461 roundabouts

and countless speedbumbs later I am in Almeria, or to be more precise, on a campsite 20 miles west of Almeria called Mare Azul. According to the description in my campguide it’s a well equiped campsite with a good restaurant and reviewers are complaining about the surroundings: nothing but plastic. Even on the beach plastic remains are washed up on the shores. The water remains Azul though.

So, that is exactly why I am here, these plastic greenhouses, shattered like broken ice on the landscape. Up on the hillsides, some 15 miles to the north they are hidden in the mountains resembling eternal snow, embedded in the shape of the slope. Down here their shapes are rather geometrical even though in a wider view you can see shapes bended and curved along the sides. Plastic can be stretched.
Most of them are built with wooden poles and iron wires, strong enough for men to walk on the surface, and sprypainted white in this time of the season. The light inside is a diffusive bright white, feeding crops like bellpeppers, cucumbers, tomatoes and courgettes
There is not much space wasted: they are built directly against each other only leaving space for a small concrete water drainage. It’s like a giant tangram puzzle, not leading to a figure but just filling up space.

These greenhouses are all connected by dirtroads, wide enough for the small vans used for distribution. And just wide enough for me to be walked with my kiteline hovering above the edges of the plastic walls.

I will be here for an other week or so, after which I am sure I can’t see plastic anymore (and breath the smell of pesticides)