We left the Ituerto Valley and headed east to the Cidacos Valley in search of its famous dinosaur footprint sites.
Get ready to see dinosaurs dotted all over the landscape soon....
This is the little town of Enciso, where we were staying. It's at the end of this long, narrow country road.
We stayed at Casa Tahona and were very impressed. It was the cheapest place we stayed at, and the best by far. Great breakfast, lovely hospitable owners, private swimming pool and comfy room :)
The lads felt at home straight away, playing with the dinosaurs in the communal room and learning about fossils.
Then we looked around the village of Enciso and its main attraction:
The Paleontology Museum :)
With their tiny plastic dinosaur souvenirs from the gift shop, Liam and Malachy were feeling fierce!
So to tame the beasts, we sought out a good local eatery... and this is what we found: La Casona del Dinosaurio!
The chef there is from Bilbao! Yummy food at good prices. We even went back there again the next day.
And, needless to say, more dinosaur souvenirs were accumulated.
We couldn't wait any longer... we needed some real dinosaur action! So, we headed to one of the sites on the Ruta del Cidacos to check out the footprints...
Yes, those dents in the ground are real dinosaur footprints!
Millions and millions of years ago, when dinosaurs roamed the earth... and La Rioja..., sometimes they would inadvertently trod on mud... sometimes the mud would harden quickly, leaving the footprints intact... sometimes other sediments would be swept on top of the mud and underneath the mud would harden and fossilise.... sometimes over millions of years, layers and layers of sediment would come to rest on this same spot.... and sometimes -just sometimes- millions of years later a seismic movement would occur, shifting the land, reopening the layers and revealing the ancient footprints once again!!
We all found this quite extraordinary. The scene with these two dinosaur models here re-enacts an ambush thought to have taken place between a herbivore and a carnivore all those millenniums ago.
Investigating the site.
Rrrroar!
The valley landscape is dotted all over with three-toed carnivores like this guy...
...and two-toed herbivores like these.
Our budding archeologist.
Making friends with the big guys.
As good a place as any to play :)
An entire family :)
Bringing us straight back to the present day, we came across these harmless herbivores on our way home :)
Back to Enciso...
More views of this quaint little village on a hill.
This is Cornago. We went to visit this beautiful castle there.
Trees are for shade :)
The views are amazing...
...driving along, it was impossible not to snap away incessantly.
We stopped off at one other site in Garranzo (driving on these dirt roads at our own peril!) and were delighted to find a great adventure playground with lots of dinosaur games and fun.
And your classical swings and slides too, of course.
And even this funny photo op thingy... :P
Back at Casa Tahona, we were winding down (yes, it's ok to be this dirty at the end of a long summer day).
And what nicer way to end the day than a dip in the pool?
Ah, the summer holidays....!
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