Latest news with #Andalusia
Times
4 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Times
The easy way to see Andalusia's beautiful, history-packed villages
On my first evening in the Alpujarran village of Mairena (population 150), I met the mayor. Rafael Marzon was herding 80 sheep down the lane and stopped to chuckle with the owner of the guesthouse where I was staying about how he had originally bought eight to 'keep his hand in' as a shepherd. He wasn't the only mayor I met on my Inntravel walking holiday, roaming between the whitewashed villages of the serrated Sierra Nevada, southeast of Granada. A phone call to request access to a little museum dedicated to the British author Gerald Brenan in the village of Yegen (population 300) resulted in Mayor José Antonio Gómez turning up to personally greet me and unlock the door. That's the way things are done in the Alpujarra, a historical region that unfurls across the famous mountain range in Andalusia, a place where a vanishing way of life still clings to the precipitous slopes. Here, close-knit communities eke out a living below the snowline, valleys are scented with wild thyme and rosemary, and until recently mules were still a preferred mode of transport. In fact these villages have long shaped our idea of romantic rural Spain, largely thanks to the generations of writers who fell in love with them. In the 1920s, recently released from the British Army after the First World War, Brenan hiked to Yegen, rented a house and lived there on and off between 1920 and 1934. He promptly invited his friends in the Bloomsbury Group to visit — Lytton Strachey wasn't such a fan but Virginia Woolf thoroughly enjoyed her stay — and eventually wrote South from Granada about village life. In the 1990s the former Genesis drummer Chris Stewart's book Driving over Lemons convinced us all that, with a little tenacity, maybe we too could buy a remote farm and a flock of sheep, and set about living a self-sufficient life. I read both books many years ago and loved the idea of ranging across the Sierra Nevada, exploring isolated villages built in the Berber style with sugar cube houses tumbling down hillsides. The Moors retreated here after the fall of Spain's last Muslim kingdom in Granada in 1492 and their influence can still be felt everywhere. Their terraced farms and acequia irrigation channels, funnelling the snow melt from higher altitudes, remain. Their crops — almonds, figs and olives — are still mainstays, as are the saffron and cumin used to flavour dishes. So blended are the layers of culture and jumbled traditions that the Spanish poet and playwright Federico García Lorca called the Alpujarra 'the land of nowhere'. • Read our full guide to Granada Inspired by Brenan but looking for rather less adventure than his days-long hikes up and down Andalusia's mountains, my boyfriend and I opted for a more sedate walking holiday. One where we would have a village base and could simply head out to follow different routes each day, ranging from morning strolls of a couple of miles to longer, full-day hikes, always with a brief stop for a tapas lunch. The walking holiday expert Inntravel found the perfect hosts to run Sierra Nevada: An Alpujarran Village Experience in the British couple David and Emma Illsley. For more than 20 years the Illsleys have lived in the village of Mairena, running Casa Las Chimeneas, which incorporates a guesthouse, a separate restaurant and even a yoga pavilion with the most meditative of valley views. They raised their sons here and fell in love with the way of life. You can feel it as soon as you check in: Casa Las Chimeneas is the kind of place that immediately folds you into Alpujarran living. Soon we were nodding buenos dias to the locals as we crossed the square for breakfast in the restaurant. As the sun set and the restaurant's log fire chased away the chill of an early spring evening, we joined fellow guests to exchange stories of favourite walks over dinner. • I've been going on walking holidays for 20 years. These are Europe's best And what dinners they were. Local produce whipped into hearty three-course meals by the villagers Conchi and Fernanda: broad beans with aged serrano ham, fried aubergine with molasses, stuffed mushrooms and red peppers. All was washed down with Alpujarran wine and followed with desserts of chocolate-dipped figs and oranges with mint and dates. So popular is the food that it has become the subject of another book eulogising the Alpujarran experience, Las Chimeneas: Recipes and Stories from an Alpujarran Village, written by the Illsleys. We had opted for a rental car through Inntravel so had the freedom to explore further afield but there was no need. A web of walking trails fans out from Mairena, following old mule tracks and linking together neighbouring villages. And Casa Las Chimeneas can always organise a taxi for adventures. Inntravel's detailed walking guide, sent before our trip, gives history lessons, tips on where to eat and detailed route information so you never get lost. Each morning we would pore over our guide, choosing our route for the day. David and Emma would chime in with their recommendations and were quick to organise additional activities, whether it was helping us to pick up the key to the Brenan museum or the chance to learn more about traditional silk weaving from Lola, a neighbour in Valor, the next village over. Late one afternoon we strolled with David to their smallholding, tasting wild asparagus, fennel and fresh oranges as we explored. Another time, we walked a mile up the road to the next village along from Mairena, Jubar, where