The Rain in Spain - Sun, Salt & Thunderstorms

We arrived back from Spain last friday after a fantastic week with our friends on the Costa Blanca. In between all the eating and drinking I managed to get out with my camera and take some landscape photographs of the salt lakes near Torrevieja and the mountains above Benidorm.

These salt lakes are lagoons that are flooded with sea water then allowed to dry out. As the water level recedes salt crystals form in the shallow water which are then harvested on a commercial scale. The lagoons have a pinkish red colour to them, however as the salt crystals break the surface of the water and dry out they turn white and have the appearance from a distance of miniature snow or icebergs. Closer to Alicante the salt lakes at Santa Pola play host to hundreds of flamingos which feed on the brine shrimps, giving them a pink colour to their feathers.

The countryside along the coastal plain is very dry and has been used extensively for centuries  for growing oranges and lemons. In between the fields there are large urbanisations of holiday homes built over the last thirty to forty years, cashing in on the holiday boom that began with cheap flights in the early 1970's. Unfortunately after the bankers crisis in 2008 leading to the recession in Spain, many of the newer urbanisations were never finished or have been left unoccupied. There are large areas which look like film sets or building sites and the value of property has plummeted. As my friend Neill said "Spain will be a wonderful country when it's finished".

Behind the coastal strip there is a range of very rugged and scenic mountains with some very pretty villages and towns set amongst them. Two of the most picturesque are Guadalest and Altea which are only a short distance from Benidorm with it's high rise hotels and bars.

According to our friends, the weather during the two weeks preceding our visit was fantastic with brilliant blue skies and endless sunshine. The minute that I arrived it clouded over and we had several storms and monsoon strength rain showers. Luckily it was still very hot, if a little humid and the thunder and lightning was quite spectacular, particularly in the mountains. I collected our friends from the airport this morning (at silly o'clock) and they informed me that on friday when we flew out the sun returned and they had another four days of clear sunny skies. I think that I must be jinxed because when I was in Spain in May we had some of the worst weather conditions for many years with cold winds, rain and snow.