Rocking the Rocha Blog.......AWW 12 Feb 2020

AWW 12/2/20 Rocking the Rocha Blog

This being our first Lead of the Wednesday walkers we were anxious not to get ourselves lost. And fortunately we overcame our first hurdle and arrived at the Folclore café in Alte with barely a wrong turn. By 9:45 a dedicated group of walkers had assembled ready for the off.

Front row, Russell

2^nd row, Richard, Geoff, Miriam, Jan, John, Olli-Pekka, Sue, Gill, Trish, Nancy, Sue, Ken, Julie, David, Terry, Frank.

3^rd row, Linda, Jim

After a brief walk through the busy village of Alte we were suddenly into the first climb up the hillside above the fonts, and soon the jumpers and jackets were coming off. Within minutes the views back to the village and beyond were extensive.

The single track route upwards had us spread out, but the way-finding was assisted by strategically placed cairns, one of which was a little novel.

As the path levelled out, close to a small cluster of houses, Jan spotted some unusually coloured shrubbery. What was it? A discarded carpet amongst the grass!

Another five minutes of gentle climbing between rocks and bushes brought us to the summit of Rocha do Soidos. Our first trig point and with 360 degree views of the coast, Foia, hills and valleys to the north and Rocha do Pena eastwards.

The journey continued east along the ridge and down a particularly rocky slope to a clearing where we regrouped. This took a little longer than expected as Sue had to retrace her steps back past the trig point to find her hat. Geoff’s actually. Geoff also returned to assist with the search, he being a gentleman.

All together again, we descended through the village of Freixe Verde where water was available for the dogs. Waiting for the tail-enders, a small group decided to stand in the bus shelter, no doubt hoping a bus would come along and pick them up.

Then more climbing, still northerly, took us to our second trig point. Oops! Wrong path. Our leader had led us straight to the first windmill instead. It was a couple of minutes to the trig point, but only Richard paid it a visit, insisting he’d been promised a second one.

We all continued to the newly painted second windmill for a well-deserved lunch stop in bright sunshine. But when the time came for us to leave everyone had got far too comfortable. Probably thinking it was all downhill from here!

On the way down we passed our third and final windmill.

Reaching Sarnadas in the valley, there was a brief road section before turning into a secluded ‘hidden valley’. The path was good and followed the reverse route of a stream, inevitably meaning we headed upwards to a low ridge. A further descent to an orange grove and our final climb was at last ahead taking us to the road home to Alte. It was here that we had a lively discussion on the existential nature of just what is Hill? Not the Geoff or Sue or even Benny type, but the small incline on tarmac type. Surely not a hill by AWW standards! Even the snake spotted by Richard doubted it was a hill.

And so in true AWW fashion, after a scenic walk down to Alte, we retired to the café for refreshing drinks.

Thanks to Marc Gomes of Alte for showing us the route.

Finally, for those of you interested in wild flowers, the waist high flowers we encountered on the first climb were called Common Asphodel. Thanks to Richard for that.

Tony and Julie