Towards the end of our stay in Andalucia, and after a delightful lunch at Venta Las Delicias in Villanueva del Rosario, we drove through the village along a paved but rough road, followed by a gravelly track, for about 6 km up into the hills to a parking area and viewing point (mirador) called Alto … More More valleys and mountains
Cities, towns and villages in Andalucía abound with restaurants and tapas bars, providing a huge variety of dishes and prices. While many genres of food are available, including Chinese, Italian and Indian, tapas bars tend to have similar ranges of local foods, based especially on seafoods and pork, salads and olives. During my days as … More More good food in Andalucía – Venta Las Delicias in Rosario
In May 2016 Christine and I visited North Island, Seychelles, to begin another WildWings Bird Mangement-led attempt to eradicate Common Mynas from the island (see blog post of 21 May 2016). The project is being funded by both GEF/UNDP and North Island and managed by Green Islands Foundation, and is undertaken by volunteers that Christine … More News update from North Island, Seychelles
As readers of my earlier blogs will know, the lagoon at Fuente de Piedra is one of my favourite birdwatching haunts, famed for its large nesting colony of Flamingos that under the right conditions can exceed 20,000 pairs. We visited on 9 October to discover a baked pan of whitish mud with no standing water. … More Only two Flamingos
Having experienced sufficient of the plastic greenhouses and the incredibly busy E-15 coastal motor way, we turned inland at Almuñécar on to explore what my ancient road map indicated as an unnumbered minor road (but which Google Maps identifies as the A-4050) heading almost due north into the interior. It was by this time mid-afternoon … More Feeling on top of a wild world
The main road eastwards from Órgiva runs along valley sides of the Sierra Nevada foothills through stunning scenery, ranging from the wide gravel valley bottom, doubtless periodically a raging flood but during our visit little more than a dry river bed, to high mountain peaks. The mixture of wooded and scrubby slopes is periodically studded … More The plastic coast
The Sierra Nevada mountain range’s highest point, Mulahacen (3478 m), is also the highest point on the Spanish mainland. In winter the mountains are snow-capped and support a thriving ski centre. Our visit in October was made in clear blue skies and hot sunshine with images of snow restricted to postcards. On the high mountains … More Jamón is in the air – Trevélez
Following our arrival in Andalucía on 4 October Christine and I had planned to visit the Alpujarras, the southern foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountain range that extends eastwards from Granada. We travelled from Antequera to Órgiva, a small town that I had visited with my younger son Simon about 20 years ago. On that … More Órgiva – gateway to the Alpujarras
“Invasive alien species” (IAS) is the term used to describe animal and plant (and even bacteria, viruses) species that have been deliberately or accidentally introduced to new parts of the world, generally through human a gency, and having been introduced they have the capacity to thrive in their new environments. In so doing they can … More Invasive Alien Species (IAS) – not just on small islands
Wild Bird Conservation 