Day 64: Berja (Arrival)

Today was all about catching up with myself! The past wee while has been a bit full on and, as a consequence, I've nearly run out of food and, and last night my water supply was down to the last few drops (drinking and washing variants), whilst the cassette was almost full, Also, the van needed a bit of a sort out, clean out and tidy up.

So I spent this morning return the van to good working order. I also had the opportunity to take a walk around the pueblo that is Gorafe. It was interesting to see some dwellings were actually built into the surrounding hillsides. In fact some are now used as tourist accommodation. I would have liked to have seen in side one. No doubt there'll be some photos online, but that's a very poor substitute to seeing with your own eyes.

In the afternoon I crested the Sierra Navada. Oh my, was I impressed. Both the climb to, and descent from, the Puerto de La Ragua (Elevation 2,000m) would have been amazing on a push-bike ... and it wasn't too bad in the van either.

I thought the descent was never going to end: it seemed as though I was going to descend in to the depths of the earth. When, in fact, it turned out to be a descent of "only" 1700m (I did that the other day on my velocipede!)! Therefore, when I reached my current park-up location there remained about 300m to go before I'd have entered the realms of negative elevations and hellfire!

One thing I've noticed is that the air is very dry out here (no surprise Sherlock: you've been in and around deserts for the past few weeks - fool! Ah but, you jump in with too much haste and with both feet: I first noticed the dryness prior to visiting desert land. Is that sorry I hear?: graciously accepted!). As a consequence my skin has become very dry. In particular my thumbs! At first they developed cracks but, yesterday and this morning the cracks morphed into bleeding cuts. So each thumb now has a plaster wrapped around! Also, I looked in the mirror this morning only to discover that a man of about 94 years of age was staring back at me; instead of the usual 64!

• Distance driven: 78
• Distance cycled: 0
• Weather: Cold start (about 1°C), sunny all day, 2°C at Puerto de La Regua; about 12°C at lower elevations (300m)
• Location: Google Maps