just 14 people live full-time. • 12 of the most beautiful places in Spain Here, the church, set on a precipice overlooking the valley, is a remnant of the many cultural layers that blanket these mountains. It follows the design of a mosque and is topped with a Star of David and a cross. Inside, 16th-century frescoes have been uncovered, combining images of Catholic saints and what is believed to be a local curandera (healer), standing at the right hand of Jesus. On the way back to Mairena we popped in on neighbour Isabel, a local beekeeper who delivered a litre of pure Alpujarran honey to David for the princely sum of £7. Wherever we went, a quick phone call from David and Emma opened doors to the communities we visited. At the Brenan museum in Yegen, Mayor Gomez showed us black-and-white photos taken by Vagn Hansen, a Danish photographer affectionately called Juan el Dinamarca (Juan the Denmark) by locals as he returned over the decades to capture their way of life. Just down the hill, Isabel Muñoz and her daughter Carmen welcomed us to Casa Muñoz, their third-generation family business curing serrano ham for sale across Spain and Europe. About 20,000 jamones pass through their bodega each year; it's quite an eerie experience wandering among hundreds of silently hanging legs. After a tasting, we picked up some pre-sliced jamon and chorizo for the road and made like Brenan would have done in the 1920s, following his favourite post-prandial walk alongside the springs that feed the village. On another day, we followed a mule track down to the buzzing market town of Ugijar. The seven-mile round trip from Mairena took us via a rippling stream and past badlands landscapes of rust-red soil, all the while glimpsing views of the ever-present snow cap the Sierra Nevada wears. A rolled ankle prevented a final day of walking. The accident was the result not of a strenuous hike — I was distracted by watching the lavender sunset roll across the valley and misstepped on my way to dinner. So instead, we opted for a half-hour drive along serpentine roads to Laujar de Andarax, just across into Almeria but still part of the historic Alpujarra. It's a handsome little town where the last sultan of Granada, Boabdil, retreated after losing his kingdom. We visited the remnants of his alcazar (fortress), the 17th-century Cathedral of the Alpujarra, and joined locals enjoying a sunny spring Sunday with coffee and churros in the main square. The surrounding countryside is stitched together with vines, and when we realised that the wine we'd been enjoying at Casa Las Chimeneas came from the vineyard Bodega Fuente Victoria nearby, we popped in unannounced. The Suárez family, who own the winery, are recuperating once-lost vines here and while we only showed up to the shop to buy a bottle (from £6), they gave us an impromptu tour of their wine cellar. Just another example of that oh-so-welcoming way of life in the mountains. I had settled into the Alpujarran way of life but Inntravel offers an add-on two-night city break. After following the Moors across the Sierra Nevada, it felt apt to explore the grandeur of their final kingdom in Granada. Our destination was the Casa Morisca hotel in the city's oldest neighbourhood, the Albaicin, which was the Moorish quarter. It sits on San Cristobal Hill looking across to the Alhambra, which in spring glows pink against the last winter snow of the Sierra Nevada. To discover the opulence of the Alhambra's Nasrid Palaces, from where Boabdil reigned, you need to book tickets well in advance (from £16, It's worth it to wander among the brilliant white marble courtyards and through keyhole doorways, taking in the intricate plaster work and flamboyant, colourful ceilings. It was said that as Boabdil headed to exile in the Alpujarra, he turned to take one last look at all he'd lost and shed a tear, only to be told by his mother: 'You do well, my son, to cry like a woman for what you couldn't defend like a man.' It's the kind of story that sums up this evocative corner of Andalusia. Where tales swirl of kingdoms won and lost, and where every corner seems to whisper stories almost lost to history. No wonder it has inspired so many generations of Gordon was a guest of Inntravel, which has three nights' half-board from £470pp, including car hire, route notes, maps and some extra meals ( A two-night add-on in Granada costs from £260pp. Fly to Granada or Malaga
The Independent
a day ago
- Business
- The Independent
From record rainfall to drought: Expert reveals what's causing Europe's unusual spring weather
2025's rainy spring has brought a swift end to the droughts plaguing several Spanish regions, restoring ecosystems to parched fields, reviving withered trees and shrubs, and bringing back a lush, green landscape not seen for a long time. It has also placed the country's reservoir levels much higher than the averages of the last decade. At the same time, drought has spread across central and northern European countries that are not used to water shortages. But why have the continent's rainfall patterns been reversed? Wet north, dry south In general, northern Europe has more rain and, importantly, more rainy days than southern Europe. If we focus on the Atlantic coast, for example, Ireland is rainier than western Andalusia or the Algarve. This is only true in broad terms, though, as even southern Spain has very rainy enclaves, such as the Sierra de Grazalema in Cádiz. The explanation for Mediterranean Europe's modest rainfall and long periods of drought, in contrast to the damp, green landscapes of northern Europe, lies in general atmospheric currents. In the mid and