On April 3, Pat and I decided to hike to an old sugar mill and aqueduct, a couple of miles outside of Nerja. We had visited Museo Nerja the day before which inspired this hike. The museums display on both the mill and aqueduct was enticing.
We started early and planned on getting breakfast on the way. Unfortunately, we kept putting it off until we were outside the city and there were no more cafes! The last thing we passed, as we got to the town border, was a grocery. Sigh. So we picked up a couple of snacks and continued on.
A 2.5 of miles east of Nerja is the San Joaquin Sugar Mill, abandoned since the mid-1900s and now derelict ruins with lots of graffiti. This was an exciting exploration because it was abandoned with no effort to preserve or make it into a tourist site. We had it all to ourselves and had to watch our footing.
You may see the photo above with the water channel – when the factory was in operation, water was diverted from a nearby stream and crossed a deep ravine in an aqueduct, the Puente del Aguila, or “Bridge of the Eagle”. The aqueduct can easily be seen from the bridge crossing the valley, but to actually get down below the bridge and under the aqueduct, there is a road and path to follow. Of course, we went there!
From here, we returned to Nerja. We walked back a different way, trying to avoid the busy roads we walked on in the morning. Our trip back took us through the fancier, upscale housing developments of Nerja, where the ex pats live. The steep streets were quite a challenge after our long morning walk. We walked over 10 miles that day.
A couple of days later, the four of us took a bus to Frigiliana, a hill town close to Nerja. The village is about 6 miles (all uphill) from Nerja. We met friends of Jim and Mary Jane for lunch after we arrived (they were staying in Frigiliana for the last several months).
The sheer whiteness of the buildings was amazing with just enough colors to make it truly beautiful. It was not an easy stroll through the streets like many villages. These streets were made up mostly of stairways and twisty alleyways with shops and cafes poking out of the doorways.