Andre and Wendy: Castles, Waterfalls & Beach town

We decided to start the day by walking to the beach area of town to get some groceries to make a picnic lunch. It was a good thing as to stretch our legs from yesterday as they were sore from walking up to the castles and back down from town centers. We stopped at an Austrian bakery where we had croissants for breakfast.

The first stop today is the Town (village) of El Castell de Guadalest. It is a little over 1 hour drive from the apartment. While driving the valley leading up to the town, we saw what we think are figs trees by the thousands. Some covered to either protect them or speed up the maturing process. We have never seen anything like this before.

What we thought was a fig tree

The mountains were covered with these "fig" tree coverings

As we approached our destination, we could see the castle sitting on top of a cliff. More walking up and down to be done today. It looked beautiful from a distance. When we arrived into the town we found out what a tourist place this was. We have no idea how so many people are here, it was a tiny little road we drove up on and we saw very few cars or people, mostly bikers. There were 6 or 7 tour buses in the parking lot, where did they come from? All of the parking lots were full in the tiny town so we drove by about 500 meters and parked on the side of the road in a little pull off and walked back to town.

View of Guadalest from a distance

Castle in Guadalest

This is a really small town that has taken full advantage of the beautiful scenery and castle. It is very tiny and most places that are along the walk to the castle have been converted into little shops, museums, restaurants or bars. We walked around the little area that is at the top level before the entrance to the castle, lots of pretty views of the surrounding mountains and valleys. We visited a couple of the small museums and then toured the castle. The tour of the castle ends in the graveyard at the top level outside, this graveyard is still in use. Again some fantastic views.

Next we leave town by a different street only to discover that this new route must be how everyone got there, it is a much quicker drive back down to our next stop, with even shoulders on the road!

You enter the town for shops thru this tunnel

View from outside castle

Prison, now a museum

Inside castle rooms

At the top of the castle

Cemetery at top of castle

Looking down on the village from the castle, you better like your neighbour!

Views were amazing, these pictures are good, but still don't do it justice, you can see the Med. Sea way in the background of this view

First stop is at a little farm that has a sign outside that he is selling honey. We interrupted their lunch they were having outside, but they were still happy to help us. No English here, but through sign language we think we bought some honey made on site, some oranges, and what we think are figs?

Next stop is at Algar Waterfalls. We planned on having our picnic lunch here. When you pull into town here there are about 5 parking lots that are blocked off with chains, this must be a very busy place in the summer. We drove up to the top lot and two young guys charge is 3 Euro for parking. We then walked about another 500 yards uphill with our picnic stuff to the falls. Arrive at the falls to find out that there is no eating allowed in the falls area, there is a picnic area just outside the falls area where there are tables set up. We decide to just eat our lunch on benches outside the entrance so we could listen to the falls. We walked the falls area and explored a little, again this is more of a summer attraction, there are places set up where you can jump in, but a little too cold for us this time of year. On the walk back to the car there were places selling the “figs” in baskets, we asked someone what they were in Spanish so we could look them up on the internet. We ate some with lunch and we were pretty sure they weren’t figs as they were so sour tasting, turns out we have bought kumquats. I’m not sure if we have ever eaten them before. Wendy liked them, but she likes sour stuff more than I do.

On a side note in Guadalest and here at the waterfalls there were people stationed around taking your picture, we felt like we were back on the cruise! We did not fall for it, just like on the cruise. Kyle and Liam would have been posing all over the place! It was a little different, some places at the end you came out and your picture was on a souvenir key chain, they were kinda cute, but no thanks...

Algar waterfalls, great more stairs to climb!

Here is where we find out the "fig" trees are Kumquat trees

Thousands of Kumquat trees in this part of Spain everywhere!

Avocado's grow on trees!

Back on the car for one more stop at Altea. This city is known for its promenade along the beach with its restaurants, bars and shopping. We walked for about an hour along the promenade, not much was open, but I did find an ice cream shop and had a yummy lemon sherbet.

Beach in Altea

Other direction

Lots of apartments along the beach here

I know some Grandsons and Nephews that would have had fun on this skateboard rail thingy at this park

Altea is also famous for its Church on top of the hill with its blue tiled dome which you can see from anywhere in town. We decided to walk to the Church, what a great walk this was, all cobblestone streets and lots and lots of steps. As we got close the Church we hit little narrow pedestrian streets and squares full of small restaurants and shops, it was very pretty. This part of the city really reminded us of some of the small tourist towns we have visited in Germany. I almost walked into the Church but Wendy called out to me as she saw a hearse parked outside the entrance and realized a funeral was taking place. We walked around the church outside area and explored more of the little side streets, this looks like it would be a really great place to come back to at night. Lots of pretty views of the sea and town below from the top of the hill. Walked back down (1000 steps or so), found the car, and drove back home for a quiet evening with some leftover pasta from Friday and a bottle of wine.