high latitudes of Europe, atmospheric circulation is characterised by prevailing westerly Atlantic, and therefore humid, winds. This is often associated with low-pressure areas, which bring warm and cold fronts. These weather systems usually move from southwest to northeast, and their fronts bring frequent, moderate rainfall. South of these prevailing westerly winds, we enter the Mediterranean latitudes, where the atmosphere is more usually marked by higher pressure. At higher altitudes of 5,500m and above, these latitudes form the northern boundary of the Subtropical High, a large belt of subtropical-tropical anticyclones that encircles the globe. The anticyclonic belt has its axis near 30° latitude in both hemispheres. It influences the climate of the world's largest tropical deserts, such as the Sahara and Arabian deserts in the northern hemisphere, and the Great Australian Desert in the south. The Azores High – a seemingly permanent fixture on weather maps of its namesake archipelago – is one of the links in the aforementioned belt. It acts as a barrier to Atlantic storms, meaning they do not usually reach much of the Iberian Peninsula as frequently as they do in more northerly countries. Indeed, it is typical to see a ridge or prolongation of the Azores anticyclone encompassing the Iberian Peninsula. This causes very clear, stable weather with no rain (except for perhaps a light drizzle on the northern Cantabrian coast). What happened this spring? The normal pattern is sometimes reversed. This often means a low-pressure area in south-western Europe, towards the Gulf of Cádiz, and an anticyclone in the north or centre of the continent, in the British Isles, Scandinavia and Central Europe. This anticyclone in latitudes further north than Spain and Portugal is called a blocking anticyclone, because it prevents the circulation of the typical westerly winds. This means heavy or even torrential rainfall in south-western Europe, and dry spells in more northerly regions. This situation occurred in the spring of 2025, with very heavy rainfall in many regions of Spain and drought in northern Europe. One question many will doubtless be asking is whether this inversion is a consequence of climate change. The answer is, at least in principle, no. In fact, there are many examples of similar springs in the past, such as those of 2013 and 2018. Indeed, the Spanish even have proverbs about spring's unpredictable and rainy weather – 'marzo ventoso y abril lluvioso, dejan a mayo florido y hermoso' (almost) literally translates into 'March winds and April showers bring forth May flowers'. It is true that the spring of 2025 has been exceptionally rainy in much of Spain, especially in the month of March, which saw two and a half times the normal amount of rainfall. A quarter of the observatories in the AEMET, the Spanish State Meteorological Agency, recorded the wettest March since 1961. The Retiro measuring station, in central Madrid, recorded 235.4mm in March – more than twice its annual average. It is also no coincidence that, precisely because of their northern location on the Iberian Peninsula, some regions between Galicia and the Basque Country have been the exception and received below-average rainfall.
Travel Daily News
2 days ago
- Business
- Travel Daily News
TIS2025 defines the challenges of tourism
From October 22 to 24, more than 8,000 professionals will gather at TIS2025 to explore the future of the tourism industry, articulated around thrusts such as technology, AI and sustainability. MADRID – TIS – Tourism Innovation Summit 2025 (TIS2025), which will be held from October 22 to 24 at the FIBES exhibition center in Seville, continues to make progress in the preparations for its next edition. This has become evident with the holding of its first Advisory Board, which has included representatives from leading companies such as Vueling, Telefónica, Veolia and MasOrange, and from organizations and institutions such as the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), SEGITTUR, CEOE and Paradores. TIS2025 will bring together more than 8,000 professionals from the global tourism ecosystem in the Andalusian capital to showcase the technological solutions that are reimagining the way we travel. With the slogan 'Innovation in motion, tourism reimagined', TIS2025 will once again be the setting for the Tourism Innovation Global Summit, a benchmark forum that will bring together more than 400 experts from different areas of the tourism sector to chart the path towards the new traveler profile. The congress will have an agenda distributed in five auditoriums that will operate in parallel and will be structured around eight specialized forums: Destinations of the Future, Hospitality, Transportation and Tourist Travel, Distribution Channels and OTAs, Activities and Attractions, MICE, Business Travel, and Leisure and Culture. In addition, customized agendas will be designed for different professional profiles such as CEO, DMO, CIO, CTO, CMO, CSO and HR managers. South Korea, guest country at TIS2025 In this sixth edition of TIS, South Korea takes over from China as guest country with the aim of 'building bridges and understanding how technological innovations are being applied in this Asian country, something that will be key to inspire new business opportunities. Through case studies and examples of disruptive marketing and communication campaigns, our goal is to offer companies and professionals in the sector, tools and learning that allow them to access this market, expand their strategic vision and apply that knowledge in their own projects to continue to evolve', explained Silvia Avilés, Director of TIS. The integration of AI among tourists is highly integrated and this is shown by recent studies that point out that almost half of travelers trust the use of artificial intelligence when planning their trips. Therefore, among the main thematic thrusts of the Tourism Innovation Global Summit, the use of artificial intelligence to drive innovation through case studies, data-driven personalization strategies, the irruption of robotics, the impact of digital solutions on business profitability, and the adoption of technologies focused on sustainability stand out. New channels to attract travelers, collaborative platforms and technological tools to reduce operating costs will also be explored. Moreover, in a context marked by changing consumer habits, today's travelers increasingly prioritize authentic experiences, access to personalized proposals and sustainable options that minimize their impact on the territory. According to recent reports, 89% of tourists say they want to travel more consciously and responsibly, choosing destinations that respect local culture and the environment, 74% look for sustainable accommodations and more than 60% are inspired by digital channels (such as social networks, travel blogs or video platforms) to plan their getaways. This highlights the broad transformation in which the sector is immersed. Faced with this evolution of the traveler, TIS-Tourism Innovation Summit 2025 is positioned as a key meeting point for travel industry players who want to adapt and lead this change. With a focus on innovation, digitization and sustainability, the event seeks to offer destinations and tourism companies the necessary tools to reformulate their business models to integrate naturally into the traveltech industry. TIS2025 will undoubtedly contribute to anticipate the expectations of new travelers and build a more resilient, personalized and sustainable tourism, aligned with market demands and the Sustainable Development Goals=.
Reuters
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Reuters
Betis chase history as chance to overshadow Sevilla fires up fans
WROCLAW, Poland, May 27 (Reuters) - Real Betis supporters are revelling in their team's achievement of reaching a European final for the first time in the club's history and the chance to overshadow local rivals Sevilla and enjoy their own chapter of continental success. Betis face Chelsea in the Conference League final on Wednesday, with supporters savouring every moment of the journey to a long-awaited European showpiece in one of the side's biggest matches since the club was formed almost 118 years ago. As far as the local rivalry in their city is concerned, the Betis and Sevilla trophy cabinets tell the story. While Betis have won three Spanish Cup titles and a LaLiga crown, Sevilla have lifted five Copa del Rey trophies, one league title and seven UEFA Cup/Europa League crowns. However, this season has marked a shift in the fortunes of the clubs in the city known as the 'The Pearl of Andalusia.' While Betis finished in a respectable sixth place and secured Europa League football for next season, Sevilla ended up just one point above the relegation zone, with their frustrated fans storming the club's training ground earlier this month. Betis followers hope their team can also lift a European trophy and stake a claim to be the city's top side. "Nowadays we feel we're better than Sevilla. We're higher in the league, have better players and a better-run team," Betis supporter Jesus said. The fans were also proud to be the first Betis supporters to wear the club's white and green colours for a European final. "We have dreamed about it for so many years and now we are living it. We will enjoy this time with friends and families, and drink a lot of beer," said supporter Alvaro.
CNA
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- CNA
Betis chase history as chance to overshadow Sevilla fires up fans
WROCLAW, Poland : Real Betis supporters are revelling in their team's achievement of reaching a European final for the first time in the club's history and the chance to overshadow local rivals Sevilla and enjoy their own chapter of continental success. Betis face Chelsea in the Conference League final on Wednesday, with supporters savouring every moment of the journey to a long-awaited European showpiece in one of the side's biggest matches since the club was formed almost 118 years ago. As far as the local rivalry in their city is concerned, the Betis and Sevilla trophy cabinets tell the story. While Betis have won three Spanish Cup titles and a LaLiga crown, Sevilla have lifted five Copa del Rey trophies, one league title and seven UEFA Cup/Europa League crowns. However, this season has marked a shift in the fortunes of the clubs in the city known as the 'The Pearl of Andalusia.' While Betis finished in a respectable sixth place and secured Europa League football for next season, Sevilla ended up just one point above the relegation zone, with their frustrated fans storming the club's training ground earlier this month. Betis followers hope their team can also lift a European trophy and stake a claim to be the city's top side. "Nowadays we feel we're better than Sevilla. We're higher in the league, have better players and a better-run team," Betis supporter Jesus said. The fans were also proud to be the first Betis supporters to wear the club's white and green colours for a European final. "We have dreamed about it for so many years and now we are living it. We will enjoy this time with friends and families, and drink a lot of beer," said supporter Alvaro.
