Senderismo

Oregon is not my home state, but my love for this state, that evades definition, abounds. As I continue to settle into Spain, echoes of what who I am, what I do and why I love it so much continue to resonate with in me. I could be having a perfectly lovely day, but then a treacherous thought of a previous Spencer’s Butte hike will sneak up on me, raining, figuratively of course (we aren’t in Eugene), on my sunny Sevilla day. Though I continue to miss Oregon and the amazing friends and fun I have there, I have found a bit of a remedy to my predicament of homesickness, that being “senderismo” or hiking. I have only been on two hikes in the nearly two months I have been here in Spain, but they have managed to lift my spirits more than I can describe. The first hike was in an a national park near Huelva, a region southwest of Sevilla. The 8 mile hike followed small paths used by animals, ancient Roman roads and cobbled streets through the towns we traversed. As we passed through a dry forest, my friend Hannah and I could not stop exclaiming to each other how much it looked like Oregon, how it smelled like Oregon, how it evoked the sensation that the next turn we took might just lead us to Eugene. Though no road turned into a street aimed for Eugene, the roads did reveal an astounding amount of history and culture of the region. One of the guides explained the changing culture of Spain after the Roman roads, that we were currently walking on, were constructed. He also explained the culture and lifestyle of rural living. He pointed out special gutters where water flowed, feeding cisterns when blocked with a stone. We tasted fruits and were warned off others, such as the dreaded “tapaculos” which essentially translates to “butt blocker”, a little berry that would make you constipated for a week if you hazarded a bite. At the half- way point, we stopped to devour our bocadillos or sandwiches prepared for us by our señoras. The little village we stopped in was described as very hippy, “aquí fuman mucho cannabis” (here the smoke a lot of weed) and was currently having a market for seed exchange, maybe we had, somehow, stumbled into Eugene! We continued on our journey, winding up steep roads and absorbing the fresh, crisp air that surrounded us.

            The Sierra Norte was the second region I visited to go hiking in. This hike was with my interest group, so rather than having fourty loud Americans traipsing through the idyllic Spanish countryside, there were only about fifteen of us, those of us who had not come down with a mysterious illness at three o’clock in the morning, the night before… After a two hour bus ride, we arrived at the trailhead. The guides reminded us to put on sunscreen, asserting that red is not the same as tan and that skin has a memory. After walking through shady trees by a cattle pasture, we found the trail, originally train tracks that have since been paved over. This hike was similar to the last hike, the guide explaining the fauna around us, me attempting to pretend I was in Oregon. My friends and I chatted in Spanish with our group leaders about differences betweent the United States and Spain, which language was harder to learn and other random topics that always faciliate conversation between people. We stopped and attempted to talk to some bulls and made our way off the path to rest by a waterfall for a while until we finally made it to the town where are bus was waiting. All in all and en enjoyable day spent in the sun, practicing Spanish in an environement that makes me happy. Hopefully the hike coming up in two weeks near Cádiz will be as enjoyable and informative as the past two.