Save Me…… from having to take a microwave oven up a mountain pass just to make a point

I’m sorry to both Scotland and Croydon. I like you both. But the following must be said.

Much of my family is from Scotland and I have toured and explored many beautiful, awe- inspiring places within it. From mountains to lochs to sweeping sandy beaches and rocky headlands. It is quite an incredible country when it comes to natural scenery.

Not so much Croydon. Before I moved to Spain, I lived in Croydon. It´s not quite Scotland. It’s more beautiful on the inside. But I’ll come to that later.

Anyway, it is with great pain that I have to say, with hand on heart, that the scenery we found this week not 100km from home in southern Spain blows all of it away. All of it. The lochs, the mountains, even the haggis and bagpipes. Even the strangely fascinating No.1 Croydon tower. It blows them all sky high, in much the same way putting a mobile phone into a microwave and pressing “start” would do.

The startlingly beautiful scenery I speak of can be found on the road between the Andaluz villages of Grazalema and Zahara de la Sierra.

Travelling from Jerez or Seville you follow a twisty mountain road from the small town of El Bosque to Grazalema which, itself, is incredibly beautiful. This first road is steep, narrow and, in places, the edge drop away hundreds of feet. It takes you past the isolated mountain village of Benamahoma, itself worth a detour to visit, and the views from the road are amazing, especially when you near the top of the pass before descending into Grazalema.

But it is here that many people stop, already blown away by the rolling hills, the deep valleys, the acres of forest and the rocky mountain pinnacles they lay before them at the “mirador” that stands just 2km from Grazalema itself.

However, what so many people miss is the turn-off to Zahara, just one more kilometre further down the road, just outside Grazalema. From here, there are 14km of road taking you through the most invigorating, spectacular and stunning scenery. Ascending the first part is breathtaking. Plunging cliffs, huge boulders, sloping trees, grey, rocky outcrops, rich green grass and sweeping vistas greet you as you look out to the right.

But that’s not even the best of it. When you come to the pass at Puerto de las Palomas, you find yourself at a point between two sweeping valleys. You can see for miles and miles across the Sierra not just to the south east but to the north west as well. It leaves you speechless (which is frankly unheard of for me). Go to any good thesaurus, find the most positive adjectives you can about scenery and you still won´t come close to describing the view from this point.

But – yes, there’s another but – as if you thought you’d already stuffed yourself full of sweets from the metaphorical sweetshop that is the view at this point, as you descend the other side towards Zahara, you drive down an awe-inspiring, twisty, turny, steep and precipitous mountain road, which reveals 2,000ft below you a fluorescent turquoise lake, while towering rock pinnacles lie jagged and broken a 1,000ft above you.

I’m out of breath just describing it.

Now, it’s fair to say that if we saw the same sight over and over again, we might become a little blasé about it. For example, I worked in central London for nearly a decade before coming to Spain and every day I would see the famous Tower Bridge and the Tower of London on my way to and from work. Wonderful sights. Incredible to look at. But after the twentieth time of looking at them as I crossed over the river in a double decker bus, I just didn’t bother any more. You know what I mean?

I can imagine Sherpas born and brought up within in the shadow of Mount Everest saying to an awe-struck mountaineering tourist seeing it for the first time: “Oh yeah, that thing. Done it already thanks.”

I bet even Kublai Khan, on seeing Xanadu for the twentieth time, probably said: “I’ve seen better if I’m honest. Don’t like the trees very much. They’re a bit too pointy.”

Now, for me, this has become true with some parts of Scotland. Don’t get me wrong. It’s an incredibly beautiful country – if you miss out most of Glasgow that is – but I can quite happily drive past whole swathes of it and not feel the need to gaze out in wonderment.

And so, this week, as we drove along this road through the sierra, I did worry for the briefest of seconds that it might all get a bit humdrum the next few times we drove that way, especially as we live not far away.

But then I slapped myself hard in the face. Metaphorically, of course. Take your eyes off the road for a few seconds and you’re liable to career off, through the concrete bollards and plunge thousands of feet to a fiery grave, all the while thinking to yourself what an incredibly beautiful place to have such a violent death.

Frankly, there is no way, no way, I could ever get bored of this sight.

I’m sorry Scotland. I really am. I think you’re great (well, maybe not Glasgow so much). But it’s over. We’ve grown apart these last few years, haven’t we? You’ve got your own friends now and I’ve got mine. We don’t do things together like we used to. Look, it’s me, it’s not you. Honestly. I’ve just moved on. I know it’ll be difficult at first. But you’ll find someone new. I know you will.

And as for Croydon. Well, it’s got a nice shopping street and some good pubs and a few parks. But it doesn’t have much in the way of rocky pinnacles, mountain passes and turquoise lakes. I like it. I do. But here I turn back to my original analogy.

Imagine Croydon’s sweeping vistas were a mobile phone and the views from the mountain roads in the sierra were the world’s most massive microwave oven.

I´m quite getting to like this country.