Visitors and visiting

This morning I drove to Velez Malaga to celebrate the Eucharist for a congregation of eighteen. We had visitors from Berlin, two couples. Curiously, both the women wore scarves over their heads, not in a way that suggested they might be Muslim, but more reminiscent of old time custom for women to cover their heads for worship. There are conservative Christian sects which still do this, but this is uncommon in my experience among modern Lutheran, and one of the men said they were Lutheran, yet they didn't take communion. This is also unusual these days, because of ecumenical agreements between Anglicans and european Lutheran and Reformed Churches. 

Nobody afterwards asked them why they hadn't received communion. I wonder if they thought we were Roman Catholic, as we worshipped in a Catholic chapel? The women may have thought this to be respectful of local custom,  given the widespread observation of head covering among Spanish Catholic women, now rapidly dying out except for special occasions calling for traditional dress.

After a coffee with congregation members in a bar across the main road, I was taken by far to the finca of David and Janice on a steep hillside of the Valle de Torrox, a few kilometres from Torrox Pueblo. The place has spectacular views of the surrounding hills and out to sea beyond the  quite big mediaeval pueblo blanco built along a promontory rising up out of the valley.

The region was settled two millennia before the Moors came and developed the town as a coastal trading gateway to Granada, reached by a network of ridge trails. The valley is patterned with terraces olive tree and fruit orchards. David and Janice's steep hillside garden has orange, lemon, peach, crab apple, almond and avocado trees. After an excellent lunch accompanied by much story-telling, I came away with a bag of lemons and avocados that'll last me a good few weeks to come.

On the return journey, I investigated a route from the A7 autovia that follows the rio Guadalmedina down to the Plaza de la Merced in the Old Town, within easy reach of the apartment, having got this route wrong leaving town last Sunday. I was on course as anticipated until the last stretch. The road I should have turned into was blocked by police, obliging me to cross the river near La Rosaleda, the football stadium. The road signs were so confusing I went around a lengthy one way system a couple of times, none the wiser about how I could find the traffic lane for moving towards the city centre. It was the parking information sign for the city centre El Corte Ingles department store which got me established in the right direction. There was a string of these which led me back to familiar terrain.

Oh yes, the police road-block diverting traffic was due to a full passiontide procession through the streets of Nuestra Senora de la Piedad to and from the barrio Parish Church of the same name. I am learning to navigate the inner city streets by trial and error. Understanding and following the road signage conventions sometimes seems impossible, even though I've been driving in Spain for years.