Mon, May 30 Old Churches and Ski Resorts

  We had the usual sumptuous breakfast buffet from the meat, fruit, pastry, cereal, & cheese tables. The sky wasn‘t looking too threatening so we set off for an area that Bob’s “Finding Birds in Spain” book said would be promising. It was only 30 miles as the birds fly, but in these mountains it was closer to 100 to drive! We drove through several tunnels, one of which was another 5 km long, but fortunately pretty old and free!

We turned into the narrow valley of Val de Boí , and as we approached a large dam, the road got very narrow with few turn offs and some deep drainage channels on either side. Fortunately we didn’t meet anyone coming down. We reached the foot of the dam and scrambled up to the lake and hiked along the very rough trail over granite. The birds were practically non-existent, but the flowers were pretty good, some of which were lovely tiny pink orchids clustered on a stem. The really great find were the shiny black slugs! Similar to the mascot for UC Santa Cruz, the yellow banana slug, but really glossy, about 3-4” long. We even found two of them curled around an egg mass!

But then it started to rain; we had umbrellas and rain coats but started back anyway. With the stony, irregular surface we had to go slowly, but got back to the car as it was really starting to come down with thunder and hail.

We waited a while and finally took off in heavy rain, meeting a couple of cars coming up (why?) and managed to squeeze by them. We turned off towards Boí-Taüll Ski Resort as the rain lessened and stopped in the village of Taüll to visit a World Heritage site: the Romanesque churches of Sant Climent de Taüll and Santa María, both of which were consecrated in Dec, 1123! The first one has a six-story belfry which we felt compelled to climb! We entered the stark and dramatic interior with large stone columns and a few murals and started up the tower. Tall, steep, and wet steps, up six flights!! The bells were lovely and fortunately did not chime, and the view was great! The exhibit in the church said that the churches were originally stuccoed and painted red and white, although I find them lovely in raw old stone. The sun emerged so we walked through the town which has grown in the last decade with many new ski condos and hotels, but they all match the style of the churches very well and the area is very attractive.

We drove up to the ski slopes which are the highest in Spain rising from 6700’ to the highest peaks and saw acres of ski lift chairs lined up for next fall. The birds that in all Spain flee when you look at them, (I suppose because until lately were considered a delicacy) were suddenly acting as birds do at home and we could actually watch them! We didn’t see any new life birds but got good views of several very colorful species such as Red-backed shrike, Citril Finch, Linnet, and Red-legged Partridge. .

We returned to the Parador at about five and relaxed until eight when we went down to dinner. The wonderful vermouth was served to us again and an appetizer of puree of squash soup. I had boar stew and Bob had a good steak with Pommes Anna made with bacon. We shared crepes with whipped cream and xocolat (chocolate in Catalan) for dessert.
For some reason I can't get the vertical photos in correctly@##%#   Sorry!