We are currently holed up in Haro on the northern edge of the La Rioja region, famous for its wines. The town is home to plenty of producers, and surrounded by vineyards. Haro is on a flat valley, albeit at about 400m, and the surrounding hills have a little snow on the top. Its pretty darn cold when the sun isn’t out, which for the last couple of days has been most of the time. But the weather is slowly improving and the forecast is for clear skies after today.
I’ve been doing some work so its been a good excuse to stay inside, but we have ventured out for a couple of walks around the town. Some of the towns historic buildings are really grand, but made from yellow sandstone (a bit like the Cotswolds) that obviously doesn’t take well to the weather, so they are all rather softly edged. The mural in the town seems to suggest that the local Policia are kept busy (but good humoured) by the side effects of the local industry.
We walked out away from the town (footpaths are hard to come by, but fortunately the GR-99 passes through) around a bend in the Rio Ebro and through vineyards. There are still many bunches of grapes on the vine, presumably left over as not ready when the main harvest went through, and no doubt are just destined to rot. Very sweet tasting, but rather pippy!
I think the plan is to stay here tonight, and then we shall probably move tomorrow and explore Rioja a bit more. Might even get around to drinking some!
Hi Dave and Mel about x- ing the Bay of Biscay on a late autum day is not very clever but You both have learnd something hope you both are keeping well .
(Joan asking have you have space for hear?)
Have a good time and entjoing it.
Love and XXX Jan and Joan