Things to do in Nijar, Andalucia: The Best Nature & Parks

Reviewed By christinem883 - Velez Blanco, Spain

We live an hour and a half away from here, but make the journey regularly. It is mainly a specialist seller of succulents and cacti, plus other xeric type plants and trees. However they also show beautiful avant garde stone statues you won’t find anywhere else. There is a lot of land here, and it has been sectioned off into different types of styles of landscapes. There’s an area to meander through ancient olive trees that are stupendously planted at least 60 cm’s higher than the path we walk on, in dappled shade. Fascinating idea. Plus another area has various water pools fashioned from concrete, and so on. The wonderful sample plantings of agaves, aeoniums, a. Haworthii’s, etc etc are all sensitively placed and without fail get me spending in order to take home the latest plants I’ve fallen in love with. They have a good selection of pots, too and if you need a particular plant potted up in a new pot, they will do it for you, using the correct porous medium. The last time we visited we were walking quietly across the land, looking down into the cañada before us when three baby ibex (a type of goat) walked out in front of us followed by four adults. They look more like deer than goats, I’ve always thought. Beautiful things. They were aware of us but kept walking or trotting slowly, climbing up the rocks and inclines until they disappeared some few minutes later, quite unconcerned. Wonderful! What a spot to go searching for plants, as well as commune with nature. I bought a desert cactus (huge thing, so pleased with it) and several large pots, plus various big succulent specimens to further widen my collection. The guys here are very knowledgable and full of information about their plants and care so it’s a pleasure to chat to lovely people and gain practical help at the same time. We’ve been to a few music gigs here, too. Great layout, different types of music and food too. Ask to go on their mailing list and you’ll then receive emails to find out when their music events are. Forget how much it is, but it’s super-cheap. If you’re interested in Mediterranean gardening, do go along and have a good look around. I read a good review on it in the Financial Times a while ago so google for that to find out their London gardening journalist’s viewpoint, too. Enjoy!