Rice Paddy

Rice Paddy

We arrived in Poblo Nou Del Delta around Midday 27^th December, all trace of the storm of Boxing Day night had finally gone ... interestingly the guy who owns/manages the bar at the Delta spoke about how powerful the winds had been up the coast. So it turns out it was a particularly strong one this year. However it is a seasonal thing, like we have autumn gales, Tarragona has this Katabatic winds thing. Also worth mentioning, because I left it out of the post regarding the journey across the high plains, that the high plains are poked with literally thousands of wind turbines, and they do in actual fact ruin the view here and there.

The Delta has been archeologically analysed to produce a map of its creation. It’s around 2000 years old and not much more and created by out-flowing silt from the River/Rio L'Ebro which runs down from the plateau a few miles inland (we crossed the river on the way in to the delta, the problem is that you can’t stop on the bridge or either side to take pictures). However in the overall scheme of things this matters little. The L Ebro is connected to several other rivers naturally and by canals running across the plains, almost as far as Bilbao. The whole delta area is now a managed reserve, though its primary function is producing rice, which at the time of writing has been harvested for this year, and the funny tractors with giant bicycle wheels are out ploughing the mud, and the water from the paddies is being drain through a massive system of canals , sluices and aqueducts.

These are European rice paddies, and from the pictures in the bar/restaurant where you pay for services used, rice has been cultivated here for hundreds of years, and in previous years the wildfowl were hunted ... I suddenly find myself wanting Crispy Duck with Plum Sauce.

Enlarge this and you will see how the Marsh and Rice Paddy Developed

We saw a wild Flamingo, Marsh Harriers, Herons, Bitterns, ducks and all manner of other birds. We also bore witness to yet another spectacular sunset.

The driving was easy, the place we stopped at was relatively remote. I managed to get two punctures in my bikes rear tyre and my sidekick is suffering from injuries incurred in a near deadly fall into a bottomless pit yesterday evening scrambling on a beach. We have shopped, we are still tired, and we think that we are going to be tired in perpetuity, or at least until we finish, and we think we will finish late autumn next year, because we do feel a bit old and because it’s so easy to spend money, but fuck it, you only live once and we’ll probably never be able to afford to do this again.

As an addendum, we bought a load of food in to cook in the evening, however the rough night of a day or two ago caught up with us and we revised our menu plans and went to the restaurant that allows overnight parking in this off the beaten track place, to save us the aggravation of cooking, washing up, putting away etc. On the restaurant’s menu was a Duck and Rice soup main course, like really loose Paella, a local dish and extremely filling. We made the beds up before we left so we could just flake out when we got back. We dined in proximity to a French neighbours from our car-park home for the night. And we decided  to go to another fully serviced campsite down the coast for a few days to clear the New Year period, by which time we will have covered a third of the Spanish Mediterranean coast.

We think we need to head inland again after that, there are few ruins to see and many are just not accessible, there are a few monasteries, but they don’t float my boat, so maybe the answer is to see what lies off the beaten track, where grape or citrus rotting on the ground may not be the sole crop, even if it does turn out to be jaw dropping landscape.

Getting Ready: The Tangents.

When eventually we leave the safety of home and home comforts, other than the Aluminium and polystyrene walls of the habitation unit of our motorhome, we intend where possible, legal and fun to try and forage for ourselves, both on the flora and fauna of our land and sea. And now without the flowery language; a bit of fishing, shooting and picking of herbs etc. In part this will help to save some pennies, (though we would hope never to be that poor), and of course it brings you a little closer to the land and sea you’re exploring, and adds extra dimensions to the overall adventure.

To this end, a week or so back we bought some very basic fishing rods and reels (from these people http://www.tacklebargains.co.uk ) and went out to practice the art of salt water fishing down near where we live on the tidal Thames at Tilbury. Now many years ago I did fish the inland waterways near home, and experienced most of my first forays into camping and sleeping outdoors in that environment. Amanda on the other hand has never fished with rod and line. So guess who blanked and who caught? That’s right on Amanda’s second cast she came up with a small Flounder http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flounder, I was very pleased for her for the reason regaled below.

I remember being invited to go fishing once a week by a fella who lived up the road from us, my mum had said I wanted to go fishing, and as he was an Angler, he volunteered for the task. Then once a week for the next four weeks or so we sat at the same spot and didn’t catch a thing. Frankly I was losing the will to live and the desire to fish. Then one evening (usually a Wednesday as I remember) I caught my first fish; a Roach,  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Roach . And from that moment on I was hooked. However until that moment I was just about sick to the back teeth of sitting by the Lea Canal at the junction of the Hertford Union canal in Stratford catching nothing. Eventually the fella (Phil) if I remember correctly moved away, but by that time I had got all my own gear and fished for several years with a group of mates. Once we all left school our group broke up and, I took up hobbies like SCUBA diving, walking and more serious trekking and a bit of air rifle hunting (more about this later).

Since then fishing hasn’t really been on my agenda; but many is the time in the last four years since I moved to Tilbury that I’ve cycled past the guys that fish down by Tilbury Fort, and thought “I fancy some of that”. And so it would appear that in the making of our trip plan, I have fulfilled a side ambition, and introduced Amanda to the joys of tangles, lost fish, tall stories, and slimy cold things that won’t stay still while you try to take hooks from their mouths.

Given the relative success of our first trip, we went out again last Friday morning the 6^th of April, on the rising tide and bagged ourselves four Whiting http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merlangius_merlangus before cycling home as the tide started its ebb and the clouds started to fill the sky; up until that point we had been facing into bright sunshine for the best part of three hours, and we both caught fish. All things being equal a very good morning. And then home to start on the serious Easter jobs at home to get the house ready for sale or rent (we still haven’t decided, and it will depend on the market later this year).

The point of this post? Well I think it’s about a coming together of many strands of life, as the plan firms up. As things start slowly to gel together and the idea feels more and more like something concrete as opposed to a pipe dream, you suddenly find that things you have paid no heed to for decades, were stored like savings earning interest in your deep long-term memory. Things like how to tie a hook, that once upon a time drove you mad with frustration, or how to disgorge a hook, and even how to fillet a Whiting; which I learnt from an ex girlfriends dad on the only other occasion in my life that I had fished from the beach. I say beach, I mean the sea wall towards Jaywick East of Frinton in Essex, but even that memory of filleting your own fish and how to do it stuck. At an appropriate time, those memories bubble to the surface imbuing one with confidence. Maybe this post as with others is also about confidence, and finding those reserves you’ve subconsciously stored away for yourself. Anyway enough for now, fishing is back on the agenda. Things are coming together, and for that I am glad.