Taking On The Deadliest Trail In Europe (2/27/24)

Today is a very exciting day, we get to go hike El Caminito Del Rey. Kayla and Gage stayed back because Kayla was scared of heights and Gage didn't feel up to going. So everyone else got up, got breakfast, got ready to leave and went to find dad who got up earlier to go get the car. Our car is a BMW that has sports mode and many other interesting gadgets and features which Connor was happy to experiment with. When we got near the Trail, the roads twisted and turned around crazy corners. But the craziest part was as we drove along these very narrow two way roads, large buses would be zooming past like it was a formula 1 race. Somehow not crashing into anything. We decided to go to the end of the hike and then take a shuttle to the start because then we would be by the car after the hike. After getting dropped off near the start, we ate lunch near the river with a gorgeous view until we had to head to the start of the hike for our guided tour.  

Now to give you some perspective, El Caminito Del Rey is considered one of the most dangerous hikes in Europe. They remodeled it after many deaths occurred due to the absolute insanity of a trail it was. Now it isn't super dangerous but it will still give you a fairly large freight. 

When we got to the start of the Caminito, there were about 50 other people in our group, everyone got a helmet, a radio thingy, and headphones to plug into the radio so you could hear the tour guide as he spoke into his microphone. We started in the Front of the pack thinking it would be a good idea to be ahead of everyone. Griffin then quickly realized that us being in the back would give us more freedom about stopping and looking around so we decided to go to the back. 

The lookouts were incredible and I've never done anything like it. It was such a cool and unique experience. We saw many vultures and even some goats that were on the mountain, but no words can explain how amazing it was so I'll let the pictures do the talking.

There was a place where the tour guide would take a photo of you on a see through glass platform which was a little crazy.

We even saw an ammonite fossil in the side of the rocks on display.

Right near the end of the trail, there is a bridge that is held up by metal wires and swings when you go on it. Going across it was very cool but also incredibly scary as there were winds at about 45mph nocking you around.

After we got off the trail we got a good view of the hiking trail we couldn't believe we did it.

After the hike we headed home and met Gage and Kayla who also had a great day.

(Parent note: the Caminito del Rey was not challenging physically, but the adrenaline rush apparently got to both Griff and Connor on the way home.)

Kayla walked a lot of the boardwalk and then went back to pick up Gage for lunch at like 3:30 and then they went out for gelato. (Parent note: Kayla took advantage of her Connor-less afternoon by going out for Thai food with many peanuts.😊). After we all met up, we went to the grocery store and got some food for dinner. We then packed up because we will leave this apartment early tomorrow morning. Connor, Griff, and Dad went out on a walk later at night and Griff and Dad got Gelato. Unfortunately Connor couldn't get any because of his peanut allergy but he has many croissants at the house. We then went to bed so we could get ready for a long day of traveling tomorrow. 

Hasta Mañana!!

Griffin

(Parent note: I'm not sure if it was the exciting day or the pressure from grandparents - certainly it was not his mother's haranguing- but isn't it nice that Griff has such a timely post this time? Hopefully this is a trend which will continue!)