The Torre Vigía Del Cap D’Or Walk (Moraira), Lunch At Restaurante La Perla (Jávea) And St. John’s Wort Oil

You’ll have to pardon my absence, life has been slightly hectic lately. We haven’t had the chance to do anything blog-worthy. At least, nothing that I haven’t already written about. But last Friday was a special day for us and we wanted to celebrate with two of our favourite pastimes, eating out and walking in the countryside. As usual I had a cunning plan in mind.

At this time of year we rarely go on walks that exceed 5 or so kilometres, especially if they’re uphill. During most of the day it’s far too hot to even contemplate walking over mountains till our feet fall off. The last thing you want is to be calling out the rescue services, a ride in their helicopter could cost you an arm and a leg!!

Many an evening we’ll have a drive down to the Fustera beach (or somewhere in that area) and have a lovely stroll between the “calas” (coves), along the “Paseo ecológico” (which I spoke about in this post), followed by a picnic on the beach. But seeing as we were celebrating we fancied seeing something new.

The short walk (SL-CV 51) up to the Torre Vigía (look-out tower), on the Cap D’or hill in Moraira is one we’ve always said we’ll do but have never got round to. Now the days are so long it’s the perfect little route for when the sun is starting to set, just before dinner.

We drove down to the Portet beach around 7:30pm. Parking can be a bit tricky in the summer but in the evening it’s slightly easier. We managed to park on the road where the route commences, just before the beach.

Gradually winding our way to the top of the estate (although it was later on in the day the temperatures were still quite high) we arrive at the track that will take us to the tower and also the Cova (cave) De Les Cendres.

From here the walk is relatively easy, just make sure you have decent walking shoes or sandals on. We come to a signpost indicating the tower and the cave. We opt to go down to the cave first.

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Steep steps are the main terrain on the track down to the cave, occasionally changing to a stony path. You have to watch your step but it’s not slippy though, at least it isn’t when it’s dry. There are also some sort of metal hand rails that you can hold on to.

After a 5-10 minute walk we arrive at the cave. The sign had informed us that it takes 15 minutes but the person who measured it must have walked reeeeaaaally slooooowly. It doesn’t even take 15 minutes to walk back up and there are some pretty steep steps to deal with. You do have to watch your step though.

The “Cova de les Cendres” (which translates as cave of the ashes) is one of the most important Palaeolithic and Neolithic archaeological sites in the Western Mediterranean. Since the early 1980’s till the present day, excavation and research works have been carried out. Thanks to the archaeologists work we are able to see into the past, as far back as 35000 years ago and up to 4000 years ago, when the site was abandoned. Quite impressive, don’t you think???

After our little roam around the cave we press on to the Torre Vigía, perched on top of the Cap D’Or hill. Sorry about the quality of the photos. Although I love the evening light my camera doesn’t.

It’s a lovely little walk to venture on on a summer evening (it takes around an hour and a half with stops if I remember rightly), followed by some tapas in one of the local bars or a picnic by the sea. Oh how I love the summer 😊

Earlier on that day we’d had lunch at one of our favourite rice restaurants. La Perla de Jávea (website here with menu, Facebook page here) is a wonderful restaurant for special occasions, and honestly, I think every day should be a special occasion 😁. We have sampled one of their rice dishes on each of our visits and they have never let us down. Our main choice is the Arroz A Banda. It’s always perfectly thin and cooked flawlessly, you can taste the quality of the ingredients.

To start we had “calamar” (squid) a la plancha”, also delicious, served with the simple “picaeata” (garlic and parsley sauce).

Our reason for going though is their rice dishes. Our “Arroz A Banda” was scrumptious, the stock adds a real creaminess to the rice. Yum

It’s quite a posh restaurant, it rarely gets noisy even though it’s full and kids always seem well behaved. But there’s one thing about this sort of restaurant that I don’t like. Most diners have their rice served onto a plate by the waiter. In my opinion this takes the enjoyment out of eating a rice dish cooked in a “paella”. We always ask for the pan to be placed on the table in between us so we can eat straight out of it. We also eat with a spoon instead of a fork. They probably think we’re right country bumpkins. Do I care??😂

We didn’t have desserts, instead opting for an ice cream and a sorbet from a parlour close by. But I can highly recommend their Tarte Tatin. It’s divine, albeit a tad pricey. Their coffee is also wonderful.

Right, moving on to more homely happenings. Before the summer heat eventually hit us (it seemed a long time coming this year) I had been collecting herbs from our garden and preparing them for drying. I’d gathered sage (salvia), wonderful for cooking and infusions. It’s often called the woman’s plant, it helps with the menstrual cycle and also with menopausal symptoms, especially hot flushes. Also peppermint (“menta”) which I speak about in this post, lavender cotton (“santolina”) post here, wild chamomile (“manzanilla silvestre”), one of Pep’s favourites, it’s wonderful for digestive problems; and lemon verbena (“hierba luisa”), my favourite, wonderful for infusions. I explain a bit about it in this post.

Another herbal potion I wouldn’t be without is “aceite de hipérico” (St. John’s wort oil). It has so many uses and I’m always retrieving it from the cupboard to treat minor burns in the kitchen (I’m great at burning my arm on the oven), as well as insect bites and stings. There is a good blog here explaining a bit more about it and its uses. She makes the oil slightly different to me, putting the jars in the sun for the first couple of days. I have read that you shouldn’t do this so I just keep mine stored in a dark cupboard from the beginning. The prepared oil works very well.

To make it I get as many flowers from the plant as I can (it normally blooms end of May-beginning of June), shove them into a dark glass jar (or normal jar wrapped in newspaper), cover with olive oil or almond oil, close tightly and store in a dark cupboard for 4 weeks, shaking every so often, daily if you remember. Once the 4 weeks are up the oil will have turned a reddish colour due to the pigments in the flowers. I store it in a cupboard in small dark glass bottles with droppers. I’ve found it needs using in 12 months more or less, it starts to lose it’s properties after that time.

Well, I think that’s about it for today. Now the day is starting to cool (it’s been 34 in the shade today, and that’s in Benissa. Dread to think what it’s like in Orba) we best get outside and do some work in the “huerta”. It’s my favourite time of year as far as veggies are concerned. I made this year’s first batch of “salmorejo” today (recipe here) and it tastes like summer. Our first couple of white aubergines were picked the other day and the “pimientos de padrón” (small green peppers) and “pimientos italianos” (Italian green peppers) are starting to fill our fridges!!

Pep has been treating all the tomato plants weekly with a mix of water and neem oil, so far it seems to be keeping the bugs away. He’s also treated the melon plants with a mix of water and white vinegar, they seem to have developed a white coating which we think is due to too much calcium in the water. It appears to be doing the trick. We’re hoping to build a depósito in the not too distant future so we can collect the rain water, the plants definitely prefer it.

Before I go just one more thing 😊. I made this lemonade today. It’s soooo refreshing. I used 3/4 cup of eco raw cane sugar and topped the mixture up with almost a litre of water and it’s just to our liking. I also added the lemon rind to infuse in the simple syrup, like the girl suggests. I’ve just put some in the ice cream maker to make a slush, it’s fabulous and ready in 20 minutes. Perfect for such a stiflingly hot day.

Ok, that’s definitely it. Thanks for reading. As always, if you’d like to get in touch we’d love to hear from you. You can contact us in the comment section below or on our contact us page. If you’d like to subscribe to this blog you can do so using the subscription form on this page. It’s free and you’ll receive an email every time I publish a new post. You can also follow our Facebook page to see new posts. Take care you lot. Enjoy the summer. See you soon. Lots of love, Georgie and Pep xxx