Ireland day 1130. Friday 01 November 2024- Agulo

Today’s summary	After 8:30 breakfast in our Casa Rural in Agulo we set off on our walk this morning at 10am, with bright sunshine all around and limpid blue skies overhead. It stayed that way all day and although quite warm, it was never unbearably so. A tough circular walk though, with many long stony ups and downs leading us over the ridges and headlands above Santa Catalina. We were back just before 4:30, so time for some quick refreshments and showers before returning to the Vieja Escuela for dinner again at 7:30.
Today’s weather	Dry sunny and warm all day. Light northerly breeze. Appx 22c

Today’s overview location (The green mark shows the location of our route)		Close-up location (The orange line shows where we walked) (Click button below to download GPX of today’s walk as recorded, or see interactive map at bottom with elevations corrected): Agulo circular

Commentary

Today was our fifth back-to-back day of hiking here in La Gomera and I have to say I think it was probably the toughest.

The day started with an al fresco breakfast here in Casa Rural Los Helechos in Agulo, at the just about acceptable hour of 8:30 am. Anyway, fortified by coffee and cereals, we were ready to set out at 10am. The sky was brilliant blue, the sun was shining and the wind had died down to almost nothing. So the omens were good.

We started off with a steep – and when I say steep I mean near-vertical – descent to the playa at Hermigua, which took us a good hour to negotiate. The slightly depressing aspect to this section of the walk was that we knew we would have to do it all in reverse at the end of the day.

From the playa, a steep path leads directly up the hillside to a road and paragliding site at the top, and we clambered up under the unblinking eye of the sun. Actually, although the sun was unrelenting, the shadows were quite long (after all it’s only seven weeks until the midwinter solstice), so the heat was not oppressive.

Once up the hill, our route took us anticlockwise, like a balloon on a string attached to the playa, on a tour of the ridges, barrancos and lofty ledges of La Gomera’s mid-highlands. It was superb. The views were breathtaking, with the outline of Teide dominating the eastern skyline throughout the whole of our walk.

We stopped for lunch at a particularly lofty perch almost exactly halfway round, and enjoyed our coffee with bread ham and tomatoes in possibly the best dining spot in the world.

The return to Agulo was more or less a re-run of the outward journey, and just as stunning. But the return back up to the town from the bottom of the Hermigua valley was a really vicious sting in the tail- a tough upward scramble just when we needed it least.

Once back at the ranch, we dropped into the supermarket for some critical refreshments which we enjoyed back at the hotel while Val wrote some postcards. Once jobs were done, clothes were washed and bodies were showered, we set out again for the short walk to the town square where cena at La Vieja Escuela awaited us once more.

A truly memorable day.

Today’s photos (click to enlarge)


*Val heading off down one of the many winding alleys in the charming pueblo* of Agulo this morning. No prizes for what is in the background**	Beautiful carmine bougainvillea right on the pathside. The very best of the best

*Skittery descent top the mirador* overlooking Playa de la Caleta**	*The caleta* (cove) from the mirador.**

Patented sun-protecting headgear being modelled at the top of the hill out of the Hermigua valley	*Well – better late than never – this was the sunrise this morning, from the roof of our casita, with the sun coming up over Teide on Tenerife*

Val taking it all in her stride on the way back up to Agulo at the end of the day