Cabo de Gata Natural Park

We travelled the 270 miles from Seville to Cabo de Gata on March 1^st. The park was created in 1987 and covers 71,000 acres of coastline and adjacent countryside. This is part of the unspoiled coastal area.

There are a few simple resorts on the coast like this one at Las Negras, but basically the whole park is totally uncommercialised. Las Negras looks almost abandoned, but then it’s out of season.

We decided to spend a day in the more remote parts of the park, and headed off along the coast until the tarmac gave way to a rough dirt road. We continued on the dirt road through small green hills, as in the photo. The small tower on the right on the horizon is a traditional windmill.

Looking inland, the green growth is exceptionally bright, with purple flowers in the foreground. This lushness strikes us as unusual because this is the driest part of Spain with around 4 inches of rain a year (10 cms): thirty miles inland is Europe’s only true desert, where the Clint Eastwood Dollar films were shot. 

On the seaward side are splendid empty beaches. Some other cars and cyclists were also using the dirt road so we had some company. No doubt at weekends anytime after Easter it could get quite busy with visitors from the city of Almeria only half an hour’s drive away.

 Miles from nowhere we noticed an odd structure- a bus stop, with bus stop sign. By the condition of the shelter, we imagine the last bus was at least 10 years ago.

The track now got smaller and rougher, and as it started to climb the mountains in the photo below, our progress was stopped by a barrier: only walkers and cyclists can continue beyond (and perhaps the bus!)

We were hoping to reach the salt flats with flamingos on the other side of the mountains by following the dirt road, but we could backtrack and go another way. Didn’t bring the zoom lens so the 50 or so flamingos in the photo are barely visible.

We were hoping to reach the salt flats with flamingos on the other side of the mountains by following the dirt road, but we could backtrack and go another way. Didn’t bring the zoom lens so the 50 or so flamingos in the photo are barely visible.

The vegetable greenhouses surrounding the park are on a larger scale than anything we’ve seen anywhere and we estimated the total area, of which the next photo shows just a part, to be at least 10 square miles of solid plastic.

 A large workforce is needed to service the crops, paid at the bottom end of the wage scale. We noticed many very dark Africans in the vicinity and then alongside the road was a shanty town which housed them. There are doubtless more that we didn’t spot. You just hope it’s a better life for them than the one they left.

One evening at the campsite there was a most beautiful sunset. The only problem from a photography point of view was to avoid the flapping giant Red Dragon Welsh flag hoisted by a neighbouring camper in honour of St. David’s day. 

This was our chill-out stop, and with the well-run modern campsite we are staying at, we have soon achieved a quick recovery from the long journey down. But the unknown issues of Corona virus are now on the horizon.