Algameca Chica

S'funny. We've lived in Cartagena over a year now but still there are parts of the city completely hidden to us.

Over the summer, in Murcia, we saw a photo exhibition that featured some snaps from a barrio called Algameca Chica in Cartagena, a district that isn't on the maps. We asked in the tourist info office where it was. "Run along the back of the naval dockyards and just before the military checkpoint take the dirt road - and there it is." New territory to us.

Maggie seemed to think we may be robbed at any moment. I was re-assured that the tourist people hadn't warned us off. In fact the only things that anyone said to us as we wandered around, me with an expensive looking camera in hand, were "Hello" or "Nice day" or some such.

Strange place, houses built out of old planks and second hand looking building materials next to a little inlet on the coast. There seemed, from a hand written notice, to be some sort of internal organisation developed on a co-operative basis, a way of sharing the costs for electric and the water that was stored in big blue drums on the rooves of most of the houses. It may be a place where poor people live and some places definitely were full time dwellings but I suspect that for the majority it's more the equivalent of having an allotment in the UK. Somewhere to get away from it, in this instance to mess around in boats, to swim or do a bit of fishing.