#64 Hike with Vultures and Mountain Goats

February 1, 2022: Grazalema, Zahara de la Sierra

J. The Sierra de Grazalema is a beautiful mountain range with high rocky mountains. The Hundidero cave (#63) is located on the edge of the natural park. But now we wanted to go hiking and drove to the picturesque town of Grazalema.

Unfortunately, the tourist information office, where we wanted to inquire about hiking routes, was closed. Luckily, we met three French people who had found the longest circular hiking trail in the region on the internet. There are many long distance walking routes here, but if you don't want to hike for several days or walk the same route back, there aren't many hiking options left. The longest circular hiking trail took about 2.5 hours, was only a few kilometers long, but had 700 meters of altitude gain. We climbed up the mountain through scree fields and were rewarded with wide, beautiful views.

Here in the Grazalema Nature Park is the largest population of Griffon vultures in Europe, so we could observe many of these flying giants from close range. They sat on the surrounding rocky peaks and seemed to watch us. Then they flew in circles in the sky, usually without flapping their wings. Sometimes we could see about 20 of these birds in the sky at the same time.

However, we could not only observe animals in the sky. We also passed by a group of mountain goats that climbed on their thin legs over the most unstable rocks and along steep slopes, or simply enjoyed the view and the sun and watched the passing hikers.

Afterwards, we drove on a serpentine mountain road with many viewpoints to a huge reservoir near Zahara de la Sierra.

Day 109 - Total tour 6,956 km

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