Heading inland, bettles, ghecko's and snakes, it's a desert

Carboneras to Sorbas - 59 km
I am glad we had our rest day as this day was challenging. We left the gorgeous coast behind us and headed inland and northwest towards the mountains. A nice road ride early on through an old mining area, iron ore was extracted from the hills here years ago and shipped out at the nearby port. We arrived at a small village in time to meet the mobile bakery so just had to buy pizza slices for lunch and to take photos of the great street signs. Some of these smaller villages are dying as the young people leave for the cities, the shops close up and just the old folk are left. Some of them seem like large retirement villages as everyone seems to have a walking stick!
The fuente was under repair and we didn't really think too much about water which really became all we thought about later in the day in a hot dry desert when we ran out!! A lovely Via Verde or greenway as they are called for the next 8 km, (actually an old paved railway track) then inland to cactuses, plenty of black and red lined blister beetles,  apparently they can poison even large animals like horses. Gheckos and snakes to see around the rocks as we pedaled under blazing sun for hours, passed the old falling down and abandoned hamlet of Hueli, a difficult long route. But interesting scenery, the Sorbas basin was under the sea 6 million years ago but now is one of the worlds foremost gypsum karst landscapes. Very glad to make it to Sorbas, a town built on a cliff, and more importantly water! Apparently it was a holiday weekend, Friday night, and all 3 supermarkets were closed. So we had dinner and a beer at a cafe, brought some bread and salami from them for the morning and headed a couple of kms back out of town to camp under some scrubby trees. Perfectly fine.
Sorbas to Chercos - 63 kms
We decided to take the road over the Sierra de la Filabres instead of the isolated trail, a scenic route but lots of foothills and valleys on the otherside as well, a slow day and a navigational error that added a few more kms and hills that we did not need but we did see lots more olive trees!  It took us a long time to find a 3 metre square flat piece of land to pitch our tent but we did about 7 pm and it still felt hot enough to get sunburnt at that time of the night.
Chercos to Baza - 82 km
Turns out we had done all the climbing so it was a quick downhill to the nearest town, Olula del Rio, we were only 15 km away. We found a small shop open on a Sunday, two days without a shop and two hungry cyclists, we stocked up, more crusty bread and cheese and olives, can you eat too many olives in a day?? Then it was a rail trail for the rest of the day, some parts not finished but some parts really well done, one cafe/bar on route, an essential stop and joined the locals for beer mid afternoon!  Lots of spring flowers still about. Slightly uphill, really hot with a head wind, we felt like all the moisture was being sucked out of us but we loved it! No big climbs. Made it to Baza at 7 pm and found a much needed hotel. Now back in Granada province for just two days then into Jaen province.
Baza to the top of a steep hill after Los Laneros - 35 km
We were very slow to get going today, by the time we stocked up all the panniers with extra food and found our route out of town, (Spanish signs are bad and noone speaks English - of course they don't have to! ) it was 1.30pm
We stopped to look at the troglodyte houses - places built into the hillside to keep cool, almost cave houses. ( photo) We could feel the cool air around the windows and doorways. There were lots in this area.
More olive trees for as far as we could see. Have I mentioned Spain produces the most olives in the world! And they seem to grow in rocks!  Almond trees as well, (photo of olive trees and almonds)
We didn't make it to the campground we had intended to stay at, a local told us of a more direct route when we were 15 km out but he had obviously never been on a bike because the road was so steep we had to push our bikes up for sooo long.  We gave up about 8 pm and camped among the pine trees. We are now carrying litres of spare water in case we have to camp out. Another peaceful night in the wilderness...

The Mediterranean Coast of Almeria

We awoke to a beautiful calm day and rode into Almeria, the only big city on the transandalus route. Navigated to the 3 bike shops but only one had a workshop. We left our bikes, found an enormous supermarket to stock up then picked the bikes up at 2 pm. New crank for my bike, bottom brackets, chains, clusters, cables etc, I think we have now replaced most moveable parts on both bikes! A nice small city to look around. The sea breeze was more of a gale as we made our way back to the campground. Just 25km ridden, a pretty good rest day.
Aguadulcia to San Jose - 51km
From Almeria there was a paved bike path for about 25 km along the coast, superb! Then a sandy stretch to Cabo de Gata, lots of empty apartments and hotels waiting for summer visitors. We are now on the most eastern southern tip of Spain. The car road ran out here and we headed up to a lighthouse then down a rocky trail which we had to take slowly finally passing beaches and coves to reach what used to be the fishing village of San Jose but is now more touristy. Found the only campground, we are enjoying the camping, while the weather is great. It is lovely sitting out in the evenings and we can sleep 10 hours a night on our air beds! They cost between 10 and 18 euro, most about 15 and the facilities have been really good.
San Jose to Carboneras 53 km
A bit of pushing our bikes up an unrideable section first thing, it took both of us on each bike but then onto a hiking trail and fantastic views around the coast, worth the effort. Then inland passed abondoned goldmines and a quite rocky hard to ride track that really took it out of us. Then a nice fast 8 km on tarmac to Agua Amarga, a gorgeous small village but accommodation was way out of our budget so we rode another 9 km to Carboneras, a much bigger place but off the route, arriving at 6.30 pm exhausted. Found a great little hostal/hotel with a lovely host who gave us a room with a balcony looking over the sea for 35 euro. Perfect! So good we decided to stay another day and leave our bikes parked in the garage. We wandered around, along the beach,  I waded in but the water was really cold. We visited all three supermarkets, ate and drank lots.

Fuentes of Spain

Here are a few photos of the gorgeous fuente's (water fountains) we found in some of the villages. They are usually in the plaza area in the centre of town. It is warming up each day, quite hot in the afternoon,  great to get cool fresh water.