Around 50 km from Granada city and the first town you come to in the Western Alpujarras, Lanjarón is considered the gateway to the region.

Lanjarón is famous for its mineral water which is sold throughout Spain, and it have been celebrated for centuries for their curative properties and are considered to be some of the best in the country, as today is still renowned at the town′s Balneario where you can indulge in a whole range of treatments, thus while the Balneario is open from March to December, Lanjarón is always full of mainly elderly visitors who come from all over Spain to take the waters.

Overlooking the town is a rocky outcrop capped by a ruined castle; legend has it that the Moorish ruler of Lanjarón threw himself from the castle tower, rather than surrender, when he realised  that the Christian army, led by the Catholic King Fernando, was going to be victorious.

The Castillo of Lanjaron Only its ruins remain over a rocky promontory near to the town, with about 600 meters of altitude its location was superb, because it dominated, on one hand, the access road to the Alpujarra and, on the other, the one that communicated Granada with the Coast; the castle was surrounded by a wall defended by two great towers of rubblework, one to the north, semi-circular, and another one to the south.

Fernando the Catholic King conquered the town in 1490.

Its Moorish inhabitants rebelled again in 1500, a revolt that was controlled by the Christians after an epic defence; as introduced before, tradition tale says that captain who defended the place preferred to throw himself from a tower before surrender.

It participated in an active way against the Napoleonic troops in the Independence War, its inhabitants receiving the qualifying name of “canoneros” since then.

Fertile terraced land sourrounding descending to the river, and set in a stunning location.

It is a very historic site with ancient pathways and terraces, and therefore represents a wonderful chance to experience nature and how life used to be, with numerous fruit trees, including olive, lemon orange, as well as grape vines, hardwood and softwood trees.

My paintings does not really deviate very much from the original scene retieved from Davi Bellamy’s Watercolour landscape portait and picture, ‘though I have changed in the atmosphere a little.

Detail in the castle itself has been considerably reduced, and aerial perpsective, which is the focus of my painting and my study in this time, has been achieved by making the mountain ridges progressively stronger in tone as they come closer to the viewer; I also added some little details, as flower red, purple and blue and some vegetation.

My intent here, as in other paintings of this time, is to reach a good technique of simplify and rearrange natural scenery, such good enought to get the right skills necessary for en plain air sketch and paintings set, which I’m going to paint whenever I travel and meet with some interesting view.

In truth, my aim is here to get the skills necessary to gather some paints and sketches when I’ll be back in Lijiang and Beijing, next summer of 2009…