Castelldefels to Sitges – Ten Thousand Miles in the Mouth of a Graveyard

Thanks again Bob. Although we might thank Lord Randal. Dylan’s song structure was based on a Scottish Borders folk ballad from the 1600s, where Lord Randal comes home from visiting his lover and his mother asks him ‘Where have ye been all the day, my own dear darling boy?
Where have ye been all the day, my own dear comfort and joy?’

Lord Randal has been visiting his lover. But Bob (can I call you Bob?) turned it into an observation of nastiness in the world. And he protested against it. Sadly, Lord Randal had been poisoned by his lover. The ballad doesn’t reveal why.

We were reluctant to get out of bed. Well, out of our respective beds, to clarify matters. I washed my dirty clothes last night and they had dried on the radiator. Gary has brought a lot of clothes and doesn’t need to wash them.

We set off in the sun, walking down to the marina en route towards Tarragona. It was a cold wind but the marina was sheltered against a hillside and it kept the heat of the sun.

We ended up on a beach that we couldn’t exit from, so we had to turn around and retreat a few hundred metres, before climbing up the hill.

This is a playground for the rich, and me and Gaz. The problem is that there are very few paths, a lot of very steep cliffs and the land between the paths is covered with very sharp gorse bushes. The only realistic route for this section is to follow the coast road, but that is very narrow, made by blasting into the hillside, and it winds around the coast. The difficulty is that it winds a lot and it is frequented by big HGVs. As they turn around a corner they can crush poor Lord Randal against the rock face. Or push him over the wall and down a sheer drop to the sea. The poor bugger’s already been poisoned by his lover. Don’t let it happen!

So we crossed over the coast road and climbed up the mountain behind it.

We wended our way westwards. Well, south actually but alliteration is my game, and Desmond Decker is my name. Oh, I’m so funny!

This was a Nativity scene left high on the path!

After a decent 5 mile slog we began to drop down towards Garraf, a tidy little marina town.

Then we got stuck. The cliffs dropped vertically to the sea and the gorse got thicker. We had to go along the narrow coastal road. It worried us but we covered 5 miles and were then desperate for space and safety. After three quarters of an hour of searching in dense woodland for the GR92, which had dropped down towards the coast, we actually found it. It sounds simple, looking for a footpath, but the vegetation is so thick that it’s a struggle. And then we’re there.

The GR92 doesn’t go around mountains. It goes up and over them. For another three hours.

We were far short of our target of Vilanouva, but the walk had been stressful and quite ridiculously meandering uphill and down dale. My lungs were packing in and Gary’s hip was well out of pain relief.

We’re not tip top today (alliteration). Maybe we pushed it yesterday. Sitges appeared way down in the valley. Six hours but only 15 miles covered.

The path was rough, and then we made it to a road, which hair-pinned down to Sitges. We’d had enough. We’re done for the day.

I booked the Hotel Port Sitges and we rocked up in the marina.

Just as the sun was setting.

A good meal and an early night.

Night night.