Pics: the Castillo, Finca Santa Marta, the stork in "our" garden, olive pressUp at seven thirty and off to the Plaza, but it was deserted and quiet, so we went to the beautiful breakfast room at the Parador for a wildly varied, but expensive buffet: several cheeses, meats, churros, pan au chocolate, fruit, yogurt, etc.
We checked out and I drove north, stopping at several supposedly birdy places without much success. We entered the National Park of Monfragüe and I turned onto a narrow winding road to the Castillo, a tower of brick and stone originally constructed in~ 12th century by the Muslims and then built over by Catholics. It was built on a wind-swept ridge overlooking the river Tajo and miles of oak woodland. It’s famous now as a great place to see storks, vultures, buzzards and eagles nesting in crags and spiraling up into the sky, and from the top we could see Griffin Vultures swooping towards us with their legs down and claws extended. Fortunately they only eat carrion!
We drove to the elaborate Visitors’ Center where we were too early for lunch, but managed to pick up Magnum ice cream bars. I had hoped to get some hiking in and they gave us a very nice map with color coded trails, but it was quite hot and the trails looked dusty and flowerless, so we drove on stopping at various overlooks. At one of the last, on the bank of the river, we could see a wonderful Black Stork on her nest in a crag. She was the size of a great Blue Heron, glossy iridescent black with a white belly and red bill and had several fluffy white chicks. We met some Brit birders who had just seen the Spanish Imperial Eagle, but it had flown away and didn’t return.
We got back on the A5 freeway and returned to Trujillo, driving ten miles east and turned off onto a country lane to Finca Santa Marta where we had booked a room for the next two nights. The Finca was built in 1879 and still functions as a olive and fruit producer. There are sixteen rooms, most in the newer buildings on the north side of the lane. We were shown our casita which is in the original building, entering through a heavy metal door into a private garden. Our cottage is built into the original hacienda wall and has a sitting room, bedroom and large patio with a view of the hacienda chapel bells complete with a huge White Stork’s nest on the top with a chick and the crucifix sticking out!
We unpacked, cleaned up and went to the honor bar by the swimming pool, for beer and gin and watched the swallows skimming the water. At eight we joined the two other couples staying there for dinner in the old olive pressing room. Two huge stone cones that used to rotate around a center column, crushing the olives stand in the middle of the room and a channel is cut into the stone flooring to direct the flow of the oil.
Dinner was perfect and simple: slices of salami and olives, followed by cold gazpacho, steak, rice and roasted peppers, and a bottle of local wine.
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