Archive for the ‘San Clemente’ Category
San Clemente
Last year we took several trips to San Clemente – water levels already down – but we’ve had a very busy year this year and so this was our first visit visit – and something of a shocker – as the water levels have dropped markedly.
The photo above shows San Clemente last year mid-summer.
This year, the levels are notably lower and areas we would have popped in for a swim previously are now dry land. Here’s hoping there’s some snow over the winter to help replenish this excellent lake.
Another great weekend
I think it’s possible we timed our trip to a lake this afternoon, perfectly. This time, Embalse De San Clemente – via a particularly inhospitable road. Back at the ranch now and I can hear thunder all around – but we managed a perfect afternoon of sunbathing and (well, I was going to say swimming but more like sunbathing in the water, really). I’ve figured out why my “Owncloud” wasn’t automatically uploading camera images from the phone – it was sitting waiting for an upgrade – major design flaw there!! Anyway, it’s getting darker now, more to do with weather than the time of day I suspect… and the rain, at last seems to be coming.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s still 28c and so no problem and as you can see from the panorama above, the lake really does need a good soaking. Chances are it’ll last a couple of hours and we’ll be back to glorious sunshine.
Meanwhile I’ve ordered an “Orange Pi” – an oriental competitor for the Raspberry Pi – at just over a third the price of the original it’s going to either be a complete waste of time or another game-changer. Put it this way, virtually the innards of a complete working (for example Ubuntu + Open Office) computer for £12 !!! Add monitor and keyboard. More on that in a couple of weeks when it arrives.
I’ll keep this one short – the power is very likely to go off in the storms – more pics… and don’t forget to click for larger versions of any pictures in here. I was going to say Maureen is watching TV but that won’t last unless the weather picks up.
A Typical Sunday at San Clemente?
Not a great start to the morning, as I was minding my own business on one of our rocking chairs I got the urge to stretch and for reasons still not clear that took the chair beyond it’s range of movement. I don’t know how I managed it but I got my hands around my head just before it went crashing down onto the very hard bathroom floor tiles, the result being a very loud cracking noise and a very sore head.
Still, that didn’t stop us getting down, via a very poor excuse for a road, to the waterside – to give it the proper title “Embalse De San Clemente” to spend the day with friends and sandwiches – I have to say not a bad way to spend a Sunday. San Clemente is at quite a low level now – but one of the advantages of that is hitherto unavailable beach areas! I can only assume that this is the reason we had for most of the day, the whole place to ourselves… maybe that and a rather forbidding road sign.
We set up shop on the “beach” complete with umbrellas and deck chairs and we had a great time fighting with the umbrellas thanks to a particularly enthusiastic gale – but at 30c+ that actually came as a bonus.
Click on the photos to expand them – originals are quite big. San Clemente is a stone’s throw away from Huescar and a pleasant enough drive apart from the last bit… did you ever see the Mars Rover videos?
So that’s how we spent our day – me nursing a bad head but otherwise everyone relaxing. I took loads of pics and will put them up on Flickr but here are some samples. What is really nice about this area is the lack of steep slope once you get in the water (and relative lack of sharp stones). The weather is changing as you can see in the photos – we started the day cloudless and now the clouds are winning though it is still very warm – I don’t suppose a downpour would do any harm and the lakes would certainly benefit. Tonight we’re planning to pop down to the medieval market in Galera for a while.