as you leave Olvera. They were most likley garrisoned with troops from the castle at Olvera, where the village was inside the murellas, or defensive walls.

          In 1327 the Christians took Olvera and the fortress at Torre Aláquime was abandoned, the garrison retreating to Ronda. Six years later the Muslims re-took Torre. At the start of the 15th century the Christians took Torre back as well as Zahara and Muslim rule here was finally ended. Torre and its surrounding area came under the control of the powerful Rivera family. 

 

         Torre Aláquime  is worth a look as part of the walk. Its tower is long gone, but the arch leading to the inner town is still there and there is a garden in what would have been the courtyard below the keep.

The river from Torre 

                                                     The fortifications above Torre.

           It is a sleepy village now, but it has seen war and bloodshed in the past. It was a scene of destruction in 2010 when the river flooded. I painted a view of the river that year when the whole valley was flooded. The sky was stormy and the sun came through in the end, but not before it had changed the course of the river here by filling the old bed with sand and cutting a new channel a hundred meters away from the old one.To see all the paintings on artistandalucia click this link

 

            As a postscript, I did this walk four years ago and again last week. In the spring of 2013 southern Spain had more rain than anytime in the last 60 years. The first corner where the track turns to the right had a tree across the track. Because I have arthritis in one knee I use a bicycle now to cover the walks.

  I had to carry my bicycle around the roots, but further on, the road had collapsed into a hole cut by rainwater and swept down into the valley.