Dog Writes Sunny Spanish Walking Guide

What with all those budget airlines flying to Malaga in southern Spain, there's never been a better time to bog off to pastures warmer over the grey British winter, etc, blah de blah...

So it's a bit of a stroke of luck that the folks over at Discovery Walking Guides have a brand new guide book to Malaga's nearest mountain area, the Alpujarras, due out in March 2003. The book's called '34 Alpujarras Walks' and takes in some of the peaks of the Sierra Nevada as well. It goes with Discovery's 1:40,000 Tour and Trail Map of the area which is in the process of being updated and will be released at the same time as the book on durable, waterproof material.

The region lies on the Mediterranean coast between Granada - top culture and history - and the sea and while it's uncomfortably hot in high summer, the weather's generally spot-on for the rest of the year. Even better it's only around an hour's drive from Malaga where you can hire a car for around 100 Euros a week all in. Not bad huh?

Rather fetchingly the guide has been compiled by new Discovery author Charles Davis, who was accompanied during his research by his giant-size old English sheepdog Bati and somewhat more usefully, a GPS unit. The latter is a precursor to a new GPS navigation service that the company is planning to introduce next year.

Downloadable GPS tracks and waypoints mean that GPS users will be able to track the routes in the books exactly as the original author walked them. Oh, finally, if you're also a mountain biker, the guide includes five pistas specifically suitable for mountain bike touring. Nice.

For more information on Discovery, who also publish a range of guides to other warm weather walking destinations including the Balearic Islands, Canaries, Algarve and more see their web site.