Pyrenees Trip June 2024 - Part 4 Ainsa and Jaca, Spain

AINSA

We set off to a place that I had read was supposed to be really good for birds of prey, particularly different species of vulture. What did we see when we got there? Nothing!

So we headed to Ainsa, about 45 minutes from Broto, which we had already planned to see. We were lucky that there was a large parking area which included motorhomes as well as cars - you don't know how welcoming that is after so many car parks with height barriers or at best, motorhomes always having to park so much further away from tourist attractions than cars.

Coming from the car park you enter the medieval old town of Ainsa through Plaza Mayor, after passing by the remains of the old castle. There were several restaurants here and some market stalls. The old town is perched up on a hill above the rivers giving it good defences and views of potential enemy in olden times.

Lots of lovely old buildings everywhere.

View of one of the bridges from the old town. The town sits on the confluence of the River Ara and the River Cinca, after which the river turns into a reservoir.

There are only two main streets running through the old town and they are very narrow.

Santa Maria church: built mostly in the Romanesque style but as is the case with many old buildings, bits were added on over the centuries and often in other styles. This tower dates from the 11th century but there are some Gothic parts to the cloister added several hundred years later.

The fauna eco museum is located in the keep of the old castle. All that is left of the castle is mostly the walls and a few small buildings.

The eco musem was very interesting although not large. What really interested us was the bird of prey hospital where injured birds were taken to recuperate. Many are injured by overhead electric cables and can no longer fly - we came across this later in the holiday at an animal park for Pyrenean fauna where there were Griffon Vultures which were no longer able to fly due to the same reason.

The highlight for us was coming practically face to face with a Lammergeier (or Bearded Vulture) (Gypaetus barbatus). Unfortunately for photography, we were in a room underneath the birds' enclosures so viewing through a dirty glass ceiling, hence the reflections and poor quality. But it didn't matter whilst we were there because we will never see a bird like this in the wild anywhere close to us so it was a real experience! These are the bone crunchers of the vulture world.

We also enjoyed seeing this Eagle Owl (Bubo bubo) up close too. It doesn't have its ears up which gives it far more of a cute look. When their ears are pricked up on their heads they look quite fierce!

JACA

The following day we left Broto and headed to Jaca, a town that K and I had visited some years ago. The plan was to have a look around, have lunch and then visit the fort, which has a military miniatures museum, which sounded interesting.

Jaca was briefly the capital of Aragon in the 11th century, though these days the capital is Zaragoza.

San Pedro Cathedral, built between 1077 and 1130 and the first Romanesque cathedral built in Aragon. It has of course been added to and modified in later centuries, in different styles.

Jaca is quite a big modern town but there are still some lovely old bits.

After having lunch out we headed to the fort to have a look around, only to find it was closed for the long Spanish siesta and didn't open again until 4.30! We really didn't want to hang around for another two hours so we decided to give it a miss and drive on to a campsite for the night and chill out for the rest of the afternoon.

The previous time that K and I were there we walked all the way around the outside of the citadel and it is well known for having a colony of Rock Sparrows living there (which we saw at that time).

Our next destination was somewhere really quite different.... 

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I said I'd share my new orchid once it started flowering so here it is. I couldn't get a really sharp image of the teeny flowers as I took these photos indoors with not enough light. Orchids don't always like being moved so I wasn't going to take it outside to take the photos.