Thursday, May 1, 2008

El Caminto del Rey - The King's Pathway

If running trails or ultras is not challenging enough for you, or if you are looking for a new adventure, perhaps a hike along the King’ Pathway in Malaga, Spain will interest you. I’m not a big fan of heights, nor do I have a death wish, so I will stick to trails myself. I did my best to get more details on the walkway's history, construction etc. but could only locate this entry in Wikipedia.

El Caminito del Rey (
English: The King's pathway) is a walkway or via ferrata, now fallen into disrepair, pinned along the steep walls of a narrow gorge in El Chorro, near Álora in Málaga, Spain. The name is often shortened to Camino del Rey.

History
In
1901 it was obvious that the workers of the Chorro Falls and Gaitanejo Falls needed a walkway to cross between the falls, to provide transport of materials, vigilance and maintenance of the channel. Construction of the walkway lasted four years. It was finished in 1905. In 1921 the king Alfonso XIII had to cross the walkway for the inauguration of the dam Conde del Guadalhorce, and it became known by its present name.

In some places the walkway has collapsed
The walkway has now gone many years without maintenance, and is in a highly deteriorated and dangerous state. It is one meter (3 ft) in width, and is over 700 feet (200 m) above the river. Nearly all of the path has no handrail. Some parts of the walkway have completely collapsed and have been replaced by a beam and a metallic wire on the wall. Many people have lost their lives on the walkway in recent years. After four people died in two accidents in
1999 and 2000, the local government closed the entrances. However, adventurous tourists still find their way into the walkway.

Watch the video and let me know if you would like to do a “trail” run there!

1 comment:

  1. Damn! I'm not afraid of heights, but I can't say I'm a fan of dying. No thanks! I don't trust man-made things such as this path.

    ReplyDelete

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