Casa rural in Aroche

Our small casa for a few days

Jose, Cooper and I spent the last few days at a casa rural in the Sierra of Huelva. Basically a casa rural is a big house or farm that has been converted into a type of rustic hotel where people can spend time in areas outside of cities (alternative tourism). It is a place where you can get away and enjoy nature, similar to camping but with better amenities. Usually instead of just having a room you end up staying in a small house with basic installations like a chimney and kitchen. This casa rural (Puerto Peñas) was what I suspect may have been an old children's camp since besides having lots of what appeared to be converted bunkhouses, it also had an old basketball court, soccer field, fire pits and swimming pool. Now it is made up of quite a few different, separate houses, a main restaurant, new swimming pool, small animal farm and hiking trails. It was a really nice place to stay.

The Aroche pueblo

This is the second time we have visited this area of the south of Spain and we absolutely love it. The last time we stayed in a pueblo called Almonaster but these last few days we were in Aroche (both are small villages in the mountains). Our casa was removed from the pueblo itself, out into the countryside where we were surrounded by nothing but farms, animals and nature. In fact we saw goats, pigs, horses, sheep, ducks, chickens, cats, dogs, hawks, even deer which unlike in Michigan are hard to spot. As you can imagine, Cooper loved being able to run around like crazy.

Like lots of villages in the south of Spain, Aroche is set up on top of hill which made it easier to defend against attacks, especially during the battles between Muslims and Christians. Aroche is fairly small but quaint. It has a castle (surprise, surprise) and a large church, the two main components of most towns you visit here. We spent an afternoon walking the streets and having lunch in Aroche on a day it rained a lot during our visit. The food was hearty and was what we had expected from this area, lots of meat, fresh ingredients, goodness.

Inside San Mames hermitage

Right outside of Aroche is a hermitage (San Mames) which had been built in the 13th century on top of old Roman city called Turobriga. The small church is set out away from the pueblo, close to the mountains and is now surrounded by small farms. It is quite picturesque. The hermitage was once used as a hospital and during a plague outbreak they actually painted over all of the frescos with lime because they believed it would help prevent the sickness from spreading. The frescos are now half-restored after they were discovered underneath layers of white lime.

Right outside of the hermitage are the excavation sites of different parts of the Roman city on which the small church was built. Turobriga dates from the 1st century B.C. until the 3rd century A.D. and scientists believe they have only unearthed about 1/3 of what could really be there left to discover. You can visit the ruins and walk around the forum, bathes and a house. This city was strategic because it helped the Romans control parts of their empire located in what is now Portugal that were rebelling at the time.

Turobriga Roman ruins

This is one of the things that I love about living in Spain, there is history layered upon history. You never know what you might find if you begin digging. In fact, it can cause people quite a bit of problems when they discover ruins during excavations or while building. Imagine you want to put in a swimming pool and discover something from ancient Rome. Spain was important to the empire and there are ruins everywhere it seems. It is always a sort of odd experience to walk around where someone lived so long ago, a strange sensation to try to think about what their lives must have been like.

Cromlech Pasada del Abad Monoliths

We had originally planned to spend this, our first day in the mountains, hiking but the weather didn't cooperate. Instead we visited Aroche, its surrounding areas and decided to then drive to Portugal which is only about 20 minutes away. On our drive we passed by another ancient site, seriously only here in Europe. We stopped to investigate. It was a group of monolithic rocks placed in a circle that dated from 5,000 years B.C. Right there, next to the highway. I thought this was really cool and wish there had been more information about it. I mean, here they were, just hanging out on the side of the road. 

After a quick visit to confirm that Portugal wasn't that interesting close to the border with Spain we returned to our casa rural and spent the rest of the rainy evening playing Scrabble in front of chimney. It was nice to relax after the craziness of Christmas. Check back for another post about this short trip!