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A 15 minute city

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  We are heading into Ciudad Real and why not. Blink and we shall be through the other side and onto Toledo.  Ciudad Real was created in 1255 as part of the colonisation and resettling of the frontier with Moorish Spain. The hamlet of Pozuelo de San Gil had the new town plonked on top of it. The arrival of this royal domain in the middle of land held by the Order of Calatrava, it struggled for people to start off with especially when the order set up Miguelturra to act as a rival. To be honest it has not been entirely plain sailing for the city - many being own goals. Having established a Jewish population a 1391 pogrom was not a happy time. On a more architectural level the 1755 Lisbon earthquake and the Civil War did for others. I know, that is a few things in many centuries but the city never grew to great heights. So into town and the Museo del Quijote. https://www.ciudadreal.es/servicios-municipales/cultura/museos/museo-del-quijote.html   It opens from 10am to 1.45pm...
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A confusion of deer and packages

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  It is a bit of a day of straight lines and rolling roads.  After all the excitement of yesterday I think we might need some restful views. We are passing La Torrecilla. It is an agrochemical supplier and maybe we need some of this to level us. Someone has posted a starry sky and a deer but they don’t say why.   Not one else does so we may never know what is going on. We end the day in Poblete. Its wiki English play carries the warning ‘ This article relies largely or entirely on a single source ’  This is the entire British coverage.  Poblete is a municipality in Ciudad Real, Castile-La Mancha, Spain. As of 2021 it has a population of 2,746. ’ Of the other 36 languages the Spanish has these tit bits.## As of 2025 2998 people lived here. You’d think they could have offered a young couple a few euros to move in to make the maths simpler. Our friend the GSH Dictionary reported the following in the mid nineteenth century. ‘It has 95 earthen houses ; a parish ch...
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A day of unresolved mysteries and disappearing things

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  Today is a day of mystery and exploration and why my internet search History is the way it is so yours doesn’t have to. Ok, I have looked up the reviews of motorway bridges but I was young and the big boys said it was alright. We are by the Caracuel lagoon.  The map shows vast amounts of water.  Turning, as our first photo shows you, to see it, the water is gone.  I have looked this up and the opening bit of the website explains all ‘The Caracuel Lagoon is a temporary wetland of volcanic origin where water, geology and wildlife combine to create one of the most dynamic and biodiverse ecosystems in the Campo de Calatrava.’  The pictures make it look much more exciting. https://www.turismocastillalamancha.es/es/naturaleza/microrreservas/microrreserva-laguna-de-caracuel   Today is a bit sparse so I will include the castle - which a few kilometres to the west.  Tomas reports ‘ Its most striking feature is its impressive pentagonal barbican tower, ten met...
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Popular Cars and notorious roads

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  It is a day of straight roads and open roads and roads uncluttered by cafes, museums or small but reviewed obelisks.  Better do five things…. Spain’s underground women’s football team got going in 1970 with Rafael Muga and others. The first official game was on 5th February 1983, where Spain lost 1-0 to Portugal at A Guarda, Galicia. The Dacia Sandero is the best-selling car in Spain with more than 38,500 sold in 2025. The N-340 National Road is the longest road in Spain, going 1,248km from Cadiz to Barcelona. It follows a lot of the Roman Via Augusta.  Wiki notes the two greatest disasters on it.  In 1978 the Los Alfaques disaster occurred on 11th July.  A tanker of liquefied propylene exploded near a campsite, killing 215 people.  The other was in 2001.  A Binter Mediterraneo flight crashed near Malaga, killing 4 of the 44 people on board. We’ve been up Spain’s highest peak - Teide on Tenerife.  The next is Mulhacen in the Sierra Nevada. ...
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Exit - pursued by angry tax payers

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 Big  open spaces then two settlements in as many days.  We are going for Argamasila de Calatrava with spirit and alacrity.  What we said yesterday, you know, depopulation, resettlement in the 13th century, that stuff.  Same as today really. Spanish wiki says ‘D. José de Hosta, author of Chronicle of the Province of Ciudad Real (1865), stated  that the town had 2149 inhabitants, with 350 one- and two-story houses distributed around a fairly spacious square and twelve cobbled streets, though poorly maintained. The town hall was rebuilt in 1776 on the site of the former granary, which had served as a jail. The land within its municipal boundaries is flat, sandy, and dry, but it has some orchards irrigated by waterwheels, reaching slightly towards the Puertollano mountain range. The roads between towns are all cart tracks but poorly maintained. Among the crops grown are wheat, barley, rye, chickpeas, beans, legumes, wine, and some olive oil. Sheep, goats, cat...
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