For the Love of the Open Road

I fly past three trucks in one go, courtesy of a huge straight stretch of tarmac plastered on the arid landscape of Aragon. Aragon is almost like a desert. Huge open skies. Large expanses of sandy or sepia toned earth. Barren hills.

 The trucks were probably going about ninety. In the interest of saving fuel I probably should have sat behind them, but I didn't. I love being able to stare out over the open, unobstructed landscape in front of me. Despite the journey between Lleida and Zaragoza not being that interesting I thoroughly enjoyed the drive. It felt like freedom. That might sound cliche but I don't know how else to describe it. The rush of warm air through the two open windows while going over 100km an hour, the distance I can see over the dead flat plains in front of me.

I camped in the desert that night, wedged between two sand hills. After setting up my tent in the dark I laid out on a crash pad for a long time, enjoying what the night sky looks like with no light pollution for the first time in ages.

In the morning the heat hit early. Lizards skimpered across the baked earth, perhaps also looking for asylum in the shade. I quickly packed up and drove the remaining distance into Zaragoza. I passed along wide boulevards, one terminating in a round-a-bout with a huge obelisk at its centre. Eventually I managed to find a park in a quite residential area, a mere 500m from the river opposite the city's iconic cathedral. I spent most of the day under the shade of the oaks, by a fountain, amongst high buildings. At about one pm the city entirely cleared out, the heat causing the population to flee for the air conditioned comfort of their homes. In the peak of the heat I ended up dozing off, my head resting in a weirdly comfortable root of a huge tree.

In the evening I finally left the city. I bought some food at a supermarket that had strangely good prices. Five kilos of a combination of nectarines and two varieties of peaches cost me all of two euros fifty.

I struggled to navigate while driving, looking at my phone every so often but mainly just aiming for the outskirts of the city hoping to see signs to the Teruel, the capital of a province by the same name. I did soon enough. Then a hail storm hit. The intensity was ridiculous. The wind screen wipers couldn't cope with the intensity and I just had to stop and wait it out. It lasted about 15mins. I got out of the car, expecting to see torrents of water gushing through the sandy earth. There was nothing. No evidence at all of the intensity of the storm.

For some reason none of the signs for the national roads pointed to Teruel. Only the Autovia signs. After being tricked into getting onto the Autovia several times I finally just commited to the national road. It took me where I wanted to go. It seems the signs are a clever ploy to try and get you to pay tolls. Thankfully I didn't have to pay any.

About 40mins out of Zaragoza the drive improves drastically. It enters a semi narrow valley with several nice towns before reaching the beautiful historic city of Daroca. Very little of the city is modern. It's amazingly well preserved. The city is built in a depression against the fragile mud cliffs of Aragon, also the material of the city walls. Most of the city walls are a mere shadow of their former constructions, the only available building material, a gravelly kind of mud, having been eroded away by hundreds of winter thawings and the ravages of wind and rain. 

There are also several towers made from imported stone, same as the city gates, but the vast majority of the city has a kind of cohesion to it, a fusion that only comes when the only building materials are excavated from the near vicinity.

I stopped at a couple of other spots that caught my fancy. First a tower on a hill guarding the town in the valley below. For some reason all the towers in Aragon seem to be locked. I never succeeded in getting up any of them. Then a very distinct, Aragonese style, cathedral appeared over the top of the buildings of a small town. It seemed so grand for a town of that size so I went and had a look at the statues feeling the niches on its facade. 

From here I saw a fortress on the hill. I found a street leading towards it and took it. At the top it turned to dirt. I drove a little further then parked, exploring the fortress and towers on foot. For a small, unknown village this place seemed to have a lot to offer. I got some curious stares from the locals, perhaps because they aren't used to tourists in Czech cars driving into the upper reaches of their town.

When I returned to the car and attempted to drive off it was stuck. I cursed. One of the wheels was repeatedly spinning, almost in air, on a sleek rock. I had somehow managed to park it in a place where it couldn't get traction. After fifteen odd goes I got it free before driving very carefully back down to meet the sealed road.

I got within 4km of my final destination before seeing a river which forced me to stop. After several days in the intense heat it was well overdue. I laid down on the smooth stones of its shallow, fast moving water, soaking my whole body. Its hard to describe how good it felt after the time I'd spent in the desert like landscape of that region. I spent two odd hours there, the sun threatening to set on me before I had time to explore the place I'd come here for.