Castle and windmills in Consuegra, Spain.

There's been an odd haze in the air the last couple of days. It's the Sahara dust again that finds it's way drifting across the south of Spain a few times per year. It was pretty bad yesterday morning, but seemed to clear up a bit by the end of the day, and this morning it seems we have our nice blue sky back again.

We went for a short walk before we left the hill behind Piedrabuena, then headed for the town of Consuegra.

We were up in time to watch the sunrise...

The odd dust in the air made for an interesting sunrise.

Looking down on Piedrabuena.

You can see the haze in the air.

Looking down at where Max is parked.

This was our overnight spot.

We hit the road around 10:30am.

So we're driving along on a back road, and Ruth spots a snake that had just crossed the road. I stopped and backed up to see if we could see it...

It was just making its way into the grass.

Hazy skies.

We like taking the back roads, but this time it didn't pay off. We got stuck on a really rough road for about 10 kms (6 miles)...

But, we're in no rush and there was no other traffic so we just took our time.

Odd how they planted something right up the side of this hill.

We arrived at the town of Consuegra and parked in the motorhome parking below the castle.

View looking up at Consuegra Castle.

The website said the windmills are open from 10am to 6pm, but the castle closes for siesta and reopens at 3:30pm. So we decided to go into town and wander around before making our way up to the castle and windmills.

Nice mural of the town. 

Notice the painting of the guy on the left pulling the curtain across.

The main church in town.

The main plaza.

Not many people around during siesta.

Municipal building.

We walked down to the river... but there was no water in it!

We wonder when the last time the river had any water!

Old door.

Another big church.

Then we hiked up the stairs to the windmills.

Rooftops of Consuegra.

One of the windmills overlooking the town.

There were originally 13 windmills built in the early 1900's, and 12 remain standing today. 5 of those 12 still have complete mechanisms and are in working condition.

What they look like inside.

The windmills were built because the surrounding area produced a lot of wheat, and the river didn't have enough flow to build a normal mill.

Consuegra Castle.

We got up to the castle after the scheduled 3:30pm opening time... and it was closed. Nobody around. Too bad.

The windmills.

Looking down at the motorhome parking area.

Max is at the top left.

Ruth and the view.

The castle is one of the oldest in Spain, built in the 11th century.

Back at Max, it was pretty warm inside, so we sat out at the shaded picnic tables and played some backgammon with a beer and a glass of wine. I noticed a big moth on a fencepost, and the birds were starting to harass it. We think it wasn't doing well, and Ruth picked it up and moved it.

Big moth.

It sure is pretty.

Nice sunset.

Today, we will make another effort to get our stay in Spain officially extended. There's a story to all of this, but I'll detail it fully in a future post. We are headed into the city of Toledo, just south of Madrid.

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