Cueva del Gato: a dip in nature's paradise is never that simple

Some people see it very clearly. "The holes at the top would be the eyes and the rest would be the mouth," they say. No cats' whiskers or ears. With a little imagination it could be said that the Cueva del Gato (Cat Cave) owes its name to its resemblance to the head of this animal.

Throughout the year it is a much sought-after place to take a photo on your mobile phone to share on social media. It is not often that you see a large cave that pours water with force, forming a generous pool of crystal clear waters. All this before it feeds into the Guadiaro river. A spectacle for the eyes but also for the ears, because the sound of birds, the water and even the trains that pass daily almost above it form part of the soundtrack to the Cueva del Gato in the municipal borders of the village of Benaoján.

Things, however, change up a few gears in summer. Many freshwater swimmers come here. Many of them are brave souls and, knowing what it is like to swim there, they come to repeat the experience. Others come, drawn by the photographs they have seen online. Photos, however, even to this day are not able to convey how low the water temperatures can be in this bathing pool known as the 'Charco Frío' (literally cold pool).

The name is certainly not misleading. It clearly prepares you to be aware that these waters are particularly cold. Bear in mind that these waters spring forth from being a long time underground in the cold and the dark, so it does not matter how much the sun warms the surrounding trees, this is not a suitable swimming spot for the thin-blooded among us.

There are always those who, despite the evidence, dare to go in. Some do it out of conviction. They say that the cold is good for the skin, but perhaps not so good for the rest of the body. It is rare to see someone fully immerse themselves and stay in for more than half a minute.

The most repeated image is that of those who wade in only up to the waist. There they wait for a truly epic photograph. At least the waters are as cold as they are crystal clear.

People come to the entrance of this cave from many places, not only from the province of Malaga but also from the rest of Andalucía. Foreign accents are also frequently heard. Some come from countries where the temperature of Charco Frío should not be a problem. Yet it remains a problem because of the thermal shock. If the cicada's never-ending buzzing can be heard only a few metres away, the difference in degrees is enough to make you catch your breath. You can't tell where anyone is from - except when the odd swear word escapes from someone's lips - because the rest are quite international, monosyllabic exclamations.

Around the Charco Frío, towels and T-shirts are laid out for those who want more than just a swim. Although the sun is strong there is almost always plenty of shade, except for a few hours around midday. There is even a natural rocky shelter where it is possible to take refuge from the heat. This is what many have done over the centuries, from the first settlers to some unthinking person who decided to spend the night and thought it was possible to make a fire there. Those were different times. Common sense was lost and it became an absurdity.

Today access to this natural monument is more regulated. A few years ago visitors were charged just one euro to access the bridge that crosses the Guadiaro river to reach the Cueva del Gato, and now there is a charge for vehicles to park. You can only park right next to the road, in a small space that on summer weekends becomes a lot smaller.

No one should think of going down the track that takes you nearer to the cave unless you are staying or eating at the Eco Hotel Cueva del Gato, owned by the affable chef Miguel Herrera, who not long ago fed the King of Spain himself at a private lunch.

In order to park there, you have to pass a barrier that only opens if you feed it a euro coin. It seems a trivial matter but, if you don't have cash with you, then you have to go round the corner to get change from the nearest business. Others ask for change from someone who has just parked. They even use Bizum to pay these strangers to get the coveted euro.

Once the parking issue has been resolved, the only thing left to do is to go down a lane some 300 metres to reach the bridge over the river. The current bridge has so far stood the test of recent storms. Its predecessors suffered a worse fate. The fury of the storms meant that the Guadiaro swallowed them up in no time at all, after weeks or even months of work. As a goatherd from Rincón de la Victoria said two decades ago, "sometimes the river comes down with the deeds of ownership under its arm."