On the way to Cuenca we stopped for lunch in Valdepenas. Since this is a wine town, I needed to find a winery. Google maps said there was one about 8 minutes walk away.
We walked into the Bodegas Aruspide and they were more than happy to open some wines and pour them. I get the feeling they don’t get too many visitors. Their Tempranillo was excellent, so we picked up a bottle for 15 euros. I think this was their top end wine. If only wine prices in California were like this!
Cuenca is a lovely little town in the middle of nowhere, and untouched by the tourism craze…..so far. If there are tourists here, they are mostly European. Of course, fewer people here speak English, so there is always a downside. Fortunately Google Translate works very well, and we are picking up little bits of Spanish here and there!
We are staying at an Airbnb here, and it’s pretty nice, with the exception of the family of maybe 8 people living above us? They must own a furniture moving company, and they spend all day practicing. Either that or they like to play Musical Chairs a lot!
Very twisty narrow streets make it hard to find our way from place to place, but that’s the “charm” of a place like this, right? We took a short walk just before sunset to this towns major feature, the Hanging Houses.
We tried to find a place for dinner but a lot of places were either closed or didn’t open until 8:30 or 9:00. We got pointed down the hill to the center of town by a friendly local and walked into a big celebration. I took this photo after dinner. Before dinner, this entire street was jam packed.
This is the night when all of the Christmas lights go on, and a big part of the city will be closed tomorrow as it’s a national holiday, Constitution Day. We did find a place to eat, but they spoke zero English. The guy at the restaurant was shocked when I gave him a 5 euro tip since he went out of his way to help us when he was frantically busy. Tipping is rare around these parts.
We hit a market on the way back and this guy in front of us knew exactly what he wanted and didn’t want to have the count the change when he got to the cashier. That’s 2.10 euros. He went for the good stuff!
The next morning we took a trek around the old town. The Hanging Houses now hosts a museum of abstract art from the 1960’s…..my favorite! Not! Check out some of this “crap”. No, I have no idea what that is. Looks like paved over road kill with some auto parts mixed in for good measure.
This is titled Bridget Bardot. I’m sure she was thrilled.
The nice thing about the museum (yes, positives do exist, even in in abstract art museums) is you can see the view from the Hanging Houses (these were actually houses at one point).
We then walked over the San Pablo bridge (this is where the best views are of the Hanging Houses) and the crowds were much worse than the night before since everybody has the day off.
We found a nice little hike that led up to the top of the hill overlooking Cuenca. Some pretty impressive rock formations along the way up, many of which had existing petons placed from previous climbing parties. They all looked pretty daunting.
There was almost nobody on this hike. Really incredible views. That’s the same San Pablo bridge down below.
Here is a better view from a little ways below the safety barricades.
Me risking life and limb to get the shot (not really, this was pretty mild compared to stuff I’ve seen in Yosemite).
Here is the statue of Jesus that was at the top of the mountain.
The same statue from back down at the Hanging Houses (seen on the right side).
This is Mangana Tower at sunset (I think Mangana is a strain of Marijuana, but I’m not certain). Beautiful spot with lots of previous ruins they discovered under an old park that was the site of a former church.
Those used to be houses in the foreground.
They light up the hills around the river gorge….a very cool effect. My attempted night shot from after dinner. The lone light at the top is the Jesus statue.
Off to Rioja and lots of wine tomorrow